Did you get a deer this year? If no, sorry, no venison steaks for you this year.  Fortunately, cottontail and snowshoe hare hunting seasons don’t close until February 27.  If you can’t dine on venison how about a delicious meal of wild rabbit fricassee.  There are a couple of good recipes on the internet.

If you are fortunate to own a beagle or two, they have probably been patiently waiting for deer season to end so that they can get out and do their thing. The late Lambert “Mickey” McGinty of Dalton, when he was president of the Berkshire Beagle Club, once commented that although he loved listening to Johann Strauss’ Radetzky March, he would much rather listen to the sound of a beagle running a rabbit.  Now, that’s music to the ears of a rabbit hunter.  If you don’t own a beagle, see if you can go rabbit hunting with someone who does.  You might be in for a thrill.

Hey, it’s still too early to ice fish.  You are not going to hang around the house, are you?

While we are on the subject of rabbits and hares, please know that the NY Department of Environmental Conservation has issued the following warning about Rabbit Hemorrhagic Disease:

“Rabbit Hemorrhagic Disease (RHD) is a fatal virus that affects rabbits and hares. A new strain, RHDV2, was identified in 2010 and recently, jumped to wild rabbits and hares in the southwestern U.S., where it spread to six states within four months. The virus can infect wild rabbits and hares, in addition to domestic rabbits. RHDV2 is extremely hardy, easily transmitted, and highly lethal to rabbits and hares. It does not infect humans or other animals like dogs or cats. RHDV2 spreads easily through direct contact between rabbits or contact with contaminated environments or objects.

The most likely potential routes of introduction are through transported domestic rabbits, internationally imported rabbit products, or people who travel to outbreak areas in the southwest. Here are some ways you can help stop its spread:

• If you are a hiker, camper, or traveler, and you have been to known RHDV2 outbreak areas (CA, NV, UT, CO, TX, AZ and Mexico), disinfect footwear with a 10 percent bleach solution (1 part household bleach, 9 parts water) before going afield here or in surrounding states.
• If you keep domestic rabbits, prevent them from intermingling with other rabbits. If you get new rabbits, quarantine them for two weeks and use separate equipment and clothing to care for them.
• If you are a wildlife rehabilitator who cares for wild rabbits, do not keep domestic rabbits as pets or have contact with domestic rabbits; maintain good disinfection techniques; and change PPE between rabbit litters or individual rabbits.
• If you are a rabbit or hare hunter, avoid contact with domestic rabbits, and do not bring rabbit carcasses killed in other states to New York (or Massachusetts).
• Report any unusual wild rabbit mortalities you encounter to the DEC Wildlife Health Unit at (518) 478-2203 (or MassWildlife).

Read the RHDV2 factsheet  (Rabbit Hemorrhagic Disease – Help Prevent this Threat to New York’s Rabbits & Hares (ny.gov) to learn more about how it spreads, ways to prevent it, and what you can do to help.

Lefty Kreh’s legacy

The American Museum of Fly Fishing, located in Manchester, VT next to the Orvis store has recently announced that its film, Time, made the rounds on the 2020 Fly Fishing Film Tour and is now available to watch for free online.  It is an exploration of Lefty Kreh’s legacy among some of the sport’s greatest living legends as they explore the backwaters of inland Florida – one of Lefty’s favorite fishing areas – and discuss how Lefty’s presence influenced their own trajectories in a life of fly fishing.  Click onto https://amff.org to see the film.

I doubt there is a fly fisherman who hasn’t heard of Lefty.  He was an expert fly fisherman, accomplished photographer, fly casting instructor and an active outdoor writer for more than forty-five years writing for most of the major outdoor magazines. He wrote about 30 flyfishing related books and received many prestigious awards.

During World War II, Lefty served in the Battle of The Bulge and was one of the men who helped take down a bridge from the Germans. After serving in the war, Kreh was one of three US servicemen infected with anthrax, and the only one to survive. The strain he was infected with was named BVK-I.  Interestingly, later in life he was part of the TFO Rod Company and played a key role in the creation of several rods, including the Lefty Kreh series and BVK series (named after the anthrax).   He created the Lefty’s Deceiver, a famous salt water streamer fly.  Kreh passed away on March 14, 2018 at the age of 93.

It was an awful year

Thank God the nightmare year of 2020 is over. A nightmare that featured severe floods, fires, tens of millions of people infected by a pandemic with hundreds of thousands of deaths, massive unemployment resulting in uncounted home evictions and systemic racism.    Hunger was rampant in our country with long lines of people showing up at food banks.   People were shot before our very eyes on nightly TV. You couldn’t hold or be with your loved ones during their last living moments.  Add to that a deadlocked Legislature and an uncaring Executive branch.   Nero fiddled while Rome burned, our emperor played golf during the pandemic.

Attempts were made to overthrow our elections and people who dared to speak the truth were fired and or threatened.  The very tools of our democracy were used to try to destroy our democracy.  We now are subject to dangerous cyberattacks from our adversaries.  Our beloved country and its democracy were like the proverbial snowball rolling for hell, with no way, not impeachment nor 81 million votes being able to stop it.  We came dangerously close to losing our democracy. One couldn’t open Facebook or other social media without encountering vitriolic messages.  I have never seen our country so divided, and I was around in the turbulent 1960’s.

Thank God the US Supreme Court, various State and Federal judicial bodies and the rule of law prevailed.  I truly believe they played an important role in saving our democracy.  Historians will have a field day writing about 2020 and some, I suspect, will not tell it like it was.  It is important that parents remind their children of what they have seen with their own eyes and that they should pass such knowledge on to their children.  In a 1948 speech to the British House of Commons, Winston Churchill paraphrased the Spanish philosopher George Santayana when he said, “Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.”  Let’s hope we have learned.

Yet, some exceptionally good things did happen in 2020 that should not be overlooked.  The dedication and self-sacrifice of our health care workers, doctors, first responders and others who risked their lives in order to fight disasters and care for those inflicted with the virus.  The warp speed development of vaccines to fight the virus by the pharmaceutical industry and the many acts of kindness and selflessness of people that we saw almost every night on the TV news.  Oh yes, some people were treated very nicely by the stock market.

Another good thing that perhaps went unnoticed was the mass movement of people to enjoy outdoor recreation.  Mother Nature can’t cure all of our ills, but she can ease the pain. 

Unfortunately, some of the nightmare will extend into 2021.  We will still have Covid-19 with its resulting sickness and death, will still have fires and floods and our adversaries will still try to bring us down. We will probably still have gridlock in Congress and there will still be vitriol.  

Let’s hope we can exercise civility and respect for one another, talk and listen to one another, become united again, love one another again and strive to become an even better country than before.  Let us also resolve to spend more time next year with Mother Nature in our beautiful woods and waters.  And, oh yes, let us ask for guidance from above.

Happy New Year and stay safe!