When I was a lil boy living in Opelika, ALABAMA there were many places ta fish. All over the world there are many places ta fish, but that is neither here nor there. ALABAMA has some of the best fishing in the world, and has more of a variety of fresh water fish. Anyways I took my lil sis and lil bro out to this large pond deep in the woods behind this raggedy barn, down the street from our house. I never knew quite how I found this pond. I tripped over it one day while runnin' barefoot in the forest. The pond was filled with all kinds of Southern RedBelly Dace, Watercress Darters, Bluegills, Alligator Gars, and my favorite fish of all the CAT FISH. YumYum
So me my, sis, and my bro pack up a small lunch of bologna sandwiches and a few sodas, grabbed our anglers and fishing net, and set out to walk a mile or so in the woods ta fish. I always led the expeditions 1: because I was their big brother. 2: I'm not afraid of anything physical not even snakes. The first snake I ever killed was a rattlesnake when I was 5, but that's another story.
So we got to the spot and cast out our lines. We started off with bobbers and night crawlers, mainly because we didn't have to keep reeling in the line and that gave us time to run around and scope out the area with play. My lil brother kept an eye out setting on a rock and eating a bag of chips, while my sis played near some rocks by a spring and I ran up the tallest tree I could find. I sat up on my perch overlooking the pond and could see the shadows of the Alligator Gars and the turtles trying to stay away from them. Off in the distance I could see and hear a Yellow Hammer pecking its way deep into a tree to make a home. My sis was amazed by the colors of the Sotheren RedBelly Dace and even though she could have just dropped our net in and scooped them up she was afraid they might cast a spell on her, for such a dastardly UN sportsman like deed.
An hour or so went by and not a nibble on our lines, so we decided to reel in our lines and get ready for lunch. Our food was over by an old rotted picnic table and as I approach bees started swarming around me. My brother laughed sayin',"Yeah I was meaning to tell you but those bees have been flying around our lunch for a while. I was gonna move it but I didn't want ta get stung." (Good thing he didn't. Many years later we found out the hard way he was deathly allergic ta bees and all their variations. My lil bro didn’t die, but came damn close.)
I grabbed our paper bagged lunch and ran back to the rock where we were setting at. By then my sis and bro wanted nothing to do with the sandwiches and only wanted the sodas. I passed the sodas out and threw the sandwiches back onto the picnic table. The sodas were warm from the sun, but they helped wet our whistles and put an extra kick in our step. The carbonation felt good on the tongue and bellies. As we drank and talked I kept a close eye on those bees, studying their habits. They wanted so bad to get into the plastic bags and tear at those bologna sandwiches. Tell this day I don’t know what was attracting them, all I can figure is maybe the nitrates used in processed meats.
My lil sis and bro were getting tired of catching nothing and being out in the sun for so long so we were gonna call it quits and head on home defeated. There’s one thing I hated in my heart and soul so much and that was giving up in defeated and quitting the task at hand. As soon as that sorrow touched my soul a violet hummingbird flew out of know?wheres and whispered something in my ear, winked, and then flew off as quickly as she appeared. What she whispered I am not at liberty ta say, but it gave me an idea.
While my sis and bro were untangling their lines I walked over to our sandwiches and unwrapped them from their Ziplocs. My sis and bro just stood there with the most absurd unknowing expression on their faces. I proceeded to pull the processed meat out from between the wheat bread and started smacking the bees out of the air with bologna. My siblings thought I was nuts. They were rolling on the ground laughing. I ended up killing most of the bees and stunning the rest. I quickly hooked the stunned ones on our anglers and casted them out into the waters. Without a doubt as soon as the bait was set a fish was snagged. We went all day without a nibble and now it was a feeding frenzy.
We left that day with about 7 good size fish, enough for each one in our family and two for our neighbors. I’m not gonna tell you the kind of fish we caught, but they sure was good eatin’.
A week later I caught the biggest BLUE CATFISH I had ever seen in my life, BUT that’s another STORY for another TIME at a different PLACE.
=P
P.S.: The best way to scale a fish is by running a silver spoon backwards across its scales. Its true. CAT FISH are a lil different, and I'm not gonna tell you why. Look it up. But did you know CAT FISH can shock you? YES SIR/MAM they can shock you, and I'm not gonna give you that reason either. :)
