These two jakes came running into our hen calls at the Big Blue Ranch and Lodge near

Burchard, Neb. (Journal photo by Larry Myhre)

BURCHARD, Neb. — Like so many times before, it was a gobble that first alerted us that a tom turkey was coming in.

Gary Howey motioned that the bird was downhill in front of us just in case I hadn’t heard.

I had the video camera running and began looking for the bird.

The first indication was the tip of his tail, spread in full strut, and slowly rocking back and forth as the bird stepped forward.

Then he was there, all puffed up and drumming. It was a glorious sight and one that sets a turkey hunter’s heart to pounding.

He was 15 yards out when Gary “putted” sharply on his diaphragm call to make the bird come out of strut and stick up his head.

Just like that it was over.

Less than two hours into our hunt on the Big Blue Ranch and Lodge south of Burchard, we had both filled turkey tags.

Gary, from Hartington, Neb., and I were guests of Scott Bodie and his wife Billie Kay. Their 2,000-acre working cattle ranch is the backdrop for a retreat for hunters, fishermen, horse enthusiasts, bird watchers or anyone just seeking relaxation.

Their cedar log lodge sits above a 25-acre, spring-fed pond stocked with largemouth bass, crappies, bluegills and northerns.

Gary and I had met Scott at the lodge where we unpacked, and then followed him to an area on the ranch where he felt confident we would see turkeys.

He left us, and we began our hunt as we often do when hunting land unfamiliar to us. We walked and called.

With Gary on the video camera, I ventured ahead calling whenever we came to a place where I couldn’t see if there were turkeys such as just before cresting a hill.

Upon hearing a call, the turkey should gobble alerting us to his location before we spook him.

But this day, the turkeys were not responding.

Gary saw them first.

Two toms heading our way.

We dropped down and crawled to a nearby burr oak tree where we sat down and waited.

I yelped a few more times and the pair of toms crested the hill and drew nearer as I made a few quiet yelps on the diaphragm.

They stopped about 30 yards out and didn’t appear to want to come any closer so I took the larger of the two.

After Gary bagged his tom we went back to the lodge and got out the fishing gear. I used the fly rod to catch and release an unbelievable number of blue-gills and crappies.

We’ll report in detail on that next week.

The next morning we decided to hunt the turkeys with our cameras. Gary carried the video and I carried my Nikon digital single lens reflex with a 70 to 3o0mm zoom lens.

We set up near where Gary had bagged his bird and called, but nothing came in.

So, we began walking and calling. We crossed a bluegrass pasture to a wooded ridge and valley on the other side.

I called there and suddenly Gary dropped down. I followed suit.

“Two toms heading our way,” he said.

We lay on our stomachs right in the open with cameras in front of our faces.

I cranked up the calling on the diaphragm call and soon saw two heads poke above the skyline.

They came in fast and close. I could hear them clucking and purring and I returned the calls hoping to lure them in closer.

At about 15 yards out they decided they had come far enough and then began to move away.

We had gotten some good footage and stills.

We continued to follow the timber’s edge and walked another hundred yards when Gary thought he saw something down in the corner of the pasture about 300 yards away. It was a tom. Soon we noticed three hens in front of him moving down a fence line. Then two more toms stepped out.

We couldn’t interest them in our calls and the hens seemed to be following the fence line so we dropped out of sight and tried to circle around and get in front of them.

This seldom works, and it didn’t this time. The birds spotted us and ran back down the fenceline and into the trees.

The turkeys here are really colorful, probably the result of a five-way cross. Biologists say the birds are a merriam, Eastern, Rio Grand, tame turkey and hybrid cross. All of the above have been stocked in the area at one time or another.

Deer grow big on this ranch as a pair of sheds lying on the table in our lodge proved.

And they are plentiful. Each day we saw several deer move away from us as we stalked through the woodlands.

The ranch is truly a hunter’s paradise.

Hammock Marsh Management Area just west of

Selkirk, Manitoba. (Journal photo by Larry Myhre)

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal.

SELKIRK, Manitoba — The big female snowy owl was perched at the top of an electrical pole as I eased the 300 mm lens out of the truck window.

The regal owl ignored us, seemingly studying the snow covered field to our right.

I pursed my lips and squeaked.

The big head swiveled to look and I pressed the shutter.

