Dog Names?

No offense Rex!

An Alligator Shot!!!!!!!!!

This picture was published in The Vicksburg Post yesterday under, "Give Us Your Best Shot." Joe Bonelli Sr., of Vicksburg and wife, Maria, who Bonelli said "was not as close as she appears," spotted this alligator on dry farmland inside the ring levee at Eagle Lake about two weeks ago, week before the Mississippi River crested at Vicksburg. Bonelli, a contractor, said he used his construction knowledge to estimate the gator's length at 12 to 13 feet. He also guessed that the alligator was "slough-hopping" through the farmland, about a mile from the Mainline Levee. Bonelli said he used a telephoto lens and he and his wife were about 30 feet from the alligator.

Flooding In Town

On the outside looking in ~ the water against the flood walls. At the top of the hill is the Old Court House Museum. A landmark that withstood the Civil War.

Flood waters at the flood wall in downtown Vicksburg.

To the left is Ameristar Casino and can see a barge getting ready to maneuver going under the two bridges.

Picture taken by one of the two Mississippi overlooks. All these pictures were taken about a week ago.

A Colorful Death Notice

A friend from Texas sent me this obituary of Ida Mae Russell Sills that was in the Memphis,TN, Commercial Appeal and was written by her son, Lee. The wording is something that you do not usually read, but it has it's little digs and jabs at her life which seems to sneak up on you. Read here....

Flooding at LeTourneau

Aerial view of LeTourneau

Glass Road to LeTourneau

Hwy 61 South

More pictures of flooding south of town. LeTourneau which employs over a thousand workers and constructs the big off shore rigs (pictured below), may be laid off for at least a month.

Tidus Mowing The Lawn

Can you believe that my great grandson is out mowing the lawn already? What a cutie! Tidus lives with his Mom and Dad at the Great Lakes Naval Station in Great Lakes, IL. He will soon be celebrating his frist birthday in May! Charming, Just Charming!

Flooded Fishing

The Vicksburg Post published Joseph Moore fishing for his supper Tuesday evening on Chickasaw Road just past Falk Steel Road. Flood waters traveled the eight miles from around Kings Point Ferry to the sight where Moore says he's caught bream, catfish, perch and gar. "You get a little of everything when water gets high like that," he said. This is a sweetthing for Joseph!

New Hunting 2 Fishing Blog

I came across a new hunting and fishing blog the other day and wanted to share it with you. It's about a guy named Bugler who lives in Grover, CO, who loves to hunt, fish, play golf, take pictures and ride his wife on his motorcycle, The Ole Bike. Bugler is 51 years old and named his new blog, Colorado Hunting 2 Fishing. He started blogging on March 30, 2008 and calls it a place to tell his hunting and fishing stories. He also has a team member by the name of Tightlines-n-Elk. Go over and welcome Bugler (also known as Hunter57) to the world of blogging. I want to wish him the very best and look forward to reading his stories of hunting and fishing in our great outdoors. This is Charming, Just Charming!

A Hummingbird Fly Zone

“..Not to leave the ‘bird watcher’s’ wanting..”
I just received this from Dennis, a friend, this morning, and it truly is remarkable just how this woman is able to get as close as she does to these very wary birds, let alone get them to light on her hands and arms.

“This is something I have never seen before, or ever even heard of. This lady lives in a Hummingbird fly zone. As they migrated, about 20 of them were in her yard. She took the little red dish, filled it with sugar water and this is the result. The woman is Abigail Alfano, of Pine, Louisiana, and she has been studying them daily and one morning put the cup from the feeder, with water in it, in her hand; as they had gotten used to her standing by the feeder they came over to her hand. She says in touching they are as light as a feather. Abigail also said, 'if she had known her husband was taking pictures she would have put on makeup.” This is so cool in our great outdoors!

Pictures Of Flooding

Steel Bayou Control Structure north of town.

International Paper Mill near Hwy 3 north of Redwood.

