“We’re better than this.”  It seems like I’ve been saying that a lot lately, and it was my first thought after seeing a friend’s post on Facebook early last week.

 

In the video post, a great blue heron hangs suspended in midair, struggling to escape from the trot line in which his or her wing has become entangled.

 

My friends Lee Harper of Oxford and her husband Andy came upon the ensnared heron during a hike at Sardis lake.  According to Harper, they noticed something in the distance that seemed awry and made the decision to investigate.

 

“Andy and I were hiking way back on the Sardis Lake moonscape area when we saw something in the distance,” Harper said. “We had seen garbage stuck in a few of these trot lines that day, so we didn’t think much of it.”

 

Fortunately for the heron, Andy had a weird feeling about what they were seeing and made the decision to investigate.  Soon they found themselves shifting into rescue mode.  Andy was able to reach the string with a stick and pull it close while Lee held the upper portion of the bird’s legs to provide stability.

 

Using a knife from Lee’s pack, Andy was able to cut the line and gently lay the heron on the ground while Lee continued to hold him.  Fortunately, the hook hadn’t penetrated the skin, and the wing had no visible sign of blood or damage.

With the bird clutching Lee’s shirt with its feet, Andy finished untangling the line.The couple then released the bird and watched from afar for several minutes.

 

At first, the bird appeared to be favoring the wing that was entangled, but eventually he or she tucked it back into the normal position and resumed fishing, all the while keeping a close, and no doubt suspicious, eye on its rescuers.

 

After watching the video of the struggling bird, my first thought was, “We’re better than this.”  As outdoorsmen and women, we must do a better job of taking care of the outdoor spaces we use and love.

 

My father’s words echoed in my mind, “Leave it better than you found it.”

 

Having been taught that lesson as a boy, I’ve always maintained the habit of picking up any trash that I encounter while in the outdoors.  It seems the least that I can do.  Call it a privilege tax.  The Harpers paid their “privilege tax” in full last week at Sardis.

 

As an aside, I loved running trotlines with my dad and his friend Mr. Bud as a boy and then, later as a young man, setting and running them with my father-in-law Billy “Pop” Hull.  I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve fished using trotlines over the years.

 

I can, however, absolutely tell you how many times we left those lines in the water after using them—zero.  At the end of the trip, we took the lines out of the water and stored them for future use.  Leaving them in would have been reckless and dangerous; it would have been no different than tossing our trash into the river or lake in which we were fishing.

 

Do lines ever break?  Certainly, they do, both trot lines and fishing lines.  Lines break off and are lost to the water.  However, those accidents need to be the exception, not the rule.

 

Could that have been the case with the trot line that snared the great blue heron at Sardis?  Yes, however, all too often the lines are not left or lost by accident.

 

As sportsmen and women, we have both a calling and a responsibility to be the caretakers of the woods and waters that we use.  It is a calling that I do not take lightly and one that I often write about, imploring others to do the same.

 

This week, Dan and I, on separate days, picked up discarded trash from near the woods along the roadside here at the farm.  Returning home one evening from work, I noticed a large mud tire discarded along the wood’s edge.

 

I left it there overnight, hoping that someone had lost in unknowingly and would pick it up when they passed on their return trip.  Alas, Dan picked it up the following day.

 

Saturday when I checked the mailbox, I noticed what I have come to refer to as the calling card of the sloppy hunter–an empty corn bag.  I see these bags all too often while traveling throughout our beautiful state for work.

 

Supplemental feeding is legal in Mississippi, and we feed corn, protein, and minerals throughout the year here at the farm.  I fully support the activity; however, I don’t support the littering.

 

I believe — perhaps I’m naive— that most often this happens unintentionally when empty bags left in the truck bed blow out while traveling.  However, it’s easily prevented by placing the bags inside one another and securing them inside the truck.

 

We’re better than this, and as outdoorsmen and women we need to prove it.  We need to give the land and the wildlife the respect that each deserves.  We need to have the mindset of a caretaker, the mindset held by our indigenous brothers and sisters.

 

In “Braiding Sweetgrass” writer Robin Wall Kimmerer discusses this mindset:

 

“In the settler mind, land was property, real estate, capital, or natural resources.  But to our people, it was everything:  identity, the connection to our ancestors, the home of our non-human kinfolk, our pharmacy, our library.  Our lands were where our responsibility to the world was enacted, sacred ground.”

 

Lee and Andy, thank you for “enacting that responsibility.”  Until next time, here’s to being better caretakers, and here’s to seeing you out there in our green and clean great outdoors.