The Old Home Place

Visiting memories of days gone by

By Tom Bryant

It was one of those rare, late fall days with the wind quartering out of the southeast. Too late to be called Indian summer, and yet the soft warm breeze had a semblance of days past when summer was holding on with a real purpose, not wanting to let fall have the upper hand. We Southerners take days like this as a blessing, knowing that right around the next bend a frosty wind will drop all the remaining tree leaves, with the exception of the live oaks, and winter will arrive in earnest.

I was sitting in the swing on the long rain porch of the old home place, and Mom was in her favorite rocker, wrapped in an afghan. We were talking about nothing much, just rambling about days gone by and plans for Christmas that was a short time away. Thanksgiving had recently been celebrated by our immediate family: my sister who lives with Mother; my other sister who had come up from Florida; my brother, who had built a small cottage right behind the big house; along with Linda, my bride; our son, Tommy; and me. It was a grand occasion, and Mom was recalling days past when everyone would descend on the farm to celebrate.

Mother’s 98th birthday was last April. She is the last surviving child of Austin and Hensalie Fore. There were eight children, and when the family got together with aunts, uncles, great aunts and great uncles, and numerous first cousins and twice-removed cousins, we had a passel of people.

Every now and then, Mother’s memory slips, but she can still recall holidays and long-gone relatives as if they were sitting on the porch with us.

“Tommy, you remember your daddy used to drive you down here a few days before Thanksgiving to hunt with your granddad. Your granddaddy loved that.”

“Those were great times, Mom. It seems as if it was just yesterday, but you know that was a long time ago.”

“It’s my old age, and my mind plays tricks, but I can still see you with that great big shotgun your dad gave you. The gun was bigger than you were. I used to worry, but he assured me that you could hold your own in the woods. And your uncle Tommy, I was just talking to him the other day, and he was asking if you were going to deer hunt with the club this year.”

“Mom, Uncle Tommy has been gone a long time now. You were just remembering funny.”

My uncle Tommy had passed away 10 years ago.

“See what I mean about my mind playing tricks?” She looked out across the fields in front of the old house. The crops had recently been harvested by the farming conglomerate that leased most of the farms in the area, and there was a tractor plowing under cornstalks. “Is that your granddad coming across the field?”

“No, Mom. He’s been gone a long time, too.”

She looked at me and smiled. “I think I’ll go in and lie down a bit. I’m feeling right tired.”

“OK, Mom. Let me help with your walker.” I pulled it out for her and helped her down the hall to her bedroom.

“Enjoy that weather on the porch, son. It’ll probably be frosty in the morning.” She sat on the side of her bed, and I pulled a blanket closer. “I love you, son. You be careful in those woods tomorrow.”

I went back out to the swing. The rest of the family was enjoying the side porch off the kitchen. I could hear them laughing. The tractor was still working, getting closer to the road in front of the house. Dogs barked somewhere across the back pasture. I sat in the old swing and remembered the special days Mother’s mind had been tricking her about.

I was 12 or maybe 13 and loved the time spent on the farm, squirrel hunting in the little swamp way back behind the west pasture.  It was my time. I had the best of both worlds. Pinebluff, where I lived, was an ideal place for a youngster who enjoyed the outdoors. I had a relatively new bicycle, a Christmas gift from the year before, a loyal companion in a black curly-coated retriever named Smut, and many friends of the same bent as I. On Granddad’s farm, I had him and uncles who let me roam in the woods with them, and they treated me with good humor, not like the kid I really was. Those were wonderful times.

An old ramshackle pickup truck rolled into the side yard amongst a blue cloud of burning oil. Ed Junior eased out of the driver’s side and looked up at me on the porch. “Hey, Tommy, I thought you’d be out there squirrel hunting.”

“I’m too full, Ed. Too much of Bonnie’s cooking.” My sister had cooked a ham and fixins for dinner and we had eaten our fill.

Ed Junior’s family has lived on the farm as long as I can remember. He and his folks were mostly tenant farmers, in other words they helped provide the labor for a crop; and my grandfather provided the seed, fertilizer, and land. Both parties shared equally in any profits that came along. They also suffered almost equally any crop disaster. My uncle Tommy bequeathed Ed and his family lifetime rights to 10 acres on his farm. Ed and I were the same age, almost to the day, and we grew up on the farm together. I ate many meals at Aunt Mary Greene’s table. She was Ed’s grandmother and ruled her house with an iron hand.

“I brought Miss Evelyn a mess o’ collards. Where you want me to put ‘em?”

“She’s resting right now, Ed. We’ll put them on the back porch.” I walked out to the pickup and helped Ed with two bushel baskets of greens. We toted them to the back porch steps and left them there.

“They gonna need washing,” Ed said. “I just picked them from the back garden.”

We walked back to the truck and sat on the tailgate.

“How’s the family?” I asked.

“They’s doing OK. The daughters are helping me at the store, and the boys are in the army.” Ed had started a little truck garden store on a side street in town where he sold the many vegetables he harvested from his extensive garden. My granddad always said that Ed could grow anything. All he had to do was stick it in the ground.

”How you been doing? Miss Evelyn talks about you a lot.”

“I’m just like you, Ed. A lot older and a little fatter.” I patted him on his rotund belly and we both laughed. We sat and talked and reminisced a little about coon and squirrel hunts we went on as youngsters.

“Yassa, a whole lot o’ water has flowed down Black Creek since them days, Tom. I best be going. It’s getting on up in the day and I got to close the store.” He shook my hand and then impulsively we hugged.

“You look after Mama,” I said as he hoisted himself in the truck. “And you and your family have a Merry Christmas.”

“You, too, Tom. I check in on Miss Evelyn about every week. She has good days and some not so good.” He fired up his old pickup and rattled off in a cloud of blue smoke.

I went back to the swing. The sun was heading to the tree line and there was a noticeable chill in the air. The tractor was nearing the last row in the field, getting ready to quit for the day.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Early to the Woods

First light in a Southern swamp

By Tom Bryant

I was just getting ready for, hopefully, a good night’s sleep. Granted, the evening was still young, but I was planning an early rendezvous with a brace of wood ducks right before sunrise. “I’m going to bed,” I said to Linda.

“It’s just 9 o’clock. What time are you getting up?”

“Four-thirty should give me enough time to get to the swamp right before shooting time. The truck’s loaded with all the gear, coffee pot’s ready to fire up first thing, sausage biscuits are wrapped and in the fridge. Not much else I can think of except creeping out of here without waking my cute little bride.”

Linda looked up from her latest issue of Southern Living. “You know I can’t sleep with you rattling around in the kitchen. I’ll get up and help you pack your lunch and send you on your way. And you be real careful in that swamp tomorrow. I hate for you to go off hunting before daylight all by yourself. What if you broke a leg or something? You aren’t a youngster anymore.”

“Babe, just how many years have I been doing this without breaking anything? I might not be as young as I was, but I’m a lot wiser. Remember what Gus McCray said in Lonesome Dove: ‘The older the violin, the sweeter the music.’”

