Another article for the Dallas Safari Club (Outdoor Parenting Column).
Catching Kids
As a kid striving to learn to hunt and fish, I had the misfortune of being raised in the city. My monthly Field and Stream was one of the principle lifelines to my hopes of achieving outdoorsman status. Ed Zern inside the back cover held just as much interest for me as did the adds just ahead of him. My relationship with the Mepps Lure Company began back there with their ad to buy squirrel tales to adorn their spinners. This was probably my first real introduction to the idea of recycling. Hunt the squirrel, eat the squirrel, sell the squirrel tail to be made into a fishing lure. Buy lures with the money and catch fish. Eat the fish. Mepps was green before being green was cool. Mepps and I go way back.
The only real vacation Dad was consistent about was to take a week in the summer and take my brother and I camping. We lived in Toronto and camped all over Ontario. In 1967 I was standing on a log protruding into the river at Algonquin Provincial Park dragging a #2 Aglia Spinner through the water. A flash of silver came from under my log, slammed the lure, and the rod doubled immediately before the line snapped. Dad took me fishing all the time but never new how to fish and I was self-taught. At age 8 I learned the double lesson of drag and the use of wire leaders for pike.
Later that year I was to catch one of my most interesting trophies. I was popping a number 2 silver Mepps with minnow along the bank at Old Mill Park in Toronto and hooked a small bass. He was tagged and quite a puzzle. I asked around at the lake and was told that the Queen of England had released a hundred tagged fish into the lake the day before to celebrate the Centennial of Canada’s independence from Britain. It was 1967. The tag was redeemed at City Hall for a medallion that still sits in my drawer 40 years later. I was so excited about the catch that I wrote to Mepps to tell them in precise and excruciating detail how I caught the fish. Their response was noteworthy. I was sent a patch affirming me as Master Angler. They sent a personal letter to me not only congratulating me on my catch, but also on my story. They included 7 or 8 articles that were hand typed and had been published in outdoor magazines about fishing by various writers. They paid attention to me and encouraged me.
My love of the outdoors continues today and I have done my best to infect my kids with it. My first degree was in Forestry and while my careers have changed over time, I continue to strive to maintain my outdoorsman status. In addition I belong to the Texas Outdoor Writers Association (TOWA) and try to share my experiences with others though this and and other publications. How much of all of this is because Dad took me camping or because Mepps took 15 minutes to respond to an 8 year old?
I got a letter in the mail the other day, one I suspect was sent to all TOWA members from Mepps. It seems they are running low on squirrel tales and are trying to get the word out that it is now legal to sell them they skins if you live in Texas. If you have never spent a day with your kid picking off squirrels with a .22 then here is a great bonus to the event. Teach them about this recycling thing and start talking conservation (not preservation) and sustained yield and use the squirrel tails as the vehicle. Mepps needs them, you need the time with your children, the kids need it and our future generations need it.
Lets recycle this encouragement and gratitude thing too. So I say thank you Dad for getting me out there, and thank you Mepps for you kind words way back then.
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