Houses under water at Hwy 465.

More flooding along Hwy 465.

Hwy 465 going towards Eagle Lake and Tara Wildlife.

This is Hwy 61 at Redwood about 9 miles north of town.

Pictures were taken about 9 days ago and was sent to me last Tuesday by e-mail. The Mississippi River finally crest this past Saturday. Hopefully, the water will be receding soon.

Vicksburg Floodwall Marks

After three weeks at levels above flood stage in Vicksburg, the Mississippi River was cresting Saturday at 50.8 feet -- slightly below earlier forecasts of 51 feet. Flood stage is 43 feet.

It is only the fifth time in the past 80 years the river has topped 50 feet at Vicksburg, and it is the worst flood since 1973, when the river crested at 51.6 feet. This is not a sweetthing! Read more about this in our Vicksburg Post.

The Arts & Crafts Show

It was a gorgeous day for fun in downtown Vicksburg yesterday. "With weather like this, I wouldn't be surprised if we set a new attendance record today," Richard O'Bannon, the organizer of the event, said as he gazed over the already hundreds of attendees at about 10 Saturday morning, two hours after vendors opened their stands. Skies were already sunny, and temperatures climbed slowly through the day to 78.

The 90 vendors, with such wares as bird feeders, bows, wooden guns, decorated mailboxes and ironworks, filled parts of Walnut, Crawford and South streets around City Hall. Read more about it here from The Vicksburg Post. Charming, Just Charming!

Holding The Sun...Marvelous!

Wanted to share with you some pictures a friend sent to me. This is so cool! Enjoy!

Still Rockin The River 2008

Our 21st annual Riverfest in downtown Vicksburg will kick off today at 6:00 p.m. when gates open for evening entertainment. Hopefully, the rain will be out of here by then. The highlights of the evening will be famous county music star, Jason Aldean. Also, our hometown band that is really good, The Chill, plus other bands. There will be two stages, a north and south stage. Tomorrow night the highlight of the evening will be Rick Springfield plus other band attractions. Tomorrow the Vicksburg-Warren County Riverfest Arts & Crafts Show will celebrate 40 years at the 2008 Riverfest and will take place in front of Vicksburg City Hall. There will be about 100 vendors from across the south that are expected to set up shop for the day-long event, which begins at 8:00 a.m. and runs until 4:30. Also, The Bluz Cruz Marathon which is a 22-mile, charity fundraiser, usually held the same weekend as Riverfest, is being postpone until May 17 due to high Mississippi River stages. A lot going on this weekend in Vicksburg. This will be party town for sure. Will not get to participate because of Doctors orders - maybe next year. This is not a sweetthing!

JeepGirl's Boone and Crockett

I have a friend by the name of JeepGirl (61) over at my CamoSpace who harvested a buck that made MASTIC #1 Perfect Typical for the State of Maine! How exciting is that! Here's a little about herself in her own words.

I am a late bloomer when it comes to hunting, but, I am trying to make up for lost time. My buck of 2006 made MASTC #1 Perfect Typical for the State Of Maine! I still have buck fever over that one! I love my family and have been married over 30 years to a wonderful patient husband! I have three wonderful grown daughters and six grands. My husband and I work summers for North Maine Woods, managing Henderson Gate up near Jo Mary Lake in Brownville area. And Yes! I love my Jeep, can you tell by my user name! I am an avid four wheeler person, live to wheel in the spring, summer, and fall, nothing like it, when I get too old to hang on they best find a seat belt for me!

Here is the story about her great hunt.....
The Morning of December 9th 2006 was the last day of muzzle hunting in Maine, and it was with little expectations of getting my deer for his season that I headed for my tree stand as soon as legal light would allow. The morning turned out to be a crisp cold one with maybe a couple inches of snow from the day before, just enough to track, but, tracks are sometimes misleading and take a long time to follow to a successful find, so with that in mind I knew the tree stand would be my only option on this day. We have just under ten acres of land behind our home in Levant, a mixture of cedar, evergreen, oak and beechnut with some popular, good food for the wildlife.

