A "Steak" Out at the Ninnescah

With beauty like this, you'd think that creatures might want never to leave.

But we have five cow-calf pairs who keep exploring life outside the pasture fences. We've rounded them up and put them back. This story has been on repeat - morning and evening - for days. I told Randy we needed to do a "stake out" like on TV cop shows. Maybe this kind of surveillance is more appropriately a "steak" out.

Randy has spent a whole lot of time repairing fence, but once cattle have had their culinary equivalent of "prime rib" - in the form of tender soybean plants - they're willing to "leap tall buildings in a single bound" - or at least, hop some fences. Randy watched them do it while he was working on said fence.

This morning, our neighbor will bring his portable corrals and another helper. Hopefully, the four of us will complete the round-up successfully, and we'll take the five pair of offenders back home. Serves them right that they will be leaving the expansive pasture for a smaller lot at home, don't you think?

One night, we'd planned to go fishing at the Ninnescah. And even though it was delayed for a little while while we went back home for 4-wheelers and fencing supplies, we eventually dropped lines in the water.

Correction: Randy dropped lines in the water. I did more wandering and clicking shot after shot on my camera.

 I'd say we were both successful. Randy caught a 6-pound catfish. 

 

 He also caught a soft-shell turtle.

He released both the turtle and the fish back to the Ninnescah. 

And I captured a whole lot of beauty is a very unassuming place. 

These snow on the mountain wildflowers were abundant. They were beautiful whether close-up or with the lowering sun streaking across the prairie.

Because of our unexpected delay, we were there during the so-called photography "golden hour."

It's supposed to be an ideal time for photographs.

There's probably a good reason for the "golden hour" reputation.

There was time for a few more camera clicks as the sun sank lower ...

and lower ...

and lower.

It was a beautiful way to end a day.

I took the photos below the next morning to show that there are rule followers in every crowd. These cattle seem perfectly content to stay within the confines of the pasture fence. And, there is plenty to eat right there.

Let's hope they've avoid "talking" to the hooligans who are always out for an adventure.

Wish us luck getting those "repeat offenders" this morning!

Gone Fishin'

Gone fishin'

Instead of just a wishin'."

The song from the 1960s television show, The Sportsman's Friend, kept floating through my head as we headed toward the pasture at the Ninnescah. That little snippet was all I could remember of the lyrics (which, by the way, got a little annoying as it played over and over and over in my mind).

Believe me, I wasn't perched in front of the TV watching the show. I didn't grow up fishing. Sports time with our dad was much more likely to involve throwing or hitting a softball and dribbling or shooting a basketball.

 

But I live with a guy who has loved fishing all his life. Randy says that the TV show's host, Harold Ensley, came to Rock Springs 4-H Camp for a fishing program one year. The impressionable young 4-Hers went fishing every day after The Sportsman's Friend came to call.

I let my favorite fisherman do the "icky" stuff. Yes, he baited my hook with the beef liver we'd pulled from the freezer. (Just a side note: That's the only acceptable use for liver, in my book. No amount of onions can redeem it.)

Randy caught two fish.

 

I was one of those fishermen with a story about "the one who got away." Yes, I really had a big one on my line, but the line broke before Randy could scoop him into the net.

He lost a few, too. That's our story, and we're sticking to it - just like fishermen have been doing for time immemorial.

After my fish swam down the river, I was less interested in catching fish than "catching" the beauty of the evening on my camera. Patience is not one of my virtues. 

But clicking the shutter button on my camera is.

After Randy was done wielding the fishing pole, we took our 4-wheelers and checked on the cattle that we'd just delivered to the pasture earlier in the week.

They seemed to be enjoying their new summer digs.

What's not to like?

Child's Play

When I grow up, I want to be a little boy.

Joseph Heller

They may be balding. Their hair may be more "salt" than "pepper" these days. But somewhere beneath the hurting hips and slower step, there's a little boy just aching to get out.

Last week, Randy had an equipment breakdown, and I was several miles away at the grocery store. After he'd made his way to the road, he settled in to wait for me.

When I picked him up, he could hardly wait to get the door open to let me know he'd found an unexpected treasure. There were goldfish swimming in the ditch.

He assumes they made their way from the Rattlesnake Creek, just a half mile away or so. He thinks rains swept them away from the creek and into the ditch, where they congregated at the end of a driveway.

Earlier in the week at breakfast in town, he'd heard that the children who live in the nearby farmhouse had a budding business. The little entrepreneurs were selling the runaway fish to local fishermen. He's not sure what price they were fetching, but even with their salesmanship skills, there were still several fish left in the ditch.

