Summer crawls away in ripe tomatoes, picking blueberries, and one final warm rain. Fall strolls in on the heels of the first frost. Geese honking over head refresh the memories of spring goslings and draw my thoughts into a wedge migration of adult birds going south.

Giant birds of soft muted tones, but powerful flyers. They leave, I stay.

Where do I go first in staying home? The duck marsh? A wooded path for grouse? Last Saturday was the big fall walleye bash with as much enthusiasm for me and the guy I fished with as the opener in May. Same guy, two different trips with the same intensity regardless of spring or fall. Walleyes were generous in quantity in the spring and size in the fall. We were frozen to the bone on both trips this year.

Yesterday was about blue skies and roaring rivers with sweat and wind from an unusually warm fall day. Salmon headed up stream for there final hurrah. We met them, we caught them and they will be smoked and eaten. They will be gone and I get to go home to my fireplace night after night as winter approaches.

I look with anticipation to this up coming Saturday. My daughter wants to “shoot grouse” as she puts it. This is a new beginning for us as father-daughter. She has been “working in clay birds” and dinning on recent ruffed grouse success. I brag about the birds and she will not tolerate having to eat what I provide. She’s gonna put dinner on the table and with a bit of her own strut. She’s cocky in the kitchen. Will see when the feathered birds fly if she’s as flustered as the rest of us when wings erupt from under the cocker spaniels nose.

I have most of the winter’s fireplace wood cut and stacked, but not all. I don’t mow my summer lawn or cut all my winter wood at once either. In my house the two of us love the smell of fresh cut grass. So I mow one half, one day, and then finish the other half of the yard, two days later. We get two helpings of the verdant aroma.

It’s the same with my wood pile. All summer I shop trees that look good for winter wood. I haul last winters storm damage into my timber landing. Some ash, birch, spruce or poplar all mixed like a fruit cocktail for the wood boiler to feast on. Every stove loading gets a top log of birch to incense the yard. That’s the only smoking on our property I do not get an earful about. The smoke goes up, the wood is reduced to ash but I’m still here.

I'm still here.

Not to sound macabre, but when I’m like the flown geese or the burnt firewood I want to make my final flight in the fall. Hopefully many autumns from now, but it’s my time of the year. I was born in the fall. I like the clothes I get to wear and the food. The leaves and the chill. I can’t have enough starlit campfires. So when Im gonna leave, I’d like to make my exit during what I consider my season.

Not sure about the weather for my final day. Do I want a storm tossed duck marsh with a tumultuous sky for a, somebody better notice salute? Should it be a soft blue skied day with leaves fluttering to the ground as I slip the bonds of earth? Maybe one of the Winnie the pooh and the blustery day kinda days. Breezy, leafy, with clouds bound for somewhere else. Hey, I’m planning on going up, so I would like to pass through some of the clouds on my way by.

I gotta remember if I get any inkling to make sure I’m wearing one of my chamois shirts. Would love my last meal to be duck breast slathered with fresh cranberries sauce. Topped of course with a strong dash of Irish whiskey from “me partin' glass”. Saints for give me, but if I went with one of those little chocolate flavored cigars that would pretty much cover it.

Then there’s the tough stuff. Does anyone see me? I think I’m gonna hope everyone’s busy just enjoying the crisp day and I go for a stroll. I'm not looking for a lot of drama when I check out.

Well I can’t control any of it. I have hoped for fish, good days in a duck blind and a nice fat white tailed buck. If I’ve been very fortunate on all that stuff, I’m hoping like the leaves now falling for an autumn close for me. If I get St Patty, instead of St Peter, on my last day I may get my wish, because, I’m still here.

Trout Whisperer

Inside the Mind of a Guide

Living the Dream in God's Country - Superior National Forest

Join author, professional guide, and master storyteller, Karl "Trout Whisperer" Seckinger, as he takes you on a 20 year, mystical journey into the Superior National Forest.

On this CD, Trout Whisperer's unique manner of storytelling, and digital sound effects, will transport you on a journey that will place you in the heart of the 'super natural forest' that is known as the Superior National Forest.

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