“That quote has nothing at all to do with you wandering around a snake-infested swamp before sunrise. You know that,” she admonished. I headed down to the guest bedroom so I wouldn’t wake her during the night. In my excitement before a morning duck hunt, I usually toss and turn a lot.

With my hunting clothes laid out, I climbed in bed and read a little of Havilah Babcock’s classic book, My Health Is Better In November. I thought about the similarities of our lives, hunting and fishing in the South. He grew up in Virginia but lived and had most of his outdoor experiences in the low country of South Carolina. He was head of the English department at the University of South Carolina and was so popular that students had to sign up for his class a year ahead of time. There was one great difference in our experiences in the woods, though. He bird-hunted when quail, or partridges as the true old-time Southern hunter called them, were extremely plentiful. It was nothing in his day to jump 10 or 15 coveys. I, on the other hand, might raise one covey, or as of late, no birds at all.

I put Havilah’s book on the nightstand and clicked off the light, making a mental list about the gear needed for the next day’s hunt. Canoe loaded on top of the truck, paddles in the back, wood duck decoys in the decoy bag ready to go, shotgun and gunning bag beside the back door, hunting coat and waders ready to put in the back seat. I would put them on before I pushed off in the canoe.

The next day’s weather was going to be a bluebird day, a little crisp, but not too cold. I’ve found that wood ducks really aren’t that influenced by the weather, though. Usually, with them, it’s a morning event, over right after sunrise. A big yawn and stretch placed me in Lady Morpheus’ arms, and the next thing I knew, the little alarm clock beside the bed was ringing me awake.As promised, Linda met me in the kitchen and had already fired up the coffee maker. In short order, the thermos was loaded with fresh hot coffee, my travel mug was ready to ride, the biscuits were in my gunning bag, and I was eager to head to the swamp.

“You be careful,” Linda admonished again, and I quietly eased out the back door, cranked the old Bronco and was on my way. I’ve noticed lately that 5 o’clock in the morning is not as deserted as it used to be in Southern Pines. These days, there are a lot more troops on their way to work at Fort Bragg. As I got farther out in the county, though, traffic became sparser, and I soon rolled up to the locked gate at the entrance of the farm I lease for hunting. There was still plenty of time before daybreak to drive to the tree line where I could drag the canoe to the beaver pond nestled in a low cut in the swamp.

My canoe is a camouflaged Old Town boat perfect for hunting and fishing out-of-the-way locations. And best of all, it’s lightweight enough to let me hoist her on top of the Bronco without pulling a muscle or tearing a rotator cuff. A nearly full moon reflected enough light to help me navigate through thick alders and briars as I dragged the boat to my launching point. In almost no time, I had the canoe loaded, and I cast off into the darkness.

A swamp at night can be a forbidding place; but fortunately, I had spent enough time walking the perimeter of the banks of the beaver pond to get the lay of the land, and moonlight helped me paddle to the spot where I wanted to hunt and hunker down to wait for sunrise.

With the decoys set out, I draped an old brown tarp over the bow of the canoe and sat on the floor of the boat to present a smaller profile. I was right next to a giant cypress and used one of the paddles to wedge the boat in as close as I could. All in all, it was a pretty good set. Watching the world come alive on a late fall morning is one of the things that keeps me coming early to the woods as many times as I have. It’s a wondrous thing. All the cares of the day before are a thing of the past as the grayness of dawn begins to cast shadows and the sun begins to rise over the pines. I’ve seen hundreds of sunrises and you would think that they would all be alike, but it’s not that way. I believe that each one is like the day itself, always the same but forever different. It heralds a new opportunity, a new beginning. I checked my watch; another 10 minutes and it would be legal shooting time, and in the distance, down toward the creek, I could hear the hawk-like screech of a wood duck on the move. The sun was just peeking through the underbrush. It was going to be a great new day. PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Sporting Life

A Parade of Summer Memories

Recognizing a near-perfect dove hunt and a trip down memory lane

By Tom Bryant

The storehouse of our memories is like an unused room in which we lay aside the odds and ends of many treasured things.  — Roland Clark, Gunner’s Dawn

Opening day of dove season was a week away and I was up in the “Roost,” our little garage apartment where I do my writing and keep out of the way of Linda, my bride. I was sorting through gear in preparation of the coming season and putting up a plethora of fishing paraphernalia from our last adventure. In late August it’s usually too hot to fish — witness a trip to Huntington Beach from which we’d just returned. It had been a smoker, in the high 90s most days with a heat index, as the Weather Channel people like to say, in the triple digits. Anyhow, it had been too hot to do much of anything except hang out in the air-conditioned little Airstream, read, and nap. We would venture out in the evening for a walk on the beach, and we did make a couple of trips down to Georgetown for lunch to eat grouper sandwiches at The Big Tuna, one of our favorite hole-in-the-wall restaurants.  I had made a start on cleaning up the “Stream” but still had a way to go. The air conditioner had given us a small problem on this last day of this trip. It refused to cycle from cold to fan, but I had hopes that it was caused from constant use and was nothing too troubling or expensive to fix. I was thinking about all of this as I wiped down my favorite dove gun, a sweet little 28-gauge Remington 870. I love her in the field because she’s light and easy to handle. Oh well, I thought, I’ll finish my cleaning chore tomorrow. Right now, it’s all about dove hunting.

I’ve been in the woods every opening day for as far back as I can remember and have memories of hunts, good and bad, from those many years. In the far corner of the roost was another of my bird guns and the one with which I’ve had the most success. It’s a Browning 16-gauge over and under, a Christmas present from Linda. I put the 870 aside and broke the Browning down for cleaning. “Hey there, babe, you remember that first hunt when you showed me what you could do?” I’ve started talking to inanimate objects and myself as I’ve grown older. Linda often admonishes me about it and says she hopes I don’t do it in public. “Only when standing in line at Walmart,” I reply. I’ll not forget the first time I hunted with the 16-gauge. Edwin Clapp, the squire of Siler City (the moniker several of his friends and fellow hunters gave him), called me late one evening after Christmas. The conversation went something like this: “Hey Bryant, get your stuff ready and be at my house in the morning at 10 o’clock. I’ve got a dove field that’s eat up with winter birds. The regular crowd will be here. Oh, bring plenty o’ shells. I remember the last shoot you had up here.” As you can tell, I get little respect from my good hunting buddies.

The next afternoon found me, along with my little yellow Lab, Paddle, stationed beside a giant dead oak tree bordering a blown-down cornfield, the victim of a late storm that blew in off the Atlantic and laid waste to the farmer’s fall harvest effort. The corn was flattened on the ground so badly there was no way it could be gathered. Bad luck for the farmer but great luck for us as we locked and loaded and waited on the dove flocks that Edwin promised were sure to come. And come they did. I made a double with my first shots from the Browning. I looked down at the brand new gun and said to her, “Looks like we’re really going to get along.” Paddle came back with the first bird, and I sent her after the second that had fallen behind the dead oak. She loped back with it, and I could see her almost smiling as if to say, “Hey boss, this is gonna be a good day.”

