Did You know - outdoor edition

[Don P]

We've been enjoying berry sorbets the past few weeks. A simple syrup and lightly smushed black, blue or wineberries, or tooty fruitti. Throw it in the little electric ice cream churn, multiple brain freezes later I still dig in too fast  :D. A splash of vodka makes it smoother by breaking up the ice crystals. A friend carries it to the margarita end of that range.

[WV Sawmiller]

   Did you know a baboon is not listed as an ape? He is listed as in the monkey family. Apes are tailless primates and include gorillas, chimps, gibbons, orangutans, and bonobos. Humans are generally not described as apes but I sometimes wonder (especially after our last family reunion). They are in the hominoid family with gorillas and chimps.

[KEC]

I'm probably opening a can of worms or hitting a hornet nest with a short stick, but I believe what some say that humans behave much like chimps. They are prone to trying to gain dominance through violence and intimidation, among other things. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   I don't know but if you have ever held and felt the hand and fingers of a 6 month old baby chimp or looked closely into the eyes of a gorilla or chimp you will be shaken. Trust me - there is something there besides animal instincts. 

[HemlockKing]

Since I don't like human babies hopefully it wouldn't be to much alike lol as long as there is no screeches or tantrums I guess. 

[HemlockKing]

I'm not sure I'd wanna get up close with a adult chimp either, they are known to just absolutely shred prey or animals up just for fun. Recently I seen a video of a raccoon that got into a chimp enclosure at a zoo. Boy was he in for a ride! They threw that thing around at a wall and sure had fun with it!

[WV Sawmiller]

    Did you know gorillas can climb trees? Most people know the small ones readily climb trees but until we had the opportunity to observe gorillas with the WWF researchers in the Central African Republic (CAR) I did not know even a huge 500 lb silverback can and will readily shinny 100' up into a huge jungle tree. We watched the silverback do that to collect some kind of orange fruit that was growing in the CAR jungle. I remember watching the silverback and my wife and some of the other trackers were watching a juvenile about 6 y/o and suddenly they just burst out laughing. Evidently junior climbed way up in a tree, grabbed a vine and did a "George of the Jungle" act and swung right into  another tree. When I saw him he was hanging by one arm 40 ft above ground looking sort of embarrassed and trying to catch his breath. It looked just like something a human child of similar age would have done. When he was not climbing trees the juvenile would sit by a termite or ant nest and poke a stick into the entrance and wait a minute till the stick was completely covered with insects then he would casually slide the stick between his lips lick them off then repeat. He looked totally at ease the whole time. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   Did you know rainbow trout are considered invasive species in Yellowstone and several years ago we were out there on a vacation and discovered fishermen were advised not to return them to the streams if they should catch one? They were to either keep it or kill it. I think the rainbows were causing problems with the native brown or other trout species.

[JJ]

Brown trout are not native to N America either.  Imported from Europe.  

     JJ

[Ljohnsaw]

Brown trout are not native to N America either.

Hence the full name (at least what we know them as) German Brown Trout

[WV Sawmiller]

  I may have been wrong about the term brown trout. I was not fishing and the fishermen I talked with just said something about native trout and I assumed they were brown trout. I never realized brown trout were imported. Then again, I am not a trout fisherman. 

   I fish for bream (Mostly bluegills) with a pole, flyrod and cork popping bug, jig and/or spinner and sometime crappie using similar tackle and I use set lines usually with live bream for bait for catfish.

   I like to eat rainbow trout when I get the chance. Same with Walleye which I also don't fish for. 

[Ljohnsaw]

There is no comparison between Brown and hatchery Rainbows when evaluating intelligence/cunning and flavor.  The hatchery bows are just dumb and bland.  Still fun to catch.  Now natives, maybe they were talking about brookies.  Very prolific and the competition for food amongst them limits their growth.  Out here, there is a 5 per day, 10 in possession on all trout except brookies.  They have a separate possession limits - like 10 or 15 in some areas - to reduce the numbers.

[beenthere]

WV
Cutthroat trout is the native trout for Yellowstone, I believe.

[WDH]

That is what I remember too from all my days as a youth reading Field & Stream. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   Did you know that one of the most popular panfish people target in the Everglades is the Oscar - yep, the same one you buy in the pet stores for your aquarium? Evidently they got too big for people's aquariums and they released them into the local streams and canals and such and they seem to be reproducing and thriving. The biggest ones I saw there seemed to be around a pound or so. 

   The fishing I saw in the Everglades was generally along the cross Florida highway (Highway 41) where they dug up fill along the way for the roadbed leaving canals along side the road that are full of fish, alligators and water birds. In most places the water seemed fairly shallow but we were there in March at the peak of the dry season. People would stop beside the road and most used cane poles with a jig head on a monofilament line and used a worm or piece of cut bait on the jig hook. In most cases they could see the fish in the clear water so they would drop their bait right in front of it. Goggle-eyes and Oscars seemed to be mostly what people were catching although I suspect a lot of small largemouth bass were caught too.

   You had to be very careful where you stepped as there seemed to be an alligator sunning himself on the bank every 100' or so as during the dry season the only significant amounts of water seem to be these canals and an occasional water hole out if the grass created by the alligators as a den area.

