First I will make you understand that I was absolutely not joking when I expressed my views of that... that awful animal! That big, white, disturbing always-getting-in-my-way, hoity-toity bird!

The enemy within Yes, that would be an appropriate name for this photo! Just to spite me, I'm sure, this couple had to nest right in my very way! Not only are they producing their ugly ducklings to harass me in winter, but also this hissing, angry male is trying to stop me from getting to my boat! How low and vindictive can you get! Can't they take a little bad press and criticism once in a while, or what? This is absolutely true! To get to my boat I must walk out to the right, out on the landing stage for my little boat.  I had to do a running jump not to get bitten and isn't that a scandalous behavior, I don't know what is!

Sometimes I think Sweden can compete with Africa or other tropical rain forests and jungles with nasty beasts. And speaking of nasty beasts...

Just take a look at this ferocious-looking little bugger! Or big bugger at that. But he looks considerably more dangerous than he is. He even lives in my garden. Yes, right down in little Gagnekulla we have this little population of the biggest insect in Sweden. We have some oak-trees right on my very ground and there they live.  It is a stag beetle if you don't recognize it. Most fly fishermen have a notion of the secret life of insects and I don't know about you, but have you ever thought about what is their "real" life? We tend to think like "Oh, what a short life!" in the case of the mayfly that only lives for a day or in some species, just a few hours. But we often forget the years it has lived as a larvae or nymph. Maybe it considers that stage as its real life? Take the stag beetle for example, its larvae stage is up to five years. The imago, if that is the right expression of a beetle, lives just a few weeks, I think.  A similar case is that of the migrating birds. At least here in Sweden we consider a lot of species as Swedish birds. In spite of the fact that they only stay here half the year as spongers.  There is specially one species of bird that I wish wouldn't come here so often and stay here so long...

My summer vacation goes on and on. Likewise the unusual fine summer weather. I know I sometimes get hung up on that expression but all right... When it coincide with my summer holiday I won't mind. And my fishing goes on as well. 

Why not stay content with a series of pictures? Why not start with a nice, salty, sunny, seasickening and sailing variant just to show you how it is here out on the Baltic a fine summer's day:

"White sails in the afternoon" one might call this photo. 

06-07-05 All my fishing days were almost the same. The weather I already spoke of. Usually I leave home about 06:15 and drive down to the coast. Force my way thorough a bunch of angry swans and enter my boat about half an hour later. Eat my breakfast on the way out to the fishing locations. It takes about 45 minutes, sometimes more, sometimes less. Depending on which direction I choose; south, west or to the east. Then I fish till about 13:00 or 14:00. Then often the wind increases too much for my liking. I think it is called like in Swedish, like in English; the sea breeze.  And by that time I've about had it! Enough of sun, pikes, a nice time, thrills, pleasure, exercise ( I often row a lot), photos, an outlet for my killing instinct. Or is it hunting instinct? The latter, of course in a modified, civilized, non-violent way by releasing the pikes unharmed back to the water. And not a bad outlet today at that!  Datum Art Vikt Bete Båt Flugspö Fluglina Tid Död 2006-07-05 Gädda 1,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 08:00 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 2,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:00 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 2,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:30 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 2,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:40 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 3 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:50 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 3 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:00 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 3 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:10 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 6,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:20 Nej 2006-07-05 Gädda 4,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:30 Nej

If you should feel a little envious of that catch, please feel free to do so!

06-07-07 This was the hottest day! Over 30 degrees Celsius. In the shadow. But where do you find any shadow out on the sea? Nowhere! And almost dead calm the first half of the day at that. How I under such circumstances could do a rather good catch of ten pikes is something of a riddle. Of course I could come up with a few suggestions to solve it but I must be a little careful with that. The Internet Ombudsman you know... He is a little sensitive about my showing off too much...  At least, that's what he used to call it. So let's just say that I was lucky. Today I seemed to prefer quantity before quality but I can't catch big pikes if there aren't any around.  But of course that's not a big deal for me a day like this.  Today the sun was shining like a Chernobyl in the sky!   Datum Art Vikt Bete Båt Flugspö Fluglina Tid Död 2006-07-07 Gädda 2 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 07:45 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 2,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 08:00 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 3 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 08:45 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 1 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:30 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 4 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:45 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 2,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:00 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 1,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 12:00 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 3 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 13:00 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 1,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 14:00 Nej 2006-07-07 Gädda 1,5 Vit Gäddsara Ja AFTM 9 Sjunklina 14:30 Nej

06-07-13

Another nice summer day. That's one of the reasons that I can't sit here indoors and writing long stories on the PC about my fishing. Do you know how hot it gets here in my little office at home when the computer is on? 
Many degrees, I can tell you. 
Hot as the sauna it is. I mean that the little room I'm sitting in, among other things, writing this,  used to be a little sauna but I turned it into a little office. Or boy's room. And, unlike my PC, it doesn't have any windows, just a little ventilator.  