And a good day it was. In short order, I had a limit of doves with only one miss. In all my recollections, it was the best day of dove shooting I’ve had. On the way out of the field, even Edwin said, “Good shooting, Bryant. Let me see that gun.” Good memories. I put the Browning aside and sorted random shells that I keep in an old military ammo box. I bought the box at an army surplus store on one of our many forays to the beach. The store was at an out of the way little town somewhere Down East, I honestly can’t remember where, but it reminded me of our last return trip from Huntington.

In the first place, I try to avoid traveling to or from the beach on a Saturday. This is the day the coastal resorts turn over; everybody who is at the beach vacationing for a week returns home, and those going to the beach for a week make the trip. Our air conditioning problem forced us to leave a day early, so we were caught in the Saturday transition. We resigned ourselves to grin and bear the traffic, and as my mom always says, take the bad with the good, which is what we did until we reached the picturesque little town of Fair Bluff.  Fair Bluff rests on the banks of the Lumber River, and the farming community is known in that part of North Carolina for its giant watermelons in the summer and sweet potatoes in the fall. As we approached the turn that would take us down Main Street and then our route home, a deputy sheriff had the main road blocked and directed us to a small, one-lane street that was parallel to, but not near, our regular route. In the process of following the officer’s direction, we met oncoming traffic that forced us to turn right. This turn put us at the end of the area’s Watermelon Festival parade which we joined much to Linda’s consternation. “We’re in the parade,” she said, slumping down in her seat. “Look, people are waving.”  There was a firetruck in front of us with red lights blazing and siren blaring. Towing the little Airstream, we fit right in with the festivities.

“There’s only one thing to do,” I replied. “Wave back,” which I did, not so much Linda. For some reason, she couldn’t get in the mood. I laughed all the way along the parade route until we soon reached the turn to the road we needed, and we bailed out of the parade and headed home. 

Finishing up with the shotguns, I put them in their cases, buttoned up the ammo box and temporarily stored everything in a corner.

I thought back to our recent beach trip, and the quote from Roland Clark. This summer I was successful in making a couple more memories for the storehouse.  “A nice way to end our last beach trip,” I said, talking to myself again. “They threw us a parade.”

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Golftown Journal

Random Walks

The pleasures of carrying the load

By Lee Pace

Perhaps it was prophetic that the very month I signed a deal with UNC Press to write a book about the joy of playing golf by foot and foot alone I was presented by the golf gods, neatly wrapped with a ribbon and bow and sweat band, a case study illustrating my renegade approach to the game.

We teed off at 8 a.m. on July 22 at Finley Golf Course in Chapel Hill, me walking with my bag slung over my shoulder along with three riders. Did I feel antisocial by leaving a single in a cart? Certainly not, as why should I accede to his preference of riding in lieu of my own desire to walk? I did tell him, incidentally, I’d help with the cart if he got stuck in a jam.

My two primary goals every time I peg it up are to get some exercise and break 80. Studying the golf course and reveling in nature come next. Enjoying the companionship of my playing partners is important as well — all the better if that’s split three ways while walking along rather than spending four hours-plus with one guy in a cart. Betting? Lame jokes? Pounding beverages? Way down or even off the scales.

One of golf’s earliest appeals was its health-giving benefits, the player walking some four miles over varied terrain with his strength and endurance key elements of the sport. Too often today that component has been lost, with many golfers playing in a default mode of mandatory riding in motorized carts.

“Such uninterrupted exercise, cooperating with the keen air from the sea, must, without all doubt, keep the appetite on edge, and steel the constitution against all the common attacks of distemper,” Tobias Smollett wrote in a 1771 novel of the golf experience in the Scottish town of Leith.

So I knew on this day with the temperature at 76 degrees when we teed off and forecasts for highs in the upper 90s that breaking 80 would be a challenge indeed. Beating the golf course and beating myself were all that mattered. Yet I’d played two weeks earlier, same morning tee time, nearly but not quite as hot, and shot 80. My game was coming into mid-summer form as it always does and, if I’d just make a full turn in good posture and not get quick at the top, I felt I could shave a couple of shots and land in lucky-70s nirvana. I was heartened that day two weeks earlier by having clipped two shots off my front nine total on the back — indicating fatigue was not an issue.

“All I can say is — stay hydrated,” the starter counseled on the first tee.

I stood 5-over on the 13th tee, having slaked several bottles of water, a Powerade at the turn and seeking shade when convenient. Some of that shade I found to the left of the 17th fairway when we were looking for a wayward tee shot. I enjoy taking photos of my collection of lightweight, simplistic carry bags juxtaposed against interesting architectural features for social media posts, so I took a quick snap of my bag in the cool shadows (out in the sun it was 92 with a heat index reading of 105) and later posted it on Twitter.

“Surely you’re not walking,” responded one follower.

“I am amazed and aghast at the same time,” another wrote.

To me, it was just another day at the golf course. And it was with no small amount of satisfaction that I played the last five holes plus-1, penciled in a 78 and enjoyed my favorite hamburger afterward in recovery mode. (And look, I’m not stupid; I’m not saying I’d have walked and lugged if my tee time had been at 1 p.m. that day.)

To hell with Mark Twain, who supposedly once said, “Golf is a good walk spoiled.” Poppycock. To me and a passionate and resolute minority, “Carts are great golf ruined.”

“I’m pretty much a traditionalist. I feel walking is the way the game is meant to be played,” says Spartanburg’s Todd White, a top mid-amateur who played in the U.S. Amateur Four-Ball at Pinehurst in May. “There is so much to enjoy between shots if you’ll just take the time to do it. To me, a golf cart takes away quite a bit from that. In a cart, you rush to your ball to sit there and wait. If you’re walking, you can experience the environment.”

“Walking No. 2 in the evenings is such a peaceful experience,” says Pinehurst member Jason Richeson, a member of the club’s Executive Golf cadre that meets every Tuesday for twilight golf on No. 2. “There’s hardly anyone else out there; you’ve got the sun setting through the pines. It’s amazing. It’s almost a surreal atmosphere.”

Mike Harmon is the director of golf at Secession Golf Club in Beaufort, South Carolina, which opened in 1992 as a walking-only course (they have two golf carts for players with doctor-verified health conditions). The club has an excellent caddie program and will allow members to carry their bags late in the day. Harmon often goes out with a Sunday bag and nine clubs.

“Obviously walking is the healthy way to play,” he says. “I always play better walking, and I nearly always play just nine clubs just putzing around the club. You find out how well you’re swinging when you have nine clubs. You have an 8-iron shot but you’ve got to pick the 7 or 9. You have to figure that one out.”

I never begrudge others their preferred method of playing. As golf architect Tom Fazio notes, the invention and proliferation of the golf cart has been in large measure “very positive” for the game.

