Blake Richard
Recent Stories
Hardwoood Hearings
If not for having seen a wood duck open its wings to unburden most everyone, I too would be a carnation which fell shut without knowing the unmitigated piles of attraction under the sun. Their overwhelming beauty blossoms into my constant pursuit of their company.
Conservation on point
It’s frequent that complete human lifetimes elapse without ever setting eyes on a brood of American woodcock (woodcock). Even those lifetimes spent tearing through the trunks with an over/under that also weave through stands of young timber in the spring can come up empty in stumbling across a hen woodcock on a nest or hunkered down with her brood.
Diving to make a difference
On each cast, there’s a risk to be run should a crankbait catch a rock, weed, log or ... toilet, treadmill, washer and dryer. A lot of anglers, dare I say nearly all, have left some kind of fishing equipment hooked to the bottom as their line snaps on a snag.
Hardwoood Hearings
The target island was there, I just couldn’t see it. My waning headlamp batteries only saw about as far as down to my feet, sinking in the silt. The little light accentuated my one ungloved hand, but didn’t extend far enough to reach the island across the slough.
Drumming surveys help with population trends in ruffed grouse
The thumping wings of a drumming ruffed grouse are unmistakable to the ears that embrace their sound during the spring. It’s an event more often heard than seen through the thick cover of young forests, and a great deal of help in estimating the population across the state.
Hardwoood Hearings
Remind me, sky, of my tilted footprints beneath your drenching upset stomach bound to the brim of my ball cap. Spit back out each smile that accompanied the atmospheric rivers who thrust castaway driftwood upon the sandy barrier beside the Bay.
Long-tailed ducks on Lake Michigan
A study recently published in The Journal of Wildlife Management explained how researchers on Lake Michigan conducted a long-tailed duck hunter survey out of Two Rivers to help address a lack of harvest information and discuss management implications for the species. It was part of a larger study of long-tailed ducks on Lake Michigan that began nearly a decade ago.
Hardwoood Hearings
A lot of the nooks and crannies in my frictionally wrinkled life are filled with duck calls. They call to me and I hear their voices between the spinning helter skelter as I wait for fall every year.
Preliminary tribal fish harvest in Oneida and Vilas
In the preliminary data collected by the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC), tribal fish harvest in Vilas and Oneida counties was estimated at 17,780 walleye and 149 muskie. Harvest ran from April 10 through May 15, and finalized numbers will be official in July.
