THE LAND NORTH OF SUPERIOR

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        I keep hearing from our government that the opportunities for fishing and hunting are expanding by leaps and bounds thanks to the licensing fees we pay.  Both the hunting and fishing regulation booklets echo this theme.  There are however the new forest management plans which incorporate road decommissioning and travel restrictions in them as they are written.  They cite liability as the reason.  The infrastructure that exists in the land north of Superior is also getting older and ‘unsafe�?roads and water crossings are being eliminated every year.

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My brother and I have for years had a kind of unspoken agreement to go hunting the first weekend of moose season.  We catch up on a year’s worth of news and views.  In today’s world the number of times we actually meet face to face is severely limited even though we only live a hundred fifty kilometres apart.  I have always enjoyed our late night talks and watching him put layer after layer of clothes on to go to bed.  I wear considerably less.

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A number of years back we were on one of our weekends.  The weather had really been co-operating, crispy nights and days that warmed up to seven or eight on the pulse side.  We were shooting our share of partridge and eating them done up in various ways.  Our favourite method was to drive a circle route.  That way we would see more of my world and the wonders it contained.  As most opening weekends still had full leaf there was rarely the chance for an open shot before the bird(s) stepped into the foliage and the hunt was on.  A quick glance at the compass, I always carried in my jacket pocket, was almost reflex.  I have seen us some distance off the road and everything around us looking the same too many times.  Many is the bird we have flushed on hillsides while the original quarry got away in a heart stopping flurry of wings from someplace much too close.  Partridge have an uncanny way of hiding until you damn near step on them before leaving in a hurry.  The sure test of a solid heart is to have wing tips brush the insides of your legs while the world explodes with sound around you!

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That particular day we had left at dawn, as was our custom.  We headed for a road we both liked.  Lots of cover for birds and moose.  There were several running roads for my brother very near prime moose feeding areas, where I would watch with the old trusty .308. The day was one of those fall gems where you don’t have to strip and aren’t bothered by those pesky flies all over the place.  I gave a soft grunt as I viewed the beaver dam from on top of a small knoll.  I thought I saw movement of to my right.  Another grunt.  The black shape I was watching suddenly got smaller.  A good-sized black bear stepped out in the open.  With no bear tag I watched him for a few minutes as it sniffed at this and that.  A glance at my watch said that it was time to get back to the truck.  A small stick cracked on my second step and the bruin seemed to melt into the bushes.  Back at the truck my brother was busy field dressing a trio of grouse.

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We continued on our ride and picked up a couple more grouse on a gravelled hillside.  A cow and calf had crossed the bush track a hundred yards from an opening which had been a Great Lakes bush camp fifty years back.  The fact that I had a bull tag meant that my only interest was to be sure no bull was following them.  After a half hour scout we drove into the opening.  Parking the truck off the road we hunted the ragged bush edge, I went right, my brother left.  We had always shot 4 or 5 birds here and today was no exception.  What was different today was the pile of timbers I sat on and waited for my partner to finish his ½ circle.

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“Looks like another bridge gone,�?I commented.

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We shouldered our guns and walked the hundred or so yards to the river that we had to cross to continue our circle route.  Sure enough the bridge was gone.  There was evidence of trucks driving of the road and through the river to the other side.  I my opinion the water was a bit high to make the attempt we started walking back to the camp yard and the truck.  We field dressed our birds and had a couple of butter buns and some sausage.

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There was a vehicle coming.  It ground its way through the rough road and surprised us as it came around the last corner.  A little red car stopped beside us and a tall lanky hunter unfolded out of it and stretched. 

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“A couple more miles and I get to have a beer,�?the hunter grinned.

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“I don’t think so�?my brother responded.

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A frown came over the hunter’s face, “Whadya mean by that, my trailer is in that gravel pit about three miles down the road at most.�?/P>

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“That’s fine, but unless your car can swim you ain’t going to camp that way.�?SPAN>  He vaguely pointed down the road toward the bridge.  “Somebody, probably the MNR, pulled the bridge onto dry land and the rivers up.�?/P>

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After more than a few words of colour he told us he was running on fumes now.  There was no way he could go all the way back.  I suppose we could have left him there, claiming to be dry ourselves, but I sold him five gallons of gas.  He drove away after thanking us and adding some more words with flavour and real meaning.  There had been no signage of any type when we had come on this road.  We later found out there was no signage from the other side either.

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That bridge stayed out for about 4 or 5 years.  Then the forest company operating in that area turned our partridge road into one huge clear-cut.  There were no partridge and few signs of moose but the new bridge was a real winner.

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The only new opportunities for hunting and fishing we will see in the north are those we fight for.  As I said the forest companies are writing closure into their plans.  Of course there is the possibility that Harris and Snobolen will keep their word and leave the roads open for increased opportunities to hunt and fish in the land north of Superior.