“I’m not sure we’d have had the growth in golf and as many people playing if not for the golf cart,” says Fazio, who’s designed and built five Sandhills area courses. “We have built courses in hilly terrain, in mountain areas that wouldn’t be accessible if not for the cart. I’d bet there are a couple thousand courses in America that would not be there if not for carts. On a grand scale, you’d have to put a plus for golf carts.”

Yet in the next breath, Fazio will admit to moving heaven and Earth to hide the visual pimples of paths on his golf courses, and that his No. 1 golf experience is playing Pine Valley Golf Club — where no carts are allowed. In other words, he’ll build what the market dictates.

The market, certainly, will be limited for my forthcoming book. The vision is some 200 pages, coffee-table format, the content built around stories of courses and clubs across the two Carolinas where the course is walkable and a healthy walking culture exists. It’s an acquired taste, as they say, but fortunately the astute numbers-crunchers at the venerable Chapel Hill publishing house are confident the readers and buyers are there.

Case in point is Jay Mickle, a Southern Pines farrier who grew up playing McCall Golf & Country Club in suburban Philadelphia in the 1960s. Carts were not part of the equation.

“Carts were high-society, resort stuff,” he says.

He moved to the Sandhills a decade ago and is a regular hoofing it about Pine Needles and Mid Pines — once walking 18 holes at Mid Pines as a twosome in one hour, 55 minutes — and relishes the late afternoons. One twilight we were walking from the tee on the 15th at Mid Pines, the setting sun at our backs and filtering through the trees to cast a golden patina on the furrows within the ancient fairways.

“It’s the magical time of day,” he says. “This is perfect.”

Mickle notes that many northern courses add an upcharge to ride, while it’s typical in the Carolinas to add it to the greens fee.

“People think, ‘I paid for it, I’m going to take it,’” he says. “Well, they can take it to their grave when their arteries are all clogged up.”

I might not get a better quote than that over the next two years, but I’m sure going to try.

Send Lee Pace an email at leepace7@gmail.com if you share his passion for walking golf and have a story to tell.

A Reunion of Memories

The beach brings them all back

By Tom Bryant

Over the last 10 years I’ve become somewhat of a specialist in setting up our little Airstream in preparation to camp. I don’t care how many times I’ve done it, I still have to refer to my mental checklist or I could leave out something important, and invariably, it will come back to bite me. It’s fun, though, and sometimes I remind myself of the dad in the holiday classic A Christmas Story, when he was timing himself while changing a tire on the old family Dodge. My record, from start to finish, including connecting to electric and water and lowering the stabilization jacks, is 20 minutes. I’ve yet to break that record, but every new campground offers me a new challenge.

On our last early summer trip to Huntington Beach State Park in South Carolina, I thought I’d broken the record, but Linda, my bride, reminded me that the awning wasn’t out, and in the summer, that’s part of the contest. So the 20-minute record still stands. We were camped on a site right across from a huge grassy field surrounded by live oaks. The sites along the edge of the field were filled to the brim with four large tow-behind campers surrounded by a bunch of kids who appeared to be from 6 to 12 years of age, all supervised by young parents. After I put the awning out, I grabbed a couple of folding chairs from the Cruiser and a cold drink from the fridge and kicked back to watch the doings right across the campground road.

They were having fun. The kids were running from here to yonder, riding bikes, pulling wagons and, in general, having a great time. I called to Linda, who was still inside sorting stuff that we had let ride on the bed coming down from Southern Pines. “Hey, Babe, come on out here and watch this. See what it reminds you of.”

Linda made herself some lemonade and joined me under the awning. “Wow, look at all those kids,” she exclaimed.

“I tried to count them, but the way they’re moving, it’s like trying to count new puppies in a box. What does it remind you of?”

“When we were young and used to rendezvous at the beach with your family.”

I agreed, and we watched for a while as the adults restored some order, and they all packed up and headed to the beach. They had a little convoy of youngsters and wagons packed with beach umbrellas, games, snacks and a couple of the youngest children.

“There was a bunch of us, but I don’t believe we ever had as many as those folks across the road.” We talked and reminisced about the vacations when we would meet at the beach with my mother and dad, brother and sisters and all our children. We did that for years until the kids got married and started having their own children. Eventually, the numbers became unmanageable, even with two houses. Nowadays when we get together we do so in a more sedate fashion.

“I miss our family beach trips,” Linda said. “I wish we could do it again, but I know it’s impossible. Everybody’s spread out all over the country.”

“Yeah, I even miss the big family reunions we used to have on the farm. Do you remember the year we had the last one?”

“No, it was so long ago. It’s getting late. I guess I’d better start supper. How about tuna salad?”

“That’s good for me. Can I help?”

Linda replied that she had it under control and went into the little Airstream. I sat and watched as sea gulls soared at treetop level out toward the ocean. I tried to remember the last big family get-together on the old plantation and couldn’t. When my grandparents were alive, we had them every five years.

After our last reunion, I put together a few observations of the extended family gatherings, and Mom used them on the back of a brochure she had printed with the addresses of relatives. Those descriptions from long ago help me remember those wonderful times:

— Cars with license plates from all over the country parked in the front yard.

— Everyone greeting one another and trying to talk at once.

— Older folks trying to figure out whose son or daughter you are.

— Kids running through the big house, slamming the front screen door.

— Brothers, sisters and cousins remembering past reunions when Uncle Jim and Uncle Fred played tricks on each other.

— New babies showing up every year. Older faces missing.

—The old house reverberating with laughter from family members who have been separated too long.

— Kids swinging each other in the long rope swing that’s tied to the ancient pecan tree.

— Different members of the family setting up lawn chairs under the huge oaks trying to catch the noon breeze, while a few diehards suffer the heat on the long rain porch.

— Ladies in the kitchen preparing food for the buffet tables in the dining room, and people everywhere catching up on family news.

— And at last, dinner, after a blessing thanking the Almighty for everything that’s good.

— Relatives trying to eat a little of everything from Uncle Tom’s barbecue to Aunt Sylvia’s pound cake. Covered dishes everywhere with food galore.

— Babies and old folks napping in the shade of the giant oak trees after a memorable old-fashioned dinner and more talking about family and friends and family history.

— And as the day slowly wanes, family members gather children and belongings, and after hugging and kissing everybody, climb into their cars and head back home. 

— Finally, the house grows quiet again, and it seems as if the ghosts of reunions past walk the old halls smiling.

A strong breeze came off the ocean and I could smell rain. Cumulus clouds inland began to grow darker, and faraway grumbles of thunder could be heard. I began to batten down chairs and tables in anticipation of a summer storm. Down the little camp road, I spotted the folks from across the way coming back from the beach. They were laughing and shouting to one another and as happy as only a young energetic bunch can be.

It was catching. I smiled as I watched the adults herd the children to where they needed to go, then take a much needed breather in chairs pulled into a circle around a fire ring. It was a pleasure watching them have fun.