[WV Sawmiller]

  Did you know native American tribes used to eat acorns? They would collect and hull out the meat, pound and dry it then soak it several times in water to leach out the tannic acid. I visited a nearby reconstructed Indian Village (Wolf Creek Indian Village near Bastion VA) and the guide there once told us local Indians did the same thing with buckeyes. I had never heard of buckeye being eaten but they are a much larger nut with a soft shell.

[WDH]

According to William Bartram, a botanist who traveled thru Georgia in the late 1760's, the native Americans would collect hickory nuts, smash them, boil them, and the oil from the nuts would float on top to be skimmed off. He called it "hickory milk".  They added this fat to the acorn flour to make a "johnnycake" type cake/biscuit.  

[Tacotodd]

According to William Bartram, a botanist who traveled thru Georgia in the late 1760's, the native Americans would collect hickory nuts, smash them, boil them, and the oil from the nuts would float on top to be skimmed off. He called it "hickory milk".  They added this fat to the acorn flour to make a "johnnycake" type cake/biscuit.  

 Did you know native American tribes used to eat acorns? They would collect and hull out the meat, pound and dry it then soak it several times in water to leach out the tannic acid. I visited a nearby reconstructed Indian Village (Wolf Creek Indian Village near Bastion VA) and the guide there once told us local Indians did the same thing with buckeyes. I had never heard of buckeye being eaten but they are a much larger nut with a soft shell.

I have to admit, these 2 are great information. I knew about the acorn trick but not about the hickory nuts, that was great!

This entire thread has been full of interesting stuff, because it's all the facts of life! I LOVE it.

[WV Sawmiller]

  Smashing and boiling the hickory nuts sounds like a good idea if they were able to get the goody out of them that way. Actually the acorn Johnny cake made with hickory nut milk sounds pretty tasty. That with stone ground grits, fresh wild honey and some venison sausage make me wonder how the Europeans ever conquered this country.

   I was always convinced a squirrel used more energy cutting a hickory nut than he got out of eating one. Kind of like cutting swamp cabbages.

   Which reminds me - When the Europeans moved here they found a society where the men hunted and fished all day and the women did all the rest of the manual labor and the Europeans thought they could improve on this society. What were they thinking! :

[WDH]

I don't think your last paragraph will win you any sensitivity awards....

[WV Sawmiller]

Danny,

 I was just pointing out what should have been patently obvious to everyone.

 I have told the tale of a day trip up the Dibamba River in Cameroon near Douala where I came across three local Africans who had been running a trotline and were paddling a heavy plank built boat about 20' long up a swift black water jungle river. There were 2 men and one woman and the men were kicked back relaxing while the woman did all the paddling - and she had to have been at least 7 months pregnant.

  Since she only needed one paddle, I went ahead about bought one of the others for a souvenir.


It is still downstairs and is at least 8' long.

 Being the true gentleman that I am, I did have my boat captain tow then half a mile up river to their village.

  I have thought many times about trading Becky in on an African wife who still retains the proper attitude and training on how to treat a husband! :D

[ellmoe]

Howard , don't mention this to your wife before I get a chance to meet you . I don't plan on packing funeral clothes!  ;D

[WDH]

You are getting worse, not better.  Like when one digs one's own hole deeper. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   The problem with marrying properly trained Asian and African wives is when you bring them home the other American women take it on as their number one mission in life to change them and before long you you find yourself warming up TV dinners in a microwave, eating canned soup or eating canned biscuits and such. :(

[WV Sawmiller]

   Did you know there are differences in the way people skin a deer in the south/east coast and out west and in the far North? We typically hang the deer by the heels from a convenient tree limb or beam on the barn or shed, tractor fork, and I have even used a ladder. Out west it seems people skin and quarter the animal on the ground using the skin as a ground cloth to keep the meat off the ground. I assume this is mostly because there are fewer convenient trees out west and I know an elk, moose or bison and possibly even a mule deer are much larger than our whitetails and would be much harder to lift without a winch or mechanical equipment. Also we typically hang the animal by its heels while hanging them head up seems popular.

I watched Masai tribesmen in Africa skinning a cow on its hide laying on the ground and Mongolian herders in Mongolia doing the same thing with a sheep they were skinning.

The best skinning rack I ever saw was installed behind the hunting camp I used to hunt at in southern Ala It was mounted on top of cut off telephone poles about 10' above the ground on about a 3" diameter shaft in a pillow block bearing. The end was welded to an old hay rake wheel with 2 open hooks in the middle with 2 braided ropes with loops in one end and S-hooks on the other end. We'd throw the loop on the rope on the hook on the shaft, hook the S-hook in the deer's rear tendons and start rolling the hay rake wheel. We set it up so the rope wound outward as you wound upward which spread the deer apart the higher you lifted. We had a short chain with a hook on the pole and when you wanted to stop you could hook the anchor hook in a hayrake spoke and it would prevent the wheel from unwinding and would hold the deer in place. When you wanted to raise or lower just move the anchor hook and wind up or down as appropriate. A small kid could crank up and very big deer and it would have easily lifted a big cow if we'd wanted to use it for such.