The cat butler is away on one of his silly hikes, so what better time to sneak a peek at some of the entries received so far in the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette fish-story contest?
The CB thinks the stories are safe in the vault here at fish-story central, but I, Boat Dock, can easily pick the lock with my lethal claw. We have a good stack of stories and there's still time to enter the contest. Let's review.
We'll take entries of true fishing stories through May 31. Your story can be about something that happened while fishing yesterday or yesteryear, on salt water or fresh, at destinations near or far. Email your story to [email protected] or snail mail it to Fish Story Contest, Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette, 2560 N. Lowell Road, Springdale, Ark., 72764. Be sure to include your name, where you live and a daytime phone number.
In June, we'll announce the winner right here in Outdoors. We'll publish the winning story with a picture of the author, along with several other entries. Our champion not only basks in fish-story fame, but gets a nice selection of fishing lures almost guaranteed to catch the big one at your favorite lake.
OK, the lock is picked. Let's look at some stories.
Talk about waters far away. Here's one from a fish-story scribe in West Fork who tells of a fishing adventure in Africa, on an island off the coast of Zanzibar. And get this. Her saga took place after she climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. Now that's a vacation.
There's even a photo of a boat the locals use. Not a trolling motor or depth finder to be found. No need in the beautiful, clear ocean water and beaches of white sand. Fine as that is, the author is happy to be back in West Fork.
We don't get a lot of stories about gar fishing, but here's a great one by an author from Prairie Creek about catching the mother, or maybe the father, of all gar. Not only that, our scribe writes that the catch was made with two ping-pong paddles and a net.
It's easy to see why the contest is for true fish stories. You can't make this stuff up.
Here's a fine story written in long hand. We always like to get those. Running a trotline is one of the best ways to catch catfish. Imagine the surprise for this fish-story author from Lincoln when he found a 112-pound snapping turtle on his line. The turtle was evidently after a blue catfish also on the trotline.
It was all part of a camping-fishing adventure in Woodruff County long ago.
So there you have a little teaser of the stories we've received so far. Sort of like when the cat butler gives me one treat nugget. We've got some dandy stories, and we look forward to having yours in the contest.
Boat Dock is feline outdoors columnist for the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. His column appears when he feels like writing one. Write to Boat Dock on his Facebook page.
Sports on 05/21/2015