Chapter 58 Day 48 - Trout Season

They Cared Not To Look My Way

Today was kind of a cut-up or diced day.  Usually on Sunday morning it's work for me and today was no exception.  After about four hours I was pretty well done at work sitting at my desk finishing some papers.  Looking at the calendar there, I realized there is only six more days to that big day that takes many of us months to pay for. 

Owning a disposition of putting things off and being a charter member of the procrastinator's club, I forced myself today to get that one special gift I had yet to buy. 

A southerly course was plotted that would require about a thirty-five minute voyage.  Throwing anchor at the brick and mortar storefront, I soon entered Eskimo Joe's and quickly acquired the object that had become the latest fancy of Miss Carol's affection. 

Back at the prairie home, the overcast sky had given way to the warming sun.  There was no chance of making Blue River today, so the waders went on, camera was grabbed, rod stowed in the cargo hull, and it was off to see what the carp of our local creek were doing. 

I would visit three different pastures at the creek - the Courtyard, Honey Hole, and Worm Pool, and nary a carp would I see.  Actually, not seeing any carp at any of these pastures told me exactly where the carp would be.  They would be at the pasture known as Well Springs - a deeper pasture with undercut banks. 

It was back to the prairie schooner and off to Well Springs where, upon arriving, find the carp waiting... just as thought.  There was a good community of carp - all suspended, none grazing. 

Oh, they're there... suspended... just sitting pretty.  

I tie on a worm pattern called San Juan Sweetheart's, which is basically two San Juan worms tied on one hook.  Time after time I offer the Sweethearts to the carp putting the fly right in front of their face, but, they cared not to look my way.  I know these beeves have to graze sometime, but, that sometime wasn't the time I was there today.

Carp by fly this winter is most likely going to be a crap shoot.  I figure it will be mid or late March until they get really interested in grazing the pastures again.

In the short time on the creek today, I did discover that the nine inch rain we received in one night washed a bunch of trash into the creek.  Trash like the piece of PVC below.

PVC can probably stay in the environment for like a gillion years or something and it has no place in a creek.  I grab onto the junk and drag it up the hill to the trash container maintained by the city.  The city guys are pretty good about picking stuff up there, so I figure they'll take care of it. 

The further downstream I go, the more trash I find.  Trash like plastic bags hanging everywhere. 

I hate plastic bags.  You see them hanging on barbed wire fencing, cyclone fencing, trapped in underbrush, captured by greenbriar, hanging in tree limbs, and submerged in our streams. 

Plastic bags should be abolished.  Now, this is coming from a guy who works at a mercantile store that dispenses probably close to a half a million of these things a year.  At the mercantile store, I've pushed earth-friendly reusable shopping bags for years now and we've sold a ton of these things.  However, the problem seems to be that people simply can't remember to bring their reusable bags and they end up getting more plastic bags.  All those darn bags end up somewhere you know. 

I've never been much for mandates, but, do think I would support a mandate to not use plastic shopping bags.

Yep, upstream is downstream and all the junk we find upstream will end up downstream unless we get rid of it. 

So, I saw a lot of trash today, and saw a community of carp, but, the carp were not interested. 

Thank goodness for those pretty little Rainbow trout.  Will hit Blue at the next chance.  

Trash Day

Last Saturday the waders went on... but a fly rod was not in hand.  Instead, two commercial sized 60 gallon trash bags were in tow. 

Working on an upstream area of Rock Creek, an area that has been previously mentioned in Trashless Wild posts, it took about fifteen minutes to fill the first bag.  Most of the trash that is found on Rock Creek still seems to be coming from the same area. 

Although it is disheartening to continually find mounting piles of trash after previous trash recovering efforts, I remain determined to make Rock Creek one of the cleanest little creeks in Oklahoma. 


The pile of trash pictured above was recovered in an area that measured maybe 10' by 10'.  Unfortunately, not all the trash could be recovered because it was strewn down a steep hill and I had old shoes on without any grips attached.


After the first bag was filled, another stretch of water was explored.  The second area was within the boundaries of the National Park System, and I'll have to say it was pleasantly void of trash.  There were only a few plastic bottles and Styrofoam cups recovered.  A lot of plastic bags hung in the tree limbs and all of those were removed.  The people at Chickasaw National Recreation Area do a good job in policing the area. 

One more trip will be made to reclaim the trash from the troubled area that has already been cleaned several times.  After that, it's time for a letter of diplomacy asking for help in remedying the problem. 

Guess I better brush up on diplomatic discourse. 

More Trash Talkin'

There's been a lot of trash talkin' on the blog here of late and it's been primarily about that big, ugly, nasty, visible trash.  However, as all of us in the fly fishing community very well know... there is another kind of trash.  It's called micro-trash and a good example is those cut-aways of our leaders and tippets.  If these innocent looking tag ends get into a river, stream, or the wild, they can stay there for hundreds of years.  Also, fish and other aquatic creatures can ingest them leading to severe problems or worse.

