BilletHead

Bummer, I was there yesterday with my uncle in my jet. Put in at Aldrich. There was quite a few people along the banks. Too bad there are some that are not responsible for their actions. I have used the Taylor launch before but constantly worried about my rig there. BilletHead

Green sunfish but the markings are cool, leutistic maybe? Yea i am not sure how to spell that word . BilletHead

Well done young Man! The BilletHead's found 43 keepers this morning. Will post the haul later today. BilletHead

Not sure about the veggie garden but they work the heck out of the perennial flowers we have going. I think they do more for our well being and the entertainment they provide is priceless.

Hey Tho1mas! One showed up in Vernon County. No not here but at my Mom's a few miles away . It will be nice to hear the masses around our feeders this summer. BilletHead

Hey John, Remember a blind hog finds an acorn now and again. That's how I stumble on most of my birds . BilletHead

Awhile back I scattered assorted lettuce seed in some of our tubs. Had a plan, So after pulling the buckets off the tomatoes we began to transplant the little lettuce starts into the tomato bed between the spaced out tomato plants. As fast as the lettuce is growing I think it will be harvest-able before it losses the light from the tomato plants. Will it work? Then put in a few more tomato plants. Will cover another night. Saying a low of forty but hey weather man has lied before, Billethead

Good question Thom1as, I really do not remember when ours show up so I checked the conservation calendar. Says the 11th. Missouri bird book says the middle of this month. Looks like you are on the ball. Mrs. BilletHead says she will get a feeder out today:). Thanks for the reminder. BilletHead

32 right now in billetHeadville. Buckets on the plants we have out. A few more degrees and off they will come and we will see if they made it. I know we have had some early warm ups this season but cools fronts too. Feels like it is dragging out too long. 15th is our average last frost. One nice thing here. Went to bed early, still sleeping on the screened porch. Went to sleep listening to turkeys on the roost, Awakened to the same sound. In between if we were awake the coyotes were howling. Life is pretty good here right now . BilletHead

Well Mr. Slinger we got the rain. There is hope now for the high ground BilletHead

I guess in vocabulary terms. I like simple like UM Fire good. Right out of the dirt or woods. Shot out of the sky. Kill it and Grill it. Wok and Roll. Hey that squirrel is a young one not too tough. Grocery shopping right here in my backyard or the neighbors . Maybe better release that bass and not eat it or Mitch will have my hide and want his crawdads back! I was hoping you were afraid of your aged steaks. I was going to offer to try them for you, No fancy cooking terms in BilletHeadville's house. Might say hey honey does this smell all right? BilletHead

Simple but elegant Mr. RPS, Some of your stuff is light years ahead of this. Life is pretty good here in BilletHeadville right now, Marty

Hey that looks pretty good there Ness BUT I think i may of had a few more morels that you did . Going to call this the hunter gatherer farmer meal. My paleo roots gave me the mallard hunted part, yes the BilletHead's are having duck again cooked over a fire. Um fire good! Then the gathered part was wild fungus of the morel variety. Salad from the garden so farmed. Oh yes some foraged wild asparagus in the greens. So I have covered some traits of mankind in the past. Will add a cold brew in a frosty glass. My taste buds have been tickled and my tummy is so happy right now, BilletHead

Nice mess you have there Ness Ok I have had enough with the plants indoors. The light table had become too dangerous and was about ready to go over being balanced on buckets and boards. Transferred the plants outside on the porch. Some of the tomato plants have made it to 28 inches from the top of the pots. These buckets are taller than standard five gallon ones. Please someone kick my rear is I want to plant seeds too early! Just had to try and get some maters in the ground. I dug a trench with post hole diggers and laid most of the plant horizontal in the trench, then gave the stem a gentle sweep to the surface leaving just 25 percent of the plant above the surface. Now I have a bed of black krim going. Short enough that buckets can cover a couple of weeks in case of a frost, Lettuce still growing like gangbusters, Went ahead a put in a couple of peppers too, Finally a skink giving a pose BilletHead

Sure is dry in the woods. Managed a mess though. Higher places are way too dry to grow any. Underbrush thick and I think we did not see many and went right by some. Some photos of the hunt. Hard to tell by the photo here but one was way back in briars and multi flora rose. I had to hack my way in with the machete,slice off the morel with that machete, scoop it on the tip of the long knife and balance and pull it out. Still bloodied my arm in the retrieve. A couple more shroom views and the daily haul, These were in great shape, not full of bugs and ants. All they needed was dusting off with the mushroom brush and split. Yes there is a brush made for cleaning mushrooms. I have one but a toothbrush works, BilletHead

I can see those on sinking line just floating right off the bottom. When I made and tried I used floating line and did catch some nice pond bass. I think in certain depths of water floating line can do just as well. Not on these wiggle minnows but weighted flys. Last week the Mrs. and I made our first trip to the Spring River in OK. Water temp 54-56. Went to the first shoal and really got into the nice female white bass. They hit in anywhere from on a cut bank in a foot of water to the middle of the run in five foot of water. She was using floating and I was using sink tip. At one time I had a call on the cell and she hit three in a row as I was talking. We quit at noon because of the wind. Fun times. Now to yesterday forum member curtisce met me in Joplin and we went. Fished the first two shoals. Caught 40 to 50 whites but all were males. Milting all over the boat as we hauled them in. Both of us were using sink tip. We caught them against the bank as soon as the clouser hit the water to again no more than five foot deep. We seen a young man catching whites using a float with a jig maybe a foot or more deep. So in certain places in shallow depths floating would be just fine. Some action picts from yesterday. BilletHead