Good folks, I thought. They’ve got a lot of living to do.  I wish them well.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Guest Lecturer

Bringing the outdoors in

By Tom Bryant

Traffic was backed up for miles on the inner beltline of Raleigh, so I decided to take country roads home to Southern Pines. Big cities seem to be getting bigger every time I have to visit one, and today was no different. On this trip to the metro, I had met a couple of friends I worked with in the newspaper business. It was a great reunion. We sympathized with each other on our personal aging problems as well as the problems the newspaper industry is experiencing. After a couple of cups of coffee and an hour or two of catching up, we hit the road to get back to our respective home bases.    

I angled my route over the backroads toward Cary and then decided to cut across country to Lake Jordan for a quick look-see. But first, since it had been a long time since my bowl of breakfast cereal, I pulled into a handy McDonald’s right outside the city limits for an early lunch. I was in luck because just as I entered the restaurant, a church bus pulled up and unloaded a bunch of youngsters. They appeared to be in their early teens, so I grabbed a table in the back corner to be out of the way. I had the morning issue of the News & Observer, so
I kicked back with my biscuit to catch up on the Raleigh news.        

As expected, the young folks came in with all the enthusiasm only they can have, especially when they’re hungry. I couldn’t help but overhear that they were on a field trip to the Capitol to see and be seen with the legislators. At a glance, it seemed as if each one had a smartphone and was constantly checking for important information or messages.

The technology that has changed the way newspapers do business was in evidence right there in McDonald’s. There I was, an older guy, not quite a geezer but on the way, reading a hard copy of a newspaper; and there they were, a bunch of young folks engrossed in their smartphones. It was a living testament to how times have changed.

These young folks reminded me of the time I was invited to speak to an eighth-grade class about the beauty of nature. It was a project dreamed up by the school to emphasize the importance of the outdoors. Even back then, school administrators understood that kids were spending too much time inside, watching TV and playing video games. That early encounter with those eighth-graders was the first inkling I had that the new generation was growing up differently from anything I had known.

A few more hungry customers came in the door, and the young folks moved as a group to the center of the restaurant. I was surprised at how subdued they were, and all but two, that I saw, were engrossed in their phones. The two kids who weren’t, a boy and a cute petite girl, carried on a conversation, laughing and smiling all the while. The contrast between the couple and the rest of the group was very evident. There are a few hanging on, I thought. The couple with no phones in sight would have fit right in with the eighth-grade class I visited many years ago.         

There were 30 or more students in that classroom, and it was just before lunch, so my time was limited. The young teacher introduced me and returned to her desk. I looked out at all those youngsters who had so much living yet to do and wondered how many had spent any time at all in the outdoors. So I asked, “Raise your hand if you’re in the Boy Scouts.”

About five boys tentatively put up their hands.

“OK,” I said, “how many of you young ladies are in the Girl Scouts?”

No hands went up.     

I decided to use a different tact. “How many of you have ever been fishing, hunting, camping or hiking, anything at all to do with the outdoors?” I was amazed at how few raised their hands.

“Well, I guess I have my work cut out for me. I’m supposed to get y’all interested enough in the birds and bees for you to spend more time away from the TV.”

The birds and bees comment brought on a little snickering in the back rows.

“Not that kind of birds and bees,” I laughed. I had gotten their attention.  A boy sitting close to the front raised his hand. “Mr. Bryant, one time when I was a lot younger, my granddad took me duck hunting.”

I looked at him with a glimmer of hope, thinking that here was a boy I could relate to.

He continued, “I not only about froze to death, but I was bored stiff. We didn’t see a duck all day.”

The class erupted with laughter. The teacher looked over at me with raised eyebrows.

I’m losing these people. What’s the best way to respond to this little whippersnapper? I thought about bringing the beauty of sunsets and sunrises into the conversation. I had even emphasized that in my notes, but that wouldn’t work; these kids have seen too many nature documentaries on TV.

OK, I figured I had one last chance before the teacher took her class back and dismissed me.

I walked around to the front of the lectern. “All right, folks,” I said. “I’ve left my speech back there. Just give me a little attention, and I’ll let you get out of here early for lunch.” That perked them up. I looked at the young fellow who gave me the duck hunting story. “I’m going to tell you about one of my duck hunts.

“It was Thanksgiving weekend, really just a couple of years ago. I was out early Friday morning at my special duck hunting spot not too far from home. It’s a beautiful undisturbed area with all kinds of wildlife and one of my favorite locations. Unfortunately, we’re losing these places all too quickly to development. So-called progress, I reckon. I have a small duck boat I use for hunting, one that will nestle right close to the creek bank; and on this morning, I was hunting alone because my old hunting dog, Paddle, had died the year before. She was a yellow Lab and a great retriever. We hunted together for 14 years and I still miss her.”

The class was paying more attention and I continued. “On this morning I didn’t really expect to have a lot of luck because of the mild weather, but I just wanted to be in the woods. I pulled the boat under alders growing from the bank and watched as the sun came up over the lake. Canada geese had roosted out in the big water the night before and were calling in preparation to head to the fields to feed. Mixed in with their calling, I could hear an unusual whistling noise coming from up the creek. A black bear had recently been sighted in the area, and not knowing what the whistling was, I hunkered down in the boat.”

I had the class now. They were all paying attention, and I finished the impromptu lecture and watched as the students were dismissed and filed out of the room heading to lunch. Several of them thanked me for the story.

The teacher gave me kudos for my talk. I don’t know if they were deserved or not, but I told her I had enjoyed the experience.

As I packed up to leave, the young guy who had duck hunted with his granddad stood by the classroom door, and as I walked out into the hall, he said, “Thanks, Mr. Bryant. I’m going to see if my grandfather will take me duck hunting again.” 

That youngster made my day.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Hearing a Faint Voice

Testing a new outfit in an old spot

By Tom Bryant

. . . A Florida conservationist is a fellow who bought his waterfront property last week, and wants to make room for two or three friends and then shut the door forever. And meanwhile the people who knew what it was like twenty years ago are an ever-dwindling minority, a voice too faint to be heard.

— The Empty Copper Sea, by John D. MacDonald

Wind was blowing out of the east at about 20 knots. That, along with a low tide, had all but emptied Chokoloskee Bay of water except in the cuts and passes. Too windy to take out the canoe, and I was determined not to make a mistake like I did the day before, when I got caught on a falling tide with wind in my face. When I made it back to the dock, it felt as if I had paddled 5 miles, towing a barge. I don’t mind a little exercise, but that was too much.

Chokoloskee Park and Marina sits on about 10 or 15 acres, all of it packed elbow-to-elbow with campers like us and mobile homes made permanent in the back. We had the site up the hill from the launching ramp of the marina, and I was sitting outside our little Airstream, keeping out of the wind. Montana Bill, a long-timer, walked by on the way to the dock, looked over at me and said, “Tom, you get to say ‘hey’ to everybody right here.”