A bigger goldfish with its flash of orange caught his eye.

But I was in the car and I was fresh out of any equipment deemed suitable for fishing.

Later in the day, however, we had to make a return trip to retrieve a pick up. And Randy went back prepared with an old coffee can and a 5-gallon bucket of fresh water. He was goin' fishing.

This expedition was a bit different than our adventure along the Ninnescah River earlier this summer. But he was no less excited.

With no rain for a couple of weeks, several of the fish had already succumbed to the lack of water. And most were just little fingerlings.

But then there were these beauties:

Randy could hardly wait to get them back to the farmstead to show Trevor, Jake's little boy who's a first grader. This real little boy was suitably excited about the great surprise from the "big little boy."

It reminded me of the goldfish that came to live at our house during a long-ago Kansas State Fair. Jill and her friend, Holly, had done their pretzel making demonstration at the 4-H building. The little brothers - Brent and Bradley - were along for the day.

To celebrate the girls' purple ribbon, our families went to the Midway, where the kids competed in a game of chance. And the prize? Goldfish.

Both families carefully carted home the wonderful treasures in plastic bags. I believe there was a detour and an investment in a small plastic aquarium and fish food before we set off for home. I don't remember how much money was spent on the game before all the kids were rewarded with their prizes. It probably would have been cheaper to buy fish at WalMart to begin with. But that wouldn't have been nearly as much fun now, would it?

The fish lived longer than the kids' interest in the fish lasted. I think Bradley's fish won the prize for ultimate longevity.

Even though our kids are grown and gone, I still am lucky enough to live with someone who can see the world with childlike wonder.

And that's a good thing.

If I needed any further confirmation of his lighthearted look at the world, the K-State game left no doubt. A family behind us had face paint, and the mom overheard Randy remarking to me about the kids' war paint.

She fixed him up with his own rather unique placement of Purple Pride.

In every real man, a child is hidden who wants to play.

Friedrich Nietzsche

And here is Exhibit A.

The Catch

Frying is usually banned at The County Line.

But there are exceptions to every rule, I suppose. After catching a mess of 14 catfish at the Ninnescah, it was a little hard to argue with the fisherman - especially when said fisherman was offering to clean all the fish and cook them.

I am all for sharing his top secret recipe. But it's a little hard to share something that he made up as he went along.

Since I didn't have any regular cornmeal in the pantry, he used a corn muffin mix as the base for his batter. If I get a vote, we'll use the muffin mix every time (Not that I'm planning on adding fried catfish to the menu frequently, but the muffin mix provided a little sweetness and was simply yummy!)

He added an egg and enough milk to make it the right consistency, along with a little salt and pepper.

He probably should have coated the fish in a little dry mix before dipping it in the batter (But I was just a humble observer who offered that opinion when he asked why the batter was sliding off a few of the fillets.)

He panfried the catfish in a little vegetable oil. And, since I had already relented on the food preparation method, why not fry a few leftover baked potatoes and have Fish 'n' Chips, right?

I did try to counteract the grease with an Oriental Cabbage Salad. We added some leftover baked beans, and we had quite a feast.

And we even had enough fillets to stash in the freezer for later. It remains to be seen whether the cooking method will be baked or fried. It probably depends on who's doing the cooking!


Here's the recipe for the Oriental Cabbage Salad. Not that it would have mattered for our grease-laden meal, but when I make this salad, I cut way back on the oil in the dressing. I also use a sugar substitute instead of the sugar.

I sometimes use this recipe as a main dish salad for me, adding cooked chicken breast (not fried, of course!)

Oriental Cabbage Salad

1/2 head cabbage, chopped or shredded (I use packaged coleslaw mix)
1 green pepper, chopped (or use yellow or red)
2 tbsp. chopped green onions
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1 small package sliced or slivered almonds (1/2 cup or so)
2 pkgs. Ramen noodles, uncooked

Dressing
2 tbsp. sugar
1/4 cup vinegar
1/2 tsp. pepper
1/2 cup oil (I never use that much anymore)
1 to 2 flavor packets from noodles

Combine cabbage, green pepper and onions. Combine dressing ingredients. Combine the almonds, sunflower seeds and crushed-up Ramen noodles. Pour dressing over vegetable mixture just before serving. If you are serving a large crowd, you can put the Ramen noodle mixture in with the cabbage and toss. If you are just serving it to a few people at home, I recommend keeping the noodle mixture separate. Then you can just sprinkle some on top of each serving and have each person mix in their own. That way, you can use the leftover salad for another meal. (It's not nearly as appealing with soggy noodles!)