Yowzer! Nice catch and congrats to the angler, good job, BilletHead

Those look nice Ronnie, Have made a couple but need to work up some more. Were they using sinking line on those? Been messing with the shuttlecocks more. Got out the copic pen air brush. Tying them in white and then hitting them with the brush two toning them. Have made a dozen more after these. Incorporating big rattles into them too. BilletHead

OK we will test train you Ness. A shock collar, a leash and some woods filled with fungus. In all seriousness I did stumble on four nice morels next to the house this morning. Looked in a known patch,nothing then headed back and almost did a face plant tripping over them. Suppose it was primal instinct not to step on them

Not saying these guys have a dog trained to do this but canines have a great sense of smell. Some dogs are so domesticated some of their senses have been bread out. Remember dogs are predators and use senses to hunt. Dogs are now trained to sense glucose levels being companions to children with diabetes. Alerting parents of these children. Now dogs are being trained to sense cancer. Just seen where they were using plasma from non ovarian cancer and diagnosed ovarian cancer patients. The dog in question could pick out the ones that had the cancer. I think this is highly possible to train a dog for the purpose of morel hunting. We as humans once had much better sensory organs being hunter gatherers. I personally have a great sense of smell where Mrs. BilletHead does not. How many times have you been walking along, smell something and sniff a little harder throwing the nose a little higher in the air? You do it by habit not even knowing you do it. I don't even go into the cleaning, detergent section in wally world as it sets me on end. Heck I can smell a elderly grey blue haired lady with that artificial nose sinus piercing perfume half way across the store. Just like designer dogs we have had our senses bread out of us over time. That and we don't depend on a lot of those senses anymore. BilletHead

Nice trip report Ronnie, We visited with Jeff yesterday. Checked out the rig on the way into the expo and then again on the way out. Nice rig! It was nice to see old friends and make some new ones.Glad you guys got out. Jeff said there was going to be an afternoon trip, BilletHead

Have some pretty nice patches. Would gladly trade an asparagus patch for a morel patch . Like to see your reports Slab, BilletHead

None morels in my spots but the Mrs. did find a fist full of wild asparagus on her way home from work! BilletHead

Have a neighbor across the road from BilletHeadville. He bought the farm I have hunted from the winter of 1975 through about 2008. When the owner passed her airs not getting along too well decided to sell. The place had changed hands two other times before this new owner. He had had it now about two years. This younger fellow in his early forties bought it for hunting with some contract farm ground to be rented out. He we will call him "B" knows what he is doing as he had taken some impressive whitetails here in Missouri and Kansas with both bow and muzzle loader. Couldn't ask for a better neighbor. When I realized this I gave him the scoop of what I had learned over all these years over there and what I know about this side of the road. We share trail cam photos from each side and compare notes. B has graced the cover of North American Whitetails, and video records his hunts. Although we don't chase the deer like we used to when we were possessed with hunting them it is neat we still get a couple every year and B is making the potential for larger bucks by management . We visit all the time and he shows me what he does over there. There are a half dozen food plots, he has planted apple trees, and has protein feeders in the off season. He has leased farms other places but this is his baby. The other day he texted and asked if I had a brush hog for my little tractor, yes I do want to use it? A pause then a text back well would you like to brush hog the power line cut food plot for me? Sure if I can get my toy tractor going I will see what I can do? Would help out anyway we can. He lets us pass through his place to hunt adjoining farms. Spring turkey season if he isn't hunting he lets us help ourselves to his place and birds! I have a little worn out 8-N ford. When Mrs. BilletHead's father passed we had a sale to pay his debts and we bought the ford. It burns and leaks oil but run's most of the time. Today I added oil and gas and got it running. Hooked up the mower and made like a farmer and head to the plot. This is where it gets funny. He has clover under the turnips. Places you cannot see the clover as it is hidden from these huge monster turnips. As I drove over the giant lumps the rotten ones would explode under the tires and the solid ones would be like rocks and try to throw me off my seat. Second gear and wound up the throttle the brush hog whirred to life with turnip shrapnel and vegetation flying around. I laughed as I drove hanging on for my dear life. The carnage is hard to explain. Like the jolly green giant had puked, or spilled his giant salad. Maybe a tribe of vegetarian zombies had been attacked bu a ninja samurai wielding his blade slicing and dicing the heads of the living dead. My imagination went as wild as my ride through the plot. I could feel stuff hitting my neck, hat and back. When I had finished I smelled like rotten turnips, pulled off my sweatshirt and it was splattered with brown and green. Took some photos although they don't do justice to the amount of turnips laying all over the ground. I would imaging some of them were pitched into the nearby woods. i even managed to miss his new planted apple trees. Solid turnips slice nicely with big rotating blades too, BilletHead who slices and dices!

Ha! That will teach me to keep up with Ness The Mess ! BilletHead