Skunked

You know you're secure with what you do when you just fess right up. Yup, the only thing worse than the fishing was the weather, it was a test. I did 3 trips in a row last week with just one chance, hey, I'm a fishing guide, and a darn good one, but....as my old friend the Iron Man Chick Kishbaugh said ' we fished for King salmon, and they were not aware of it ' . So I just want to thank Steve and Norm and Chris, Glenn and my old buddy Kenny Fallon for hanging in there and being the sports people they are. But in Jeff's world this means only one thing...it'll get better real soon. We were faced with a river that is filling a bit late with chaulky water and the usual in between run low sonar counts. Here's the USGS graph this morning. The pyramids are the historical average stream flow.

Bear  with me for one more graph, good news. This shows the overall early run strength starting in 2013 and ending this year. As you can see each year has gotten progressively better so it looks like we've pitched our way out of the slump. These trends usually keep continuity so it looks bright for 2018, my last year of guiding on the world famous. The red is 2017, the purple 2013.

It was awful quiet here on the long weekend at Mile 14, rained everyday. But our friends Troy and Tammy do a 'staycation' every year and caught the first sockeyes of 2017 at Mile 14. Here's their camp and them fishing...and of course , them two are plum in love.... Thanks you guys for treating us like part of your family....

We've got a new neighbor. The Conservation Fund of America bought all the Stewart wetlands down river from us and conveyed it to Alaska State Parks. For us it's good and it's bad...the good is that the public owns it now and no development should occur. The bad is, it's State Parks - who I hope will be good neighbors but we're not off to a good start. So for any of you Park Ranger yo yo's reading this here's what happens to your ' don't have fun here' signs when you put them on the wrong property. Yup, they get ripped down and tossed where they belong. 

MP has the botanical garden that is Mile 14 in full bloom and it's gorgeous.

These Petunia's below are called 'Night Sky' and boy were the expensive. She saw them in some of the City of Soldotna's beautiful parks and just had to have them. So this year they were at the greenhouse at twice the price as a regular Petunia because they are patented. Right on the plastic it said ' Don not propogate'....so of course we didn't , right ? 😉

And this guy is CaChing Cherry.....he ain't patented be he oughta be.

My favorite is the Lily's

And a Nasturshum or two....

But a guy's gotta eat ya know too....so she's got the garden and greenhouses full to the top. You can't put a price on your own food but boy oh boy, don't count the hours of work. It's a labor of love for sure.

She's got a few Marigold's that she likes the way they match the paint in one of our signs. We hope the flowers and beauty here tell people that when the check in gate says ' Welcome to Stewart's Landing '....we mean it. 

So with July and the crazyness that is dip netting upon us a lot of people in our town get kind of hinky about sharing. Ya know I have to say that even me who depends on tourism get's a little  tired of the fish crazed crowds and having the Fred Meyer store sold out of what you need and of course the traffic....BUT.... when you share with visitors that do this, it all makes sense in Jeff's world. How cool, and welcome to Soldotna.