Our Outdoors

Our Outdoors: The Shift is On By Nick Simonson   The flock rose and fell like a slow pulse, banking and turning against the southerly gusts. They made the sky look like static on an old black and white TV screen long after the daily programming had stopped and the national anthem signaled the end of the broadcast day.  The growing crowd standing with me alongside the rapidly-shrinking snow piles in the brown, muddy parking lot of the tree nursery at the edge of town began estimating the number of snow geese that squeaked and honked just to the north […]

Our Outdoors: The Ice Derby By Nick Simonson   There’s something mind-boggling about a couple hundred, or a couple thousand, or maybe more than 10,000 anglers huddled on the ice, staring at their bobbers, electronics and the slush melting around their one hole; hopefully that lucky spot in a grid of many, many similar holes.  The fact that ice gets thick enough to support that many people, vehicles, RV-based weigh stations, on-ice restaurants and tiki bars, even in this winter which has lost much of its punch in the last few weeks, is what carries us, both literally and figuratively, […]

Our Outdoors: All Natural By Nick Simonson   These days, it seems as if all companies are selling the world on food that’s non-GMO, preservative-free, contains no artificial colors and is all-natural, in an attempt to hook consumers on a “better-for-you” option.  If it looks like it came from a pristine garden, is minimally processed, or would be something you’d eat right off the tree or from the ground, their bet is that you will buy it and more importantly, feel good about it in this age where the Big Mac is still a top seller and most of us […]

Our Outdoors: Midseason Electronic Edges By Nick Simonson   The rush of first ice is in the rear view mirror, and that stretch of more challenging mid-winter fishing is underway.  While February marks the traditional seasonal slowdown in on-ice action in the upper Midwest, the midseason doldrums rarely prevent anglers from making their way out after fish.  Heightened technology specifically designed for ice fishing is a primary reason why, even during the tough middle stretch of winter, many anglers can find more success than in past years and can still locate aggressive fish that rival the early season bite, or […]

Our Outdoors: More to Come By Nick Simonson With the blue tent cover flipped over us and the ice hole before him meticulously cleaned after an entertaining five minutes of scooping, my nearly three-year-old son A.J. was receptive to dropping his first wriggling minnow down the silver-blue cylinder toward the gravelly bottom below. I clicked open the bail on the reel while he held the cork-and-electrician-tape handle and the yellow foam bobber hit the slush free surface of the eight-inch circle with a plop and his small split shot and fathead spiraled down the hole.  He laughed as the foam […]

Our Outdoors: The League By Nick Simonson   Case upon case of 12 gauge shells piled up in the safe room at the trap club as a line of volunteers – some of them fellow coaches, some parents and some shooters – daisy-chained the 100 brown boxes of ammo through the snow to their resting place along the wall.  While it will remain there for a few more months until the spring league kicks off on April 3, it serves as a sign that what will surely be the nation’s biggest shooting sports season isn’t far away.  With one introductory […]

Our Outdoors: Get a Bead On It By Nick Simonson When it comes to fast moving water, or big fish lurking below the school, nothing gets an angler down to business like the addition of a heavy, flashy bead at the front of a fly.  Whether it is a rapidly-flowing stream harboring trout in deeper pockets or tucked into the slow water of pools several feet deep, or the larger panfish that occupy the bottom strata of the group in a lake or a pond, a bead helps get traditional fly offerings down to these fish and set off strikes […]

Our Outdoors: A Perfect Reminder By Nick Simonson   We were five-for-seven heading into the homeward turn of a slough on a year end pheasant hunt.  Seemingly every rooster that got up in shooting range went down in shooting range.  The couple that escaped did so by the very fibers of their long tailfeathers which waggled in the breeze after some amazing evasive maneuvers. It was a great afternoon patrolling the frozen doughnut sloughs with rings of cover around solid icy middles that seemed to hold a bird in every fifteen minutes or so of walking.   Despite the incredible […]

Our Outdoors: The Late Season Experience By Nick Simonson   The end of the year provides unique opportunities to put a bow on hunting adventures and taking advantage of those chances to get outdoors, whenever they come and whatever the conditions are, gives one last look at an autumn gone by and excitement for next year’s time in the field. Christmas weekend provided one such opportunity for my visiting brother and me on a large chunk of public land just a few miles down the road. The bone chilling cold of the past few weeks had frozen the swampy surface […]