I laughed. “You’re right, Bill, if I get tired of folks I just go inside.” The site was narrow but a little bigger than the rest on the front row. This was our annual winter visit to Florida. We had budgeted two weeks for the island and we were just getting into a routine. The weather had been windy but warm, and the snowbirds who had been there a lot longer said we were blessed with the wind because the mosquitoes and no-see-ums had been murder before the breeze cranked up and blew them away.

Not wanting to take the canoe out, I ventured out on the dock with a new spinning outfit I received for Christmas. It was a combo from L.L. Bean, spinning rod and reel and fly rod and reel. I was excited about trying it out. The dock runs beside the launching ramp to a fish-cleaning station, hangs a right and goes in a semicircle back toward the marina, creating a space for boats to come into the slips available and tie up for the evening or for any length of stay. It’s a pretty efficient little harbor just right for small boats.  I, on the other hand, parked my canoe beside the Airstream.

There are a couple of benches placed strategically along the dock walkway where folks could rest and watch wildlife or maybe sunsets, which are magnificent over the Ten Thousand Islands. I noticed an old fellow sitting at the bench closest to the cleaning station, so I moved down toward the north end of the dock so I wouldn’t accidentally hook him if the wind blew the lure his way. He was a weathered old guy, wearing a cut-off sweatshirt, denim shorts, and a canvas hat that looked as if it had done duty in the big war, World War I, I mean. He had a pipe that he would repack with tobacco from time to time. I hadn’t smelled a pipe smoker in many years. The wind blew me a whiff every now and then, and it brought back memories of the days when I used to smoke a pipe before I gave up tobacco entirely. To me, it wasn’t unpleasant the way cigarettes and cigars are.

I tossed the light lure out as far as I could, more just learning the touch of the spinning outfit than hoping to catch something. A stiff breeze at my back helped, but I still couldn’t reach deep water like I wanted. I noticed the old guy had moved to the bench nearer to where I was.

“You’re gonna have to put more weight on that leader if you want to get where the fish are,” he said, chuckling.

“You’re right, but I’m more interested in how this little thing works than actually catching a fish. It’s new to me and I’m impressed with it so far.”

“I bet it would be fun with a 3- or 4-pound trout on it.”

“Mister, I haven’t caught a 3- or 4-pound trout in quite a while. I don’t know if they grow ’em that big anymore.”

“It would break your heart to see the fish pulled out of these waters 20 years ago,” he said. “A 3-pound trout was common, and pompano and snook and red fish and sheepshead. You name it, the fishing was so good you had to hide your bait or they would jump in the boat.”

I laughed and said, “I’ve heard that one before, old-timer. Believe it or not, I used to fish these waters with my granddad over 60 years ago, and I can relate to what you’re saying.”

“Well, I’ve got some years on you, and I can remember that before that causeway and bridge were built, nobody fished off Chokoloskee Island except the locals. Most everybody put in at Everglades City, what few came here to fish. The rich folks fished out of the Rod and Gun Club. Met Hemingway there one time. He gave me a dollar to haul in his suitcase.”

He was looking to the north where the causeway crossed the bay to the island. The folks from the highway department were hard at work replacing the bridge located in the middle, and they had a way to go before they finished. They were working one lane at a time and had an automatic light controlling traffic.

“Yep,” he said, “before they dug the ditch to build that road and bridge, the flow of the bay coming out of the Glades was a lot better. Some folks say the reason the fishing is not as good as it used to be is because of that cotton-picking’ road.”

He knocked tobacco ash out of his pipe, refilled it, and lit it again. He stood, shuffling a bit to get his feet working. “Well, anyhow, ain’t nothing the way it used to be. Good luck, fellow. I hope you catch some fish. My daughter is supposed to pick me up in a few minutes. She brings me over here every now and then so I can check out the fishing. Maybe I’ll see you again.”

We said our goodbyes, and I watched as he slowly made his way around the dock to the parking lot. He’s right, I thought. Times have changed, not always for the better.

In the distance I could hear the pounding as the big diesel pile driver worked on the bridge.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Airstream Heritage

Chasing fish — and a bit of warmth

By Tom Bryant

Snowbird (person) — Wikipedia

A snowbird is a person who moves from the higher latitudes and colder climates of the northern United States and Canada and migrates southward to warmer locales such as Florida, California, Arizona, Texas, or elsewhere along the Sun Belt of the southern United States.

I guess you could say my grandfather fit the Wikipedia definition long before Wikipedia existed or the term “snowbird” was coined anywhere in the vernacular. He really didn’t qualify for the definition in its truest sense though, in as much as he already lived in the Sun Belt, in sunny South Carolina.

But Granddad was always cold-natured. When I was just a youngster, I can remember deer hunting with him and listening as he complained about the frosty weather. Many times he said, “Son, just as soon as the Christmas holidays are over, your grandma and I are heading south, down to Florida, where I plan to bask in the sun and catch as many fish as your grandma and I can eat, and you know she loves fresh fish.”

Granddad wasn’t a true snowbird because he bought a place, 100 acres exactly, right on the St. Johns River at a little crossroads of a town by the name of Astor Park. After that he was no longer a transient. Later when I visited them at their Florida property, I asked him why he needed so much land. His answer was simple: “Son, I might need to expand.”

He started with a little Airstream trailer, which he would tow from the homestead in South Carolina to the river property in Florida. Every winter when the wind would begin whistling out of the north and a heavy coat of frost would whiten the fields, my granddad would hitch up the little Airstream and head to the St. Johns.

Now both Granddad and Gangama, as we grandchildren called her, were pretty big people, and it didn’t take them long to decide that the trailer was OK but they needed more room. So they built a place with all the conveniences of home and parked the little trailer behind the new storage building. It didn’t stay there for long, though.

In the early ’50s, winters seemed to be colder and summers hotter. This was way before the catchphrases “global warming” and “climate change” rolled around. Granddad always said that weather was cyclical; we could have several years of colder winters than usual, and then several years of warmer than usual weather. Everything seemed to even out in the course of things. 

But, when the cold migrated farther south and my granddad couldn’t fish in his shirtsleeves, he hooked up the little Airstream and headed to the warmer climes at Everglades City and Chokoloskee Bay.  He bought a little place on Half-Way Creek just big enough for his boats and the trailer. Here he would retreat when old man winter got nasty up around Astor.

It turns out that the acorn really doesn’t fall far from the tree. My dad built a river house on the St. Johns; and after he passed away, my mom started wintering in Florida. So what do I do in retirement? I buy a little Airstream trailer and my bride, Linda, and I make our own winter sojourn south.

This will be the fifth year we’ve hooked up and hit the southern roads, and what an experience it has been. I was fortunate as a youngster to spend a lot of time with my granddad fishing in Florida, and I’ve lived long enough to see the major changes that have taken place in that state. It has been nothing short of amazing. The 100 acres that my granddad bought in the ’50s was nothing but scrub palmetto bushes, pine trees and sand. Today, his land is home to upscale restaurants, horse farms, and parts of cattle ranches.