We had arrived at Stu McKay’s Cats on the Red Resort at the Lockport Dam on the Red River early that afternoon.

Stu, an avid bird and landscape photographer, suggested Fran and I head out to nearby Oak Hammock Marsh to look for snowy owls.

It didn’t take long. Fran was shooting a Nikon D60 DSLR with a 70-300mm zoom lens. I was using a Cannon D50 with a 300mm lens.

We made several exposures and then drove on. As we passed the Oak Hammock Marsh Interpretive Center I saw something sitting on a sign.

“What’s that?” I said while braking the truck.

“That’s the Interpretive center,” Fran said.

“No, that bird sitting on the sign,” I answered.

I threw the truck in reverse, backed up past the driveway and drove in, stopping about 50 feet from a brown owl.

Another car was driving out and I got off only two exposures before the owl flew.

I wasn’t even sure what kind of owl it was, but I thought it was a short-eared. Turns out it was.

For the next three days, Fran and I would ice fish for walleyes on the Red River with Stu.

With the sun shining on the first two days, we spent the afternoons driving around looking for owls.

Stu shoots a Canon D50 with a big 500 mm lens and has captured some magnificent photographs of birds and landscapes in his area.

“This is just a wonderful place for birders and bird photographers,” Stu says. We have northern hawk owls, snowy owls, short-eared owls, great grey owls, all rather common in the wintertime. In late April, early May, mid May and right on through the month of May when the birds are on their nest, it’s just unbelievable.

“This whole region is so alive with birds,” he says. “There are warblers, shorebirds, raptors of every description, and bald eagles and ospreys nest right here in this area.

“Canada has over 500 species migrating into here each year for nesting and Manitoba claims two out of every three,” he adds. “It is truly a mecca for bird watchers and nature photographers.”

There are lots of public lands near Selkirk where a variety of birds can be found and lots of different habitats. Birds Hill Provencial Park is one of them, just 10 minutes away from Stu’s lodge. It was here we photographed northern hawk owls.

The park is 22 square miles with a mix of aspen and oak forest with open prairies, spruce, bog areas and a lake.

Fran and I will be back next spring to do more photography while headquartered at Cats on the Red.

“I’d be happy to accommodate birders,” Stu says. “I’d provide maps and information, but there would be lots of times, because of my love for photography, I would say, ‘Lets go out and get you acquainted with the area. Walk the beaches of Lake Winnipeg. It’s an absolute paradise for birds.’”

On our last afternoon of photography we went back to Oak Hammock Marsh. We soon found the female snowy perched in a tree about a quarter mile off the road. There was an observation tower near her so we walked out to it and made our photographs of the owl sitting only about 75 feet away.

For more information on Cats on the Red go to www.catsonthered.net or call (204) 757-9876 or email: redcats@mts.net.

Hammock Marsh Management Area just west of

Selkirk, Manitoba. (Journal photo by Larry Myhre)

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal.

SELKIRK, Manitoba — The big female snowy owl was perched at the top of an electrical pole as I eased the 300 mm lens out of the truck window.

The regal owl ignored us, seemingly studying the snow covered field to our right.

I pursed my lips and squeaked.

The big head swiveled to look and I pressed the shutter.

We had arrived at Stu McKay’s Cats on the Red Resort at the Lockport Dam on the Red River early that afternoon.

Stu, an avid bird and landscape photographer, suggested Fran and I head out to nearby Oak Hammock Marsh to look for snowy owls.

It didn’t take long. Fran was shooting a Nikon D60 DSLR with a 70-300mm zoom lens. I was using a Cannon D50 with a 300mm lens.

We made several exposures and then drove on. As we passed the Oak Hammock Marsh Interpretive Center I saw something sitting on a sign.

“What’s that?” I said while braking the truck.

“That’s the Interpretive center,” Fran said.

“No, that bird sitting on the sign,” I answered.

I threw the truck in reverse, backed up past the driveway and drove in, stopping about 50 feet from a brown owl.

Another car was driving out and I got off only two exposures before the owl flew.

I wasn’t even sure what kind of owl it was, but I thought it was a short-eared. Turns out it was.

For the next three days, Fran and I would ice fish for walleyes on the Red River with Stu.

With the sun shining on the first two days, we spent the afternoons driving around looking for owls.

Stu shoots a Canon D50 with a big 500 mm lens and has captured some magnificent photographs of birds and landscapes in his area.

