Inane Ramblings

28 June 2010

Fishing for fun and necessity.

So yesterday we were out and about in Walden Woods, circling the overfilled Walden Pond looking for a suitable place to wet some lines. Walden is a kettle pond in Concord, MA…made famous by some guy named “Thoreau”. In any case, we had some heavy rains back in the spring, and the pond is filled anywhere from 3-5 feet above normal levels. Since it is a kettle pond, the only outflow is by evaporation, so it might take a while to get back to a more normal level.

We tried a couple of spots, and wound up on the far side by Thoreau’s cabin, before finally finding a section of walkway with no obstructing trees, right by a dropoff to deeper water. Walden is stocked with trout, but they were out in the deeper, cool waters. I did see a big fish looking at the bait, but he was never interested. In the end, we wound up catching one moderate sized Pumpknseed, and then a fairly big Bluegill.

This was Javi’s first time fishing in clean water where we could actually keep the fish, so he was quite fascinated by the poor things flapping around in the cooler. I had hoped to catch enough for Sunday dinner, but it was not to be, so we finally made the long walk home.

Now came the fun part. Once we got home, I dumped the fish in the sink, and ran some tap water over them. Imagine my surprise when one of them gasped and started twitching weakly around the bottom of my sink. I worked on the obviously dead one, but my attempt to filet it yielded not much meat. Moving to the bigger fish, I lopped off its head and gutted it, intending to fry the body whole.

Now, I’m not squeamish about food; Intellectually, I know where it comes from, and a long time ago I used to be a far more active fisherman. In fact, before I was married, I used to be an unpaid deckhand on a private boat…my only payment was a day on the water in the sun, and whatever fish I could catch.

But yesterday was the first time in a long, long time that I caught a fellow-creature, killed it with my own hands, and ate its flesh. It actually gave me pause. Surely I’ll not become a vegan; I like meat too much. But I guess like any American, I like my meat to come in neat Styrofoam packages at the supermarket.

I won’t be quitting fishing anytime soon…in fact, I’m searching for more bodies of water nearby where we can actually eat what we catch. The way things are going, foraging for food may become an economic necessity.

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