Kingfisher Press Art Galleries

Lake Ketchum, a Visual Experience

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Wood ducks are shy and evasive creatures, yet this pair and another regularly come  to our deck to eat sunflower seeds.  The only duck with prehensile feet, the rail offers them a secure perch from which to feed.  No other duck is quite so beautiful. DCP_0097TwoWoodies,cropped,sharpen10CROPAGAIN,sharpen7.JPG (43169 bytes)
Top Drawer 24,c7MistyLake,red3.8x5.7.JPG (24452 bytes) Early-morning  mist obscures nearly everything and we become a mountain lake; well, almost.  The water is never that clear, because low-land lakes are naturally tannic.  It's fun to try to fool yourself into believing, but I never quite succeed.   

 
Two K96cropBigSpawner,b15sharpen15.JPG (151035 bytes) Rainbow trout have no inlet in our lake in which to spawn, so the good folks in Fish and Wildlife plant a thousand pan-sized trout each April.  Since many of us fish catch and release, the next spring we find a few bigger ones hanging around, such as this fat female.  She is egg-bound and won't spawn.  I let her go, but she probably won't winter over again.
wpe32.jpg (36487 bytes) Ready to go at a moment's  notice, whether for trout or bass, I don't know.  But if the Mariners have a winning streak going, I just might stay glued to the set.
A large-mouth bass of about four pounds, taken on a plug a hundred feet from my dock in March. P0000370Basssharpen105X3.JPG (16223 bytes)
DCP_0120Flotfisher,sharpen10crop.JPG (474021 bytes) This lucky visitor to the lake shows us a fine, sixteen-inch  rainbow trout, which he quickly released.  It was a good night for him and he hooked and turned back fish after fish, all caught on the small nymph pattern.  Other fishers were not so fortunate.  In fact, most of them caught nothing.
A cloudy-day sunset hushes the lake and makes everything mysteriously and beautiful.  What a great place to be and to live!  Yet we are only one of dozens of lakes around here that offer nearly the same amenities. Two K275,ContrastLakeSunset.JPG (34429 bytes)