Who's Great?

Scoutmaster Tbone

This entry is a little off topic, but one that it is very important to me.  It’s about our Boy Scout Troop.  I’ve been a Boy Scout Leader for over 15 years and have accomplished just about all of the goals I set for myself.  I’ve received various awards and accolades as a scout leader but those are absolutely meaningless if it were not for the boys.  The Scouting program “is all about the boys” not the number of square knots I wear on my uniform.  Oh wait…enough about me, this entry is about the boys.

For the last 10 or 11 years I’ve been associated with Pack 438 and subsequently Troop 438.  Pack 438 has been around for about 40 years while Troop 438 was started just seven years ago when my oldest crossed over from Cub Scouts into Boy Scouts.  I spent six years as Cubmaster and I’m in my fifth year as Scoutmaster.  During that tenure there is a simple cheer we have…someone yells, “WHO’S GREAT!?” and everyone replies “438!”

I’ve noticed that as the boys get older that cheer is done less and less.  That’s ok.  Boys Scouts is boy led and they should do their own cheer.  However, our recent scout camp experience brought back the “Who’s Great!?” with a vengeance.

We attended our local council camp this year.  I like this camp because they have lots of fun contests our scouts can enter.  They also award a spirit stick to the troop that exemplifies true scout spirit each day and at the end of the week, one troop is selected as the winner of the spirit stick and gets to take it home.

My Assistant Scoutmaster, Fishy the Clown

Camp started out ok this year, but I guess my expectations were a little high since we had a fair number of older scouts attending.  Of course we also had a fair number of first year scouts and that always presents us Scoutmasters with lots of challenges.  For one, I’m a stickler for a clean camp.  We get inspected daily and our cleanliness scores have a bearing on who wins the daily spirit stick.  It was obvious with all our new scouts, many had never held a broom, let alone sweep…and I’m guessing most had never cleaned a toilet either.

Early on, our scouts didn’t seem too enthused about getting involved.  All I could do was prod them.  Remember that Boys Scouts are boy led and while I’m happy to give ideas and my opinion, I can’t do it for them.  I got tired of pushing them…because anyone with a teenager knows you can only push so far.  The trick is to push, then back off.

Then there was the homesick scout.  I’m no therapist, so it is very exhausting trying to figure out how to deal with a homesick scout.  So, by the third day of scout camp I had enough and announced to our troop that I was “done”.  This was not some reverse psychology ploy…I was literally done.  I told them it’s their camp, it's their troop.  I was there to make sure they followed the scout law and the buddy system and otherwise I didn’t care what they did.  Instead I hung my hammock and took a nap.

Amazingly my scouts decided that they would get off their collective duffs and get some things done.  They lashed together a gateway (needed to get a perfect camp score), they entered the Huck Fin race, the slushy chuggin’ contest, the flop from the dock, the photo scavenger hunt, and the tomahawk race.  In fact, they not only entered, they did their best and it showed.

Blue Man Scouts

I had a first year scout win the slushy contest…maybe not the best scout skill, but it may serve him well in college.  Three of our scouts built a raft using a footlocker and came in second in the Huck Fin race. A group of our scouts entered the photo scavenger hunt and needed a picture of a clown.  They also needed a picture of someone fishing. They convinced one of my assistant leaders to paint his face and grab his fishing rod.  Their effort paid off as they won the contest.  Once of my scouts also put his own pain aside as he won the flop from the dock...a belly flop contest where the redder your stomach and chest, the better chance you have in winning.

Then, without me saying a word eight of our scouts put together a team for the tomahawk race.  This is a scout skill based relay race.  Each team has to build a tomahawk and the participants must carry it from station to station.  I should have known we were destined for greatness by the size of the tomahawk the boys made…it was huge!  They did pretty well…not only did they finish first, they set a record for fastest time the entire summer.

Then there were the scouts that did the intangible stuff, like my Senior Patrol Leader dressing in a blue man suit to go to a campfire ceremony, or the scout that at assembly walked up and took a call…it was Lucifer he said…and he wanted his weather back.  We had boys do a great job with a flag raising one morning and we had scouts volunteer in the dining hall.  These things earned us the spirit stick for the day and I was proud.

At the closing campfire, when it came time for roll call of which troops where there, our scouts yelled, “WHO’s GREAT…438!”  I was stunned but also thrilled that they revived this cheer.  Several troops started making fun of it.  I sat and watched our scouts intently.  They took the high road.

Then the awards were handed out and it seemed that every other one announced was won by our troop or one of the boys in our troop.  It was amazing to see these guys, some I’ve known since they were in first grade, hoot and holler after each award we received.  In addition to the events listed above, we did enough to earn Honor Troop and then it came down to the last award for the week…they coveted spirit stick.

There were two other troops I thought had been outstanding all week.  Certainly my scouts had already earned more than anyone thought they would.  Excitement was high…there was a drum roll…there was lots of discussion by the spirit committee.

“And the winner of the spirit stick is…Troop….438!”

I screamed at the top of my lungs, “WHO’S GREAT!?”