There is a large swamp just behind out property for the deer to yard and hide, so they have many options to avoid hunters. Once on my tree stand I reflected on the long month gone past and of the two deer my husband Val and I had missed the day before, due to damp powder in our loaders, we will always be wary of that from now on and take precautions to prevent that ever from happening again. We are quite new to muzzle hunting, this is just our second year so I guess you learn as you go, we did. Our nephew Brad had been hunting with us that season and he was nice enough to share his ammo for the powder guns with us. I had been on my tree stand maybe 15 minutes or so when I saw the doe come out of the trees into a small clearing, she was maybe 40 yards away or more, and had not a clue I was anywhere near, she stopped and paused long enough to sniff the ground and then walked casually away into the trees on the other side of the small clearing. I had her in my cross hairs for a second time in two days, this time I let her walk away, with the thought maybe a buck would be following, and then the nagging thought followed that I probably just let the only deer I would see today get away, I had no excuse, I had my doe permit, she was there, but, I let her walk away. About five minutes later I saw the rack first moving through the trees, (I had been telling my husband, and nephew about this buck with a monster rack I called the walking tree, but, since up until that day I was the only one to see him, it was chalked up as a hunting story). The buck stepped into the clearing, I was in awe of his entire presentation, the body, the rack, What a Rack, there was only 8 points, but, the mass of those 8 points made his head look undersized to me. I had to take several deep breaths and calm myself down to keep my heart from jumping out of my chest. The buck walked almost in the same tracks as the doe had minutes before, he stopped and sniffed the ground almost exactly where she had, that was his mistake, my gain, I had him in the cross hairs as he picked up his head and looked right towards my direction, I took one last deep breath and pulled the trigger, The shot hit with a thump sound and the buck did a slight backwards drop then with tail down he took two leaps and was gone. As sure as I was that I had him dead to rights I could not wait to get to the spot where he was standing when I shot him. I called my husband on the cell phone and told him I had shot the walking tree, he paused just for a second before asking which direction did the walking tree run? My husband was hunting on the other side of our property so we agreed which direction we would take and go from there. I climbed down from the tree stand and went to the spot where I knew the buck had been standing when I shot and could not find one trace of blood, my hopes were sliding away. But, I followed the first two leaps that we so evident, then the following tracks after there, which was no easy feat as there were so many other deer tracks, I am not a tracker, not like my husband who could find a spot of blood in a bed of fall leaves! Soon I heard my husband whooping and hollering and making these sounds that did not sound human to me. I yelled where are you and he yelled back, MOM! come and see what you shot!!! As soon as I stepped into the area where both husband and deer was he grabbed me and lifted me clear off the ground and twirled me around, and I was like, put me down so I can see it! The buck had not dropped any blood until just before he dropped, I am not a good judge of distance, but, I would guess that he ran maybe 600 yards, but, don't take that to the bank. My husband is such an awesome tracker! I was so proud to find the spot I aimed is exactly where I hit. I always scope a deer, then check my site, then the scope to be certain of my aim, depending on the distance I have to make the shot. I had the best teacher in the world, my husband! He will tell you men, be careful what you wish for if you want your wife to hunt.
What a buck, what a RACK, 2007 best offer something good to top this, I don't see it happening, but, I am so anxious to see what that big doe brings to the woods, I hope she made connections with my buck before he made his connection with me.

We took pictures, then to the tag station, it took us a while to get out of there as everyone wanted to see the buck, and of course they all wanted to congratulate my husband for such a trophy deer, and for the third year in a row he had to tell them that his wife, not he, had shot this buck.

Be careful what you wish for men!