I really like the products the folk at Fishpond make.  All of their products seem of high quality and designed for efficiency.  Fishpond makes a micro-trash container that can be fastened on the wading belt or somewhere else while we are on the water or trekking through the wild on our way to the water.  These containers are fairly inexpensive and work like a charm. 

For years, I've tried to discard my tag ends by slipping them in a baggy or vest pocket, but that's difficult and not very successful at all.  If there is any moisture on your fingers the tag ends tend to hang on for dear life.  With the Fishpond micro-trash container you basically scrape the tippet or leader off of you finger.

An alternative is a 35 mm film container.  Simply take the container and cut an X in the lid and you have a handy dandy micro-trash collector. 

Whether it's the film container or the Fishpond Micro-Trash Container, we can keep a lot of unwanted stuff out of our precious streams and waterways.

Artifacts Of Modern Man - Today's Big Bag Of Crap

It's time for this week's editon of "Artifacts Of Modern Man - Today's Big Bag Of Crap", what otherwise might become known as the Rock Creek Rant. 

Now, you can call it trash, garbage, refuse, or anything you like, but I call it crap - a whole bunch of crap!  Yes, I took a collection bag with me today and filled it with the crap from the creek and banks.  It didn't take long to fill, which makes me realize I'm going to need some bigger bags.



Oh, I get it.  Save money, live better, and toss the damn bag in the wild.

 Wal-Mart is the world's largest retailer.  If Wal-Mart would lead the initiative to do away with plastic shopping bags, requiring us to use reusable cloth shopping bags, then the rest of the retail industry will follow suit. 

It is estimated that four to five trillion plastic shopping bags are produced each year, and in the United States alone, we discard 100 billion annually. 

The proliferation of plastic is slowly choking our environment to death.  Plastic, whether it is HDPE, LDPE, or any other kind of PE can take hundreds of years to breakdown.  With plastic, it's a matter of more than meets the eye.  Of course plastic bags are unsightly hanging on tree limbs and floating down our rivers, but there are some other environmental impacts we probably never think about.

Some estimates have that the manufacturing of plastic shopping bags accounting for four percent (4%) of the world's total oil production.  That's a lot of oil folks.  Producing two plastic shopping bags produces 1/10th of a gallon of waste water and where does waste waster go?  It goes into our struggling streams, rivers, and oceans. 

The impact on wildlife is devastating.  Worldwide, 100 million birds and mammals loose their life due to the ingestion of plastics each year.  To compound things, once the animal dies and decomposes, the ethylene is released back into the environment. 

Getting people to give up the convenience of plastic shopping bags is going to be one tall order of business.  It will take a combined effort by all of us.  However, organized efforts to promote reusable cloth bags can begin with just one person who carries a fiery torch of the well-being of our earth.

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Project Trashless Wild

I plan on starting a personal project soon and I'm naming it Trashless Wild.

The goal of Trashless Wild is to rid our wilderness areas, rivers, and streams of as much debris and trash as possible. I have chosen two pilot projects areas to begin this effort and they are Rock Creek in Sulphur and of course beloved Blue.

Upstream is downstream is a simple and workable theory. The cleaner water is upstream then the cleaner water will be downstream.

Rock Creek will be tackled first. She meanders her way along the boundaries of the local school system. Of course with school comes a lot of activities and the sports complex is along the banks of the creek. With all the sporting events that go on of course trash is going to accumulate and unfortunately it ends up on the creek's banks, trees and shrubs and in the water itself. From here, Rock Creek flows through the Chickasaw National Recreation Area on her way to Arbuckle Lake. Again... upstream is downstream.

Here are some pictures of what I will be trying to remedy. My ultimate goal is to make this project infectious and many more outdoor-minded people will join me. Hopefully the day will come we can form as an organization or society. Once that happens we can take Project Trashless Wild to other wild areas across Oklahoma and even beyond those borders.



I'll start the project at the bridge north of the school system and clean the creek until I hit the main bridge that divides east and west Sulphur. This is about three quarters of a mile of water.


There is a wide assortment of trash along the creek including clothes, discarded toys, aluminum cans, and plastic.

Many of the plastic bags have become lodged in the overhanging tree branches and shrubbery.

Unfortunately, the area of the creek behind the school system is the trashiest spot on the whole of Rock Creek.


More and more plastic in any color you want, black, white, yellow, and clear in the form of discarded water bottles.


Plastic, plastic, everywhere.


Lots of Styrofoam too in the form of drinking cups. I wonder if Styrofoam every completely degrades?


Hanging like ornaments in the trees... more plastic. It's quite unsightly and will eventually end up downstream.


There are some rather large chunks of Styrofoam also and I know they'll be there quite sometime.

Upstream is downstream. There's no doubt about it.