“This is just a wonderful place for birders and bird photographers,” Stu says. We have northern hawk owls, snowy owls, short-eared owls, great grey owls, all rather common in the wintertime. In late April, early May, mid May and right on through the month of May when the birds are on their nest, it’s just unbelievable.

“This whole region is so alive with birds,” he says. “There are warblers, shorebirds, raptors of every description, and bald eagles and ospreys nest right here in this area.

“Canada has over 500 species migrating into here each year for nesting and Manitoba claims two out of every three,” he adds. “It is truly a mecca for bird watchers and nature photographers.”

There are lots of public lands near Selkirk where a variety of birds can be found and lots of different habitats. Birds Hill Provencial Park is one of them, just 10 minutes away from Stu’s lodge. It was here we photographed northern hawk owls.

The park is 22 square miles with a mix of aspen and oak forest with open prairies, spruce, bog areas and a lake.

Fran and I will be back next spring to do more photography while headquartered at Cats on the Red.

“I’d be happy to accommodate birders,” Stu says. “I’d provide maps and information, but there would be lots of times, because of my love for photography, I would say, ‘Lets go out and get you acquainted with the area. Walk the beaches of Lake Winnipeg. It’s an absolute paradise for birds.’”

On our last afternoon of photography we went back to Oak Hammock Marsh. We soon found the female snowy perched in a tree about a quarter mile off the road. There was an observation tower near her so we walked out to it and made our photographs of the owl sitting only about 75 feet away.

For more information on Cats on the Red go to www.catsonthered.net or call (204) 757-9876 or email: redcats@mts.net.

Also the deer was cleaned up, no blood, no wound showing.

Reprinted from the Sioux City Journal

It seems everyone is taking pictures these days.

Digital photography has taken a lot of the mystery out of photography and today’s point and shoot cameras are so simple to operate that they should not be intimidating to any one.

Although practically no one worries much about f stops or shutter speeds nowadays, getting a good photograph still depends upon who is pushing the button.

Since I’ve been running reader photos on these pages, it’s been longer than six years, believe it or not, I get to see a lot of efforts from amateur photographers.

Some of their “look at my fish” or “look at my deer” are pretty good, but others are not what they should be.

So, I’m going to offer some suggestions here for you to get better photos of your fish and game.

The first thing I would tell you is keep blood out of the photo, whether it’s a fish or a deer. Sure, hunting and fishing are blood sports, but we should have more respect for the game than to photograph blood.

I always carry some rags with me to wipe the blood off of whatever game I am photographing. You must take the time to clean up before you take the photograph.

Also, nothing detracts from a deer picture than a tongue hanging out of the animals mouth. Cut if off before taking the picture.

Your photographs will be much better if you take the time to display the fish or animal as good as possible.

Move in close to the subject. Photographs with a lot of area around the subjects are not as good as those where the subject fills the frame.

Also consider the level of the camera. Most photographs are taken from eye level. Many could be improved by shooting from a lower level, especially if the camera is pointing down at the subject.

When photographing someone holding fish or small game, have them hold them high, at least eye level. Also, especially with fish, hold them under the gill flap on the side opposite the camera and do everything you can to keep fingers out of the photograph.

When taking your picture, you should make sure the sun is at your back and shining on your subject. This will provide the best lighting for most subjects.

If your subject is wearing a cap or a hat, have them push it back so a shadow does not fall across their face.

If the subject is wearing dark glasses, ask them to take them off.

Many photographs can be improved if you use the flash, especially if the subject is wearing a cap. The flash will light up the shadow across the face. The flash on most point-and-shoot cameras is only good out to about 9 or 10 feet so you have to be close to get the best effect.

If possible get the photographs out in the field. This will be much better than making the picture in the back of pickup or on the garage floor. I know that is not possible if you are hunting alone, and few of you are going to carry a tripod into the field and use the self timer.

But, there is never an excuse not to have a camera along.

Although I shoot mostly single lens reflex (SLR) cameras with interchangeable lenses, I always carry a point-and-shoot in my shirt pocket. The SLRs are big and heavy and many times not convenient to take into the field. A lot of the photographs of turkey and deer that I take are taken with that point and shoot.

To sum up, keep blood out of the pictures, keep the sun at your back, move in close, hold the fish or small game high and use the fill-flash in bright sun. Just those few things will improve your photography.