The little piece of property in Everglades City on Half-Way Creek is now part of a huge marina where fishermen from all over the country come to try their luck in the 10,000 Islands that border Chokoloskee Bay and the Gulf of Mexico.

Our winter spot down there is what Linda calls the fish camp. It’s located on Chokoloskee Island and is usually inhabited this time of year by true snowbirds. These folks come from frosty hinterlands such as Canada, New York, Connecticut, Minnesota and other frigid locales, many arriving in southern Florida around November. They will soak up the sun until the weather up north becomes more habitable, usually in April. Then they will line Interstate 95 almost bumper to bumper as they head home to do it all over again the following winter. It’s something to see, and we have become part of this exodus.

When you read this, we’ll be on the way home after another month or so enjoying the warmth and some good fishing. Southwest Florida is beautiful in late winter. The sky is bluer and the air is moist and easy to breathe. Cumulous clouds hang low like puffs of cotton and look as if they can almost touch the coconut palms.

Our little Airstream has opened the door to an entirely different lifestyle that grows every year, that of traveling Americans. Not the ones who hop on a plane in New York and scurry off to sunny California, but the folks who drive across the country, seeing it from the ground level. These are the ones closer to our forefathers who backed their horses into the traces, hooked up the Conestoga wagons and headed to parts unknown. I know that sounds a little dramatic. Where they had four horses, our FJ Cruiser has almost 300; and whereas their maps were hand-drawn and sometimes not accurate, our GPS keeps us on the right path wherever we go. But like those folks from long ago, we’re looking at the same country, however changed it might be.

In the 10 years we’ve had the Airstream, we’ve traveled through almost every state, and I’ve confirmed an observation made many years ago by my granddad. Early one morning as we were fishing for sheepshead near Fiddler Key in the 10,000  Islands, I said, “There are a lot more folks down here this winter, Granddad. Seems as if most of them are Yankees who talk funny.”

He laughed, “There is a bunch more this year.” He paused and added, “I bet we sound funny to them, too. But you know, son, one thing I’ve discovered in my many years and travels, people are mostly the same wherever you go. I bet you’ll find that to be true when you get a little older and see more of the country.”

He was right. Just about everybody we’ve met from Alaska to Florida might speak with a different accent, but their hearts seem to be in the right place.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

On Point

The beauty of champion bird dogs

By Tom Bryant

My cellphone rang just as I was crossing the bridge over the Pungo River, leaving Hyde County. I had spent the last four days at Lake Mattamuskeet in pursuit of waterfowl, and I could feel every one of my
advanced years. As my good friend and hunting buddy John Vernon says, “Tom, how many more times do you think we’ll be able to do this?”

I saw that the caller was Rich Warters, another friend and outdoor enthusiast.

“Tom, you ready to shoot some birds?” Rich trains bird dogs, and a time or two I’ve shot pen-raised quail over his trainees.

“Rich, old buddy, that’s what I’ve been doing for the last week. I’m on the way home from Mattamuskeet.”

“That’s right, I remember now. How was the hunt?”

“We had a grand time. The ducks were kind of sporadic, but we did get enough for a meal or two. I’ll get you and Penny over for a duck dinner after a while.”

“Great,” Rich said. “But right now, I need you to shoot some birds for me. Robert Ecker is here training dogs before a trial coming up in February and we need a shooter.” Ecker is a professional bird dog trainer and is well-known in the sport as one of the best. He has two of Rich’s pointers in his training regimen, and he and Rich work closely honing the dogs’ natural ability. Rich had asked me a few weeks before if I could help out, and I enthusiastically agreed. Hunting pen-raised quail is not like hunting wild birds; but with the serious shortage of the wild variety, bird hunters shoot on preserves where quail are raised for this purpose. It’s not the same, but it’s the next best thing.

“Rich, I’d love to help you, but I injured a back muscle hunting this week, and I’m probably going to have to see the doc when I get home. This thing’s giving me a fit. I have to stop the vehicle every hour or so to stretch.” Many years ago, I had torn a muscle in my back while white-water canoeing. Every now and then, the injury will reappear just to let me know who’s boss.

“OK, Tom. Drive safely and call me after you see the doctor. If nothing else, we want you out here just to see the dogs. Bo and Bud are here, and I want you to watch ’em work.” Bo and Bud are Rich’s pointer bird dogs. I’d heard a lot about them but had not watched them in action. We rang off and I continued driving west toward Southern Pines.

A few days after I got home from the Mattamuskeet hunt, my back was making a slow recovery. Rich called again. “Bryant, how’s the back?”

“A little better, but I’m not going to be able to shoot for you. I don’t believe I’d be able to swing a shotgun.”

“That’s all right. We’re just going to make some photos, and I’ll bring a 20- gauge Remington for you to just shoot one bird. That way we’ll be able to get some pictures. How about Friday around one o’clock out at the kennel?” The kennel is located in west central Moore County on about 800 acres. Mills Hodge, another bird dog aficionado, actually owns the kennel, and he and Rich work closely training the dogs. The big difference in the two is that Rich owns and works English pointers, and his good friend Mills owns and works English setters. There is a lot of friendly competition going on all the time.

When I arrived that Friday, Rich and Robert were already there getting things ready for the afternoon training session. I hadn’t seen Robert since Rich and I ventured up to Michigan to hunt grouse. At that time, we again used Robert’s expertise and his dogs to locate wild birds.

Robert hadn’t changed a bit. A young ball of fire, he still has the enthusiasm and skill required to turn young dogs into champions. There are 42 dogs in his training camp; but on this outing, he would only take four: Rich’s two pointers, an Irish setter, and an English setter. Robert is from Quakake, a small town in Pennsylvania where he has his kennel. He has been a professional bird dog trainer since 1994; and in that time, he has won about 80 field trials. When I expressed my amazement, he modestly replied, “Tom, those are in the past; it’s the trials and the dogs in the future that count.”

When I drove up, Rich walked over to the car. I hadn’t seen him in a while, but Rich never changes. An amazing individual at 82, he seems half his age and can outdo many people much younger. Rich and his lovely bride, Penny, retired to Pinehurst in 1995 after he served as assistant school superintendent in Horseheads, New York. An avid golfer, Rich plays three or four times a week and is a member of the renowned Tin Whistles, founded in1904 and the oldest golfing fraternity in the country. He has won several tournaments with that esteemed organization. When he’s not playing golf, he’s out working his dogs. I met Rich shortly after he retired, and I consider myself a better man for it.

“Bryant, limp on over here. In a minute we’re gonna put you in this four-wheeler and show you some pretty dog work.” Robert loaded the dogs in their crates in the back of the vehicle and left to put out birds for the dogs to find during the work session.

“Here’s the shotgun.” Rich handed me a 20-gauge Remington 1100 and a handful of shells. “Now don’t get upset,” he said as I started to protest. “You only have to shoot one time. We just want to take some pictures. You don’t even have to hit the bird.”