Now to something completely different: And that is that I finally succeeded in Quake 4!  Yes I blasted the last enemies to Kingdom come just the other day. In the Nexus...  Wow! And of course I play in the hardest mode. Many hours had I to sit here and let them have it! Bangs and explosions galore, I love it! I have to save often and play the situations over and over again, but no matter, now it's done!  Or was this piece of information completely different from my fishing? I think not. But one thing is sure and that is if more people restricted their tendencies for murder and violence to c&r-fishing and video games the world would've been a much better place to live in. Datum Art Vikt Bete Flugspö Fluglina Tid Död 2006-07-13 Gädda 4 Vit Gäddsara AFTM 9 Sjunklina 08:00 Nej 2006-07-13 Gädda 3,5 Vit Gäddsara AFTM 9 Sjunklina 08:30 Nej 2006-07-13 Gädda 2 Vit Gäddsara AFTM 9 Sjunklina 10:00 Nej 2006-07-13 Gädda 3 Vit Gäddsara AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:00 Nej 2006-07-13 Gädda 5 Vit Gäddsara AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:30 Nej 2006-07-13 Gädda 2 Vit Gäddsara AFTM 9 Sjunklina 11:45 Nej

The pike above is today's first catch. The one weighing about 4 kilo. I got one a little bit bigger than that but I've had a little problem with the camera which... No, the stupid photographer I had on board had it, of course! He couldn't handle the settings and controls rightly and many photos turned out bad. 
With a little more luck I'd be lifting up a much bigger pike. At least seven or eight kilo. But that pike didn't have the time to strike. It came too close to the boat and quickly turned around and went away. 

06-07-20

The last day

That expression could be a very dramatic one. Add "very" and at once it becomes even apocalyptical. But my intention was not in the least meant to lead the thoughts in that direction. I was just meaning that today was the last fishing day of my summer vacation. Or summer holiday. And even that concept needs to be explained a little. Apparently not all countries have that luxury that they have the benefit of paid holidays. Not even if we keep it to the so called Western Civilization. 
Here in Sweden all employed are guaranteed at least 5 weeks of paid vacation. Four weeks at summer and 5 days after mutual agreement with the employer. And now my four weeks are over. 
But speaking of the very last day, just now I hear that the temperature in Germany is the impressing 40 degrees Celsius. Was it last summer or the the summer before that 30 000 people in Europe died as a direct cause of the heat?
How many will it be this summer?
But in my opinion it has to be at least a couple of millions before something really will happen. 
But the whole thing about changing climate, increasing carbon dioxide and the greenhouse effect is a very dubious issue. I mean that it easily could have natural causes as well as we are responsible for it. But in either case it will be unstoppable. 
The difference between a statesman and a politician is that the statesman plans for the next generation but the politician just for the next election, they say. So that's the price you have to pay for living in a democracy. What politician would be voted for, promising what it would take to stop an eventual greenhouse effect? The measurements and undertakings to do so would be enormous and affect our lives so deep no one will hear about it.
 Not until so and so many millions of people have died anyway. 
On the other hand, is the increasing heat caused by  sun spots or just natural variations in the interglacial period we all live in just now, we can't do shit about it either. This is a very controversial statement, I know, but I've read about other scientists believing that, or at least say that we can't know it. They mean that we have to wait at least a couple of thousand years before we can sort out what is natural and what's caused by us. They point out that for only about 6000 years ago it was hotter than today. But for the moment I don't have access to that source so don't take the number of years as a fact. My memory, specially for dates and numbers isn't what it used to be. Or at least should've been. 
So we've been kind of stuck, anyway you look at it.
So prepare for Judgment Day!

OK, how did we end up in this gloominess? I just wanted to tell a little about my fishing and before you know it, someone starts talking about politics!   But just now I remembered a very appropriate and famous quotation that fits in just all too well of today's situation. Especially for you in the Netherlands...  Of course I refer to "Après nous, le déluge!", said by a certain madam de Pompadour in 1757 to Louis XV. In France and in French. "After us, the Flood!" Build up your walls even higher! one want to say to them.  There's a prophesy saying that when the icecaps are melting down, the sea level will rise 10 meters or so. Or is the proper word prediction? But as a small consolation for my Dutch readers, I can say that I don't believe that. The sea-level rising part, that is. But this is my own speculation and thus, very unsure. But what will happen when the temperature rises so high the icebergs and glaciers in the poles are melting?