Record Setting Tomahawk Relay Team

The boys responded, “TROOP 438!”

It was amazing…those scouts acted as if they had just won the Super Bowl, and maybe they had.  They accomplished this, and they did it without me pushing them every step of the way.  That was a better feeling than any award I’ve ever received.

And as we left the arena I heard a scout from another troop say, “Hey…I guess they are great.”  Yes there are…all of my scouts are great and I am thankful for getting to be a small part of their lives.

Summer Heat and Late Day Thunderstorms

Summer heat and late day thunderstorms often play havoc with my favorite outdoor activities. On an evening earmarked for mountain biking, a late day thunder boomer shut down my local single track. Once the storm had passed, the coolness of air begged me outside. I was still in need of some sort of outdoor fix to release tension of the day. I turned to my other outdoor passion, grabbed my five weight and headed to a local pond.

When I arrived, the pond was alive with activity.  Dragon flies buzzed and hovered, small bugs skirted across the water, turtles grabbed a breath, then headed back under the water.  As I watched, I noticed dimple after dimple…rise forms…caused by what I surmised were big bream. “A hatch,” I giddily said to myself. Something was definitely happening…there were some pushes from what looked like really big bream…probably bluegill or as the big ones are called “bull gills.”

I grabbed a flybox and looked through it.  I had to find a match for the hatch. There were some winged ants on the water and I guessed that’s what the fish were taking.  Several casts proved me wrong. I went with a small black and brown popper to match the small dragon flies I noticed, but again no takers. I was getting anxious…this was not a good way to relieve my stress.  I HAD to figure out what these fish were taking.

I decided that these fish were indeed feeding on the small dragon flies, but using some of my trout stream tactics when fish won’t take the dry fly version, I went with the “emerger” pattern. I figured that these fish were feeding on the bug as it was “hatching”. So I tied on a small black and brown wooly bugger and cast to a rise. I put the first cast right in the middle of the rings left from the rise. My line tightened immediately, but I wasn’t quick enough on the set. I casted at another rise and this time my timing was perfect. The rod bowed under the weight and for a moment I thought I was “under gunned.” Big bluegills fight well for their size…there’s an old adage among fly fishers that says, “if bluegills (or shell crackers, long ear, red breast or any other sunfish species, we often refer to as bream) got any bigger, I wouldn’t fish for anything else.”

After a few minutes I had the fish in hand…well not really…he was much bigger than my hand, nearly dinner plate size!  For the next hour I continued casting to rise forms and whacking the heck out of huge bluegills and shell cracker sunfish.  Now when I say big, I don’t mean “hand size.” I mean rod bending, drag pulling big ‘ole bream that use their dorsal fin spines, not as protection, but as a weapon! I couldn’t get my hand around most of these fish. On average they weighed a pound and a half, and a few were even bigger!

I don’t know how many of these fish I caught…I didn’t bother counting. I don’t know how long it lasted…I didn’t bother with my watch or cell phone. I just fly fished and it was just as rewarding as any trout stream or salt water flat I had ever fished. As the hatch ended and the dimples disappeared, I thought I had experienced fly fishing nirvana. I was wrong…nirvana was yet to come.

While the stress of the day had long left my muscles and mind, I was in fly fishing predator mode and was ready to catch more fish. As I pondered what to try now that fish had stopped rising, I realized that not a single largemouth bass found my fly…not even a small one. Something told me that the bass in the pond were ready to eat, now that the bream had left the buffet.

By now, the sun had set and darkness was making its way to the pond.  This is magic time for sportsmen. I tied on a stealth bomber…a surface bass bug I learned to tie earlier this year.  It has proven to be quite effective…this night proved no different.  I started working the fly along edges, near structure and even in the middle of the pond. Bass were apparently cruising.  Bass were apparently hungry.

The strikes ranged from subtle slurps to thrashing gulps. These were healthy largemouth bass…nice color and the iconic football shape.  While none of these fish put my biggest bass record in danger or fight quite as hard as their buddies that live in my revered Eno River, they did like to jump and pulled hard. I easily caught over a dozen in this thirty minute twilight period, the biggest going four pounds.

Then it was done. It was dark. I was thirsty. I headed home where my wonderful wife had kept back some dinner for me, which is no easy task with three teenage boys in the house.  Equally wonderful was the magic elixir of malted grains that accompanied my late dinner, a great way to end the day. And while I probably didn’t burn as many calories as I may have shredding single track, it was good to be blessed with such a great fly fishing evening.

And that’s the point of this story…I feel blessed every time I’m lucky enough to catch a fish on the fly. I don’t even need pictures to prove it. Fly fishing is always exciting, whether it’s bass and bream from a local pond or bones and big permit from an exotic flat. I don’t bad mouth any fish I catch on the fly, it’s bad karma.  Maybe that’s why I’ve been on a roll this year. As long as I get to fly fish, it will always be a great year fishing, but so far this year has also been a great year catching.

I hope it continues especially when I head off to one of my favorite fly fishing trips of the year when I get to combine biking on the New River trail with fly fishing for river smallies!