We took the deer to have it weighed and it did not quite make the big buck club, but, it came close. When we got home from the weigh station, being the nut that I am I went out in the woods and scooped all his insides into a container and bought it home and weighed it, minus the blood it weighed a little over 40 pounds! the man at the weigh station told us if I had shot this buck at the start of hunting season he would have carried at least 25 or more pounds more, so I am guessing that in early hunting season on hoof this guy would have gone at least 250 easy!

If our 2007 hunting season weather starts out like the last couple I am going to wait and hunt the muzzle season again with my trusty Thompson 50 caliber black power rifle again. I have shot three bucks in the last three years and two of them have been with the same muzzle loader, great gun! I must add that this buck would not have been bagged if it were not for our nephew Brad loaning us some ammo, he jokes with us about it being a group effort buck, his powder, my husband loaded the rifle and I pulled the trigger, way to go teamwork wins every time!
I have to admit as much as I love to hunt, I have not yet tried to load my muzzle loader, I do have to learn how to do that. As for hunting with my regular rifle I have no problem loading and unloading, old hat at that.

I have always bought my deer down with one shot, if I don't get it with the fist I don't take another, I won't take a running shot, I have to know my target, and I don't want the deer to suffer or be bait for a predator. So hunting with a muzzle loader and only having one shot is not an issue with me.

I am having a shoulder mount done of the buck. A taxidermist from Frankfort, Toby Montgomery came highly recommended to us and we are so glad that he did. Toby is a genuine person who goes out of his way to accommodate you and his knowledge of deer is so incredible. I love to pick his brain! He was nice enough to come right to our home to cape out the buck, he is an official measure for Boone and Crockett and MASTC. My total points for Boone and Crockett after the sixty days drying period was 164 2/8. Toby helped me with all the paperwork and guided me through what I need for pictures, he always has gone above and beyond to help us, and we are very happy with his service, we for sure would use him again!

Congratulations JeepGirl!

Way to go Rob!

The expression on Rob's face is priceless to say the least! He is one of my friends over at my MySpace and I asked him to share his fishing experience on catching this fine large month on the Guadalupe River back in March. Below is Rob's story in his own words......

Pure boredom last Sunday afternoon and once again, I'm headed to the Guadalupe River. A cloudy day, off and on mist and my thought is simply fishing the late afternoon, 3:30 pm to sunset with the hope somewhere in that window the bite will kick in. Guadalupe River bass are finicky and you can cast a million times, literally wondering if any fish are there, then suddenly, the bite turns on.

I worked the same section of river I landed my personal best large mouth last October. I didn't expect to really score another trophy fish. Fishing was rather slow during the daylight period, had to work a lot of river to find fish. I mixed top waters (weedless Jitterbug) and a charty/white spinner bait picking up 5 fish (2 large mouth and 3 Guadalupe bass). The tactic was simply working structure and lily pads, bordering edges of shallow to deeper water along the shoreline.

Once the sun started to settle, I worked back up river to a shallow river section, 1-3ft of water, with more flow and a rocky bottom. This section does not hold fish during the daytime but once the sun dips down, bass move up into this zone and feed aggressively. I sat in the deeper river section, holding my kayak mid-channel with the paddles making long casts up current, working the edges and main channel on a down stream retrieve. I guess I was a couple of dozen casts into my routine, no hits when I see the water pushed up from a good sized fish, tracking the lure in pursuit and suddenly BAM! She hits and pulls line off the reel, fighting hard as heck and then shoots to the right bank, pulling me in the yak before sounding in a tight tangle of lily pads. At that point, I got a little nervous since I'm casting 10lb test Suffix and she knows I'm up top. I gave her a little slack, letting her think she is free, she clears the pads and I finally lipped her in open water for the land.

She's a healthy Guadalupe River large mouth. Rob

Congratulations Rob! This is Charming, Just Charming!

Happy Birthday Greg!

Your Dad and I want to wish you a very Happy 41st Birthday today! May you have many, many more to come. We love you!

Deer, Deer, Deer Me!

Mississippi River rising pushing deer out - awesome pictures! Now you know why hunting is so great in Mississppi!