More paddlefish

You requested more pictures so here they are. These should give a better look at the "paddle" part. They have huge mouths with no teeth and eat in similar fashion to a whale by filtering small bugs, plankton, algea type things from the water.

I also found out that I gave some bad information before and they are located in a lot more places than I was told. This map indicates their habitat in the U.S.

Paddlefishing

I know what your thinking, "What in the world is a paddlefish?" Well, it is an ancient type of fish that is only found in a few select places around the world, mainly Montana and a river in China.

Once a year, for a couple of weeks people are alowed to try and catch a paddlefish. We thought it would be great fun to take our boy scout troop out for this rare opportunity. So myself and two other leaders packed up 15 boy scouts and hit the road for an overnight stay near the Yellowstone river just outside of the city of Glendive, MT.


The process of fishing for paddlefish is no simple matter. Paddlefish do not eat during their spawning season, so you can't entice them to bite a hook. No, the means of catching one are much more primitive, you have to snagg them. You take a size 8 treble hook, attach 5 ounces of lead to it, and throw it out into the river, then yank on the line and real like a mad man so you can yank it again. Hopefully somewhere in this process a paddle fish gets in the way and your hook will get caught on it. More than likely you end up getting snagged on a rock or log that is under water. Once you go hook one, then the fight begins. A paddle fish can weigh any where from 19 to 110 pounds, with the females tending to be much larger than the males. Trying to catch one can be quite physically tiring.


Anyway, it really is something that not many people will get a chance to experience in their lifetime, so we thought is would be great fun for the boys. Saddly, we were not successfull and went home empty handed, but we sure had some fun doing it.

Here is what a paddlefish looks like. Notice the long flat snout

that looks like a boat oar, hence the name paddlefish.

The first order of buisness was to set up camp. It rained the entire way there, so we were pleasantly surprised that we had fairly mild conditions for camping.

With some large hooks and heavy pieces of lead flying around, the river bank would get a little crowded, so here some of our scouts are waiting their turn to try.

This young man is about half the size of the pole we had to use. I thought it was very telling of how tiring it can be trying to catch a paddlefish.

Here I am trying to instruct one of the boys. I spent most of my time teaching and tying on new hooks and wieghts, so I did not get much of a chance to fish, but I had a lot of fun anyway.

Ori what?

Origami, the ancient art of paper folding is one of my hobbies. A few years go my wife bought me a calander for my desk at work that was a different origami pattern everyday. I abosolutley loved it, and am always looking to learn new patterns. Well, I came across a pattern the other day that really interested me. A dragon. I have seen some pretty amazing things folded out of paper, but these are two of my favorites that I can make.

Dragon -- I have always had a facination with dragons.

Frog -- I ecpecially love this one becasue it is very complicated to fold and is different than most frog patterns.

Here are a coupe of amazing ones that I did not make. Maybe some day though.