It didn’t take Robert long to finish his chores, and we crammed into the vehicle and headed out through the pines. A little way into the longleaf pine forest, Robert pulled over and got Bud, Rich’s champion pointer, out of the carrier. Bud was runner-up national champion last year, and this year has a real opportunity to take first place. We drove a bit farther down the sand path with Bud hunting in front. All of a sudden, he locked up on point like a statue. If there is anything prettier than a bird dog on point, I don’t know what it is. We piled out of the vehicle and Rich said, “Tom, here’s your chance. Don’t miss.” Chuckling all the time.

Robert eased up to me and quietly said, “I’ll jump the bird. Be ready.”

I loaded the 20-gauge and watched as Robert slowly edged into the undergrowth. Then it happened; a bird the size of a chicken burst from the cover, cackling like a demented pterodactyl. It was a great big cock pheasant. I almost dropped the gun. I was expecting a little quail, and this monster flew out of the brush right over my head. I did have the wherewithal to swing the shotgun and get the bird as he was going away.

Rich and Robert almost doubled over, they were laughing so hard. I was set up. Rich said, “Tom, I remembered that you had never shot a pheasant, and I had the good luck to acquire this one for you. He’s going to be great on the dinner table with your ducks.”

The rest of the afternoon went by quickly, and I got to watch some superior dogs at work. On the drive home, I thought back to John’s question of how much longer we’d be able to do this. If Rich Warters is an example, it’s gonna be a long time.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.

Whistling Wings

Return of the Hyde County duck hunt

By Tom Bryant

I was up in the roost, a little apartment above our garage where I go to write and hang out when I need to get out of the way of the vacuum cleaner and my bride, Linda. I was sorting through duck hunting gear from my last trip to Lake Mattamuskeet. Shotguns, waders, heavy waterproof hunting coats, shotgun shells, duck calls, hunting trousers — you name it and if it pertains to duck hunting, it was in a pile in the roost. 

Duck season ushered in a new kind of hunting for me in 2016 and January of the new year. In the past, I was used to running my own show so to speak. A group of us, six to be exact, leased impoundments right on the Pamlico Sound. Also included in the lease was a small house that served as our lodge. For a few years, the arrangement worked OK; but then a series of bad weather events flooded the impoundments with salt water, making them useless for growing corn, and the ducks went elsewhere. At the same time, our little lodge was invaded with a legion of mice, making the place uninhabitable, so we gave up our efforts, and I didn’t duck hunt in that area for a while.

I missed the wilds of Hyde County, though, so last summer, when my good friend Art called me after a visit to Engelhard, scouting for a new duck hunting venue, I was excited. “Hey, Tom, this is Art.  How you doing, sport?”

“Great, Art! Good to hear from you, old friend. What are you up to?”

“Jack, John and I have been scouting around Hyde County, looking for a spot for us to hang our duck-hunting hats, and we think we’ve found it. You interested?”

Needless to say I was, and they added me to the group. The hunt would be handled sort of the way I was introduced to the area. We would use a guide and his impoundments located right on the northern end of the lake. The guide would take care of all the details, which I wasn’t used to; but hey, I thought, I’m not getting any younger, and maybe an easy hunt like this would be nice.

The weeks rolled by and all of a sudden, it was time to round up all my duck-hunting stuff, load up the Cruiser and head east. The ride to Hyde County from Southern Pines was a trip of extremes, up through Raleigh and all the breakneck traffic trying to get nowhere fast, and then with a sigh of relief, I eased across the Pungo River onto the “Road Less Traveled,” which is the motto of Hyde County.

When I crossed the river, I pulled into a little gravel parking area right on the other side of the bridge and walked back to see if anything had changed since my last visit. An osprey was fishing, diving into the water with a splash, and with a fish in his claws, headed back across the tree line bordering the river to eat lunch. Then I heard them before I could see them. So high above were hundreds of snow geese, only little spots against the washed-out blue of the winter sky, their soft plaintive calls an indication of the altitude at which they were flying.

Excited, I fired up the Cruiser and motored toward Engelhard and the pair of cabins that would serve as our headquarters for the next four days. Art, John, Jack and Art’s son, Michael, were an hour or more behind me, so I got to the cabins first, unloaded some gear and waited for their arrival and the beginning of good times.

I had just sat down in a swing on the porch overlooking the Pamlico Sound when the troops pulled in the drive. In no time, all their gear was unloaded and John, the gourmet chef of the group, had staked out which cabin and kitchen he would use for his culinary efforts. I have been hunting with John for years and have been fortunate to experience many meals prepared by this excellent cook. We all looked forward to his expertise in the kitchen, always a high point of the hunt.

After completing the details of unloading and who was to use which cabin, Art called the guide to get our marching orders for the next day and also see if we could check out the evening flight into the impoundments. The guide said he would meet us at his barn and take us to the dike to watch, so we took care of some last minute details and everyone loaded into Michael’s big Suburban for the 15-minute ride to our morning rendezvous, hopefully, with ducks. The gray evening was heavily overcast with low clouds spitting rain, and although we couldn’t see the ducks, we sure could hear them. Our guide said, “If the weather holds, we should wear ’em out at sunrise.” We drove back to the cabins full of anticipation.

Five a.m. came early after an evening of good fellowship and John’s great cooking, but it didn’t take long to trudge to the Suburban, heavily loaded with guns and gear. On the way to the impoundments, Michael was commiserating about his lack of experience duck hunting. This was his first time in a blind. Michael has a very responsible position with Wells Fargo Bank and spends a lot of time on the job. The rest of the guys told him that duck hunting was a snap and he should be really good at it. Jokingly they said, “Just watch Bryant and try to do the opposite.”

We met the guide and trooped to the blind in good order. The weather was still blowing out of the northeast with a heavy mist. We hunkered down under cover and waited for legal shooting time. Whistling wings could be heard overhead as ducks started coming off the roost heading to the lake. You could almost taste the excitement. The guide whispered, “OK, it’s time, get ready.”

A pair of widgeons swung by out front, and one fell to our guns. Another pair, wood ducks this time, came from the right and flew straight out. Michael’s gun roared and both ducks fell. Two ducks, one shot. Even the guide celebrated and gave Michael a high-five. “See,” I said and laughed. “This duck hunting isn’t that hard.”

The morning went by in a blur as ducks came to the blind; but to me, the most incredible sight were the tundra swans coming off the lake, literally by the thousands. They were flying treetop high over the blind, and the sounds they made calling in those impossible numbers I’ll probably never hear again in my lifetime. It was one of nature’s most incredible sights, and I surely won’t forget it.

I looked out the window of the roost and watched as a pair of cardinals flew to the bird feeder. Well, I thought, here it is February, and there’s duck hunting stuff everywhere. Time to put it all away until next season and see if I can put together some fishing gear. We’re leaving for Florida and Chokoloskee Island soon, and the folks down there say the fishing is great.  PS

Tom Bryant, a Southern Pines resident, is a lifelong outdoorsman and PineStraw’s Sporting Life columnist.