I think that the evaporation will increase accordingly. I mean, you can't just look at it up in the poles or one aspect of the earth's increasing temperature. How hot will it not become round the equator? If you get lucky the sea level won't rise a bit but be sure that the rain, storms and hurricanes will increase. The evaporated water wants to return to the surface again. Like in the saying that all that goes up will fall down. So maybe it isn't such a bad idea to look over your walls...
Enough of this environmental shit for now!

Another nice day out in my little boat. Four kilos I wrote down in my little notebook that this pike weighed. It wasn't so much but under these circumstances you aren't allowed to complain. The water isn't warm, it's hot.  There's a lot of algae in the water.  We have this problem here in the Baltic with flourishing little algae hot summer days with little or no wind. They float up to the surface and starts to bloom and... Hey, why not cheat a little!?  Here's a clip from Encyclopedia Britannica: "Cyanobacteria reproduce asexually, either by means of binary or multiple fission in unicellular and colonial forms or by fragmentation and spore formation in filamentous species. Under favourable conditions, cyanobacteria can reproduce at explosive rates, forming dense concentrations called blooms. Cyanobacteria blooms can colour a body of water. For example, many ponds take on an opaque shade of green as a result of overgrowths of cyanobacteria, and blooms of phycoerythrin-rich species cause the occasional red colour of the Red Sea. Cyanobacteria blooms are especially common in waters that have been polluted by nitrogen wastes; in such cases, the overgrowths of cyanobacteria can consume so much of the water's dissolved oxygen that fish and other aquatic organisms perish." I certainly hope I'm not breaking any laws by citing the above. You never know these days when the war against the evil file sharers is picking up speed.

Hey, wait a minute here! Is it really correct, the last part of the quotation? I thought it was the other way around; that algae produced oxygen instead of consuming it!
Or do they mean when algae die, sink down to the bottom to rot? That process consumes oxygen, that's true...
But there you are, I shouldn't deal in matters I know so little about!

But before I close down for now, just let... Oho... The Internet Ombudsman... Now, what does he want? Probably no good news... Or...? 
-Hi, just wait till you see this! 
-What?
-It's a message! A very important message, I can assure you!
-All I get is spam! Damn spam! Ha! Did you hear that? A rhyme! 
-Be quiet and listen! This...
-I can do better than that! Who said "I learned the truth from Lenny Bruce"?
-Bob Dylan of course, but enough of that and...
-"I learned even more from Michael Moore" I said that. 
-You idiot! Don't mention that name or you'll ruin the whole thing! Look at the message! It's from George!
-George...? What George? I don't know any George! Are you sure it isn't from someone trying to sell me cialis or stock? Or maybe some Nigerian, runaway Government minister wanting to do me a great favor?
-Will you shut up and listen! Look at it! It's from George W!
-You don't mean...?
-Yes! Take it!
-OK... Now, let's see... Hm... Ooops! What do you know... Hm... That sure was unexpected... Well, I'll be...
-What? What?
-He congratulates me to take his side on this greenhouse effect thing! Seems that he always had someone keeping an eye on this website and now he was gladly surprised me ending up on his way of seeing things... He even offers me a job in his staff of environmental experts... Maybe even sponsor this website if I continue to support him on his holy war against those opposed to the Great American Way of Life... 
-Will you take it? This could be your big chance! 
-Well.... No, I couldn't really do that... Oh, wait a minute! Whooha! Look at this!:
 "And let me finish off this kind offer to you, Mr. Essebo,  by telling you that I happen to know some influential people down in the Great State of Florida. My staff tells me that you expressed some interest in going there to try our truly Famous and Great American way of fishing we have down there. My  brother Jeb tells me that he'd be honored seeing you as a guest down on some of the very best flats there is. For a week or two..." 
Well, that sure sounds tempting! Let me think for a minute...
But I sure got to hand it to them, his Intelligence, knowing what I write here even before I got it published... You don't happen to know something about that?
-Me...? Of course not! 
-But you sure seemed to know the contents of the message, raving about it, the way you did. But no...
 No, I mustn't forget myself what I'm warning others, that this is the Internet and you can't trust all you see here! So just throw it away, please! Nice try though, all you spammers out there! But I won't fall for your dirty tricks!

That's all for now, folks. And maybe for a long time.