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#161284 04/30/09 01:50 AM
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Bruce and I were having an interesting exchange of ideas on the "Super Fish" Bluegills Produced thread. It was getting a little hijacked by us, so I thought I would start a new thread for us to continue to exchange ideas and let others put their thoughts into the subject.

I wrote:
 Originally Posted By: CJBS2003
I guess I wasn't clear in what I was trying to say. It doesn't appear they are genetically altering the fish. They are just selectively breeding them for desired traits and then treating them with hormones.

The odds of it affecting wild fish populations is probably slim... For one, the odds of the fish escaping is unlikely. Fish treated with hormones are not going to affect other wild fish even if they did escape. My concern is what the affects of selectively bred fish would have on the gene pool of wild fish should they escape. Would the addition of genetics not necessarily found in wild fish be harmful to the wild population should fish escape and successfully spawn with wild fish?

Even though fish maybe the same species or even the same subspecies, even fish populations from adjacent drainages have often been separated for thousands of years. This separation has no doubt led to genetic differences(however slight they may be), between the populations in each drainage. Although the biotic and abiotic factors in each drainage are similar, they are slightly different and each population will evolve to best survive those conditions.

When humans remove fish from the wild and breed them in an aquaculture facility, even if no intentional selective breeding is done, the selection if over a long enough period is going to be for survival in a aquaculture facility, not in the wild. Rainbow trout are a prime example of this... Many strains have been in captivity for so long, they do very poor when released into the wild.

IMO, when it comes to BG and YP or most other species of North American fishes, this is a minor worry compared to the many other more serious threats wild fish populations face in a human altered world...

And yes, there would be a lot more hungry and even starving people if it weren't for genetically altered and selectively bred food products, everything for soybeans to corn and chickens to cows... However, some of those genetic alteration and selective breeding have affected the wild populations from which those original food species came from. Its just the price we pay for being in a modern world where humans have far out surpassed the natural carrying capacity. Humans are just smart enough to alter their environment to allow more humans to live with a set amount of natural resources.


Then Bruce wrote:
 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
Very nicely stated.

I don't think there's really any difference in what we're stating. Just slightly different angles of perspective, so I'd like to move away from anything that would seem like an argument.

What I'd like to do, with your permission, is use this thread to broaden the discussion.

I'd like to pose the following questions. They may seem somewhat rhetorical, but in actuality, I don't know the answers.

How do we define "wild" populations? It seems like we sometimes stray a little when we use this term. Is it a term that encompasses populations that were present from a particular point in time? If I genetically alter pheasants, then release them on my farm, can they affect the "wild" population? Or is that population not wild because they were brought from China a few decades ago?

What constitutes genetic change? Does it have to be man-made, or does it include the natural selection process that occurs in only a few generations in a sequestered group of individuals? In other words, if you willingly move fish from a creek to a pond, is that any different than moving "laboratory" fish into a stream? If the fish in the creek are selected to "creek life" after several generations, is that not the same as moving "laboratory" fish into a creek? Just wondering...

Since humans are animals too, are our actions considered "unnatural" just because we're human, or are our actions "natural" because we're part of nature? Why does human activity get special labeling? Is it because we're smarter? Or do we just think we're smarter?

If humans willingly eradicated elephants from the world in the next five years, which we undoubtedly could do, why is this considered tampering with, and negatively affecting nature? If we're part of nature itself, isnt' this natural? Just wondering....

If a population of coyotes eliminated all of the worlds remaining black-footed ferrets, is this a "natural" or "unnatural" act? Is it different than the humans eliminating the elephants? Or do we just "know better"?

Just wondering....

BTW, we'll never be able to answer these questions....only speculate. Our part in nature makes it impossible for us to objectively view the questions. JMHO.


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It can't be an argument cause I don't know what we're arguing about! I think we are on the same page, but perhaps playing devil's advocate from different perspectives...

These are my opinions… I hope others will share their opinions as well! As Bruce has already said, we can’t answer these questions, just speculate. Speculation is an opinion, however we can learn a lot when reading other people’s opinions/speculations!

 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
How do we define "wild" populations? It seems like we sometimes stray a little when we use this term. Is it a term that encompasses populations that were present from a particular point in time? If I genetically alter pheasants, then release them on my farm, can they affect the "wild" population? Or is that population not wild because they were brought from China a few decades ago?


This is a complex idea that is multifaceted. What is wild? Can feral be wild? Can an animal not native to an area be wild or is it just feral? In the case of the ringneck pheasant, its probably one of the toughest examples to take on. As I recall, ringneck pheasants are not truly a species but rather a hybrid of perhaps as many as 3 or 4 different parental species. So really, it’s a man made bird in a way.

The releasing of pen reared birds into wild/feral pheasants has been shown in some studies to be detrimental. The same has been shown in native wild bobwhite quail. Bobwhite quail that have been pen raised for years which are then released into the wild, can have detrimental affects on the native wild bird population.

I define a wild population as: A collection of inter-breeding organisms of a particular species which do not display the physical features produced by domestication.

I define a feral population as: A collection of inter-breeding organisms of a particular species which do display the physical features produced by domestication.

OK, so you have ringneck pheasants which are naturally reproducing in the wild. Are they wild or are they feral? That is a tough question to answer! They don’t really fit either definition IMO. They are not so easy to classify. They aren’t like the wild hogs found in Texas or Florida. These hogs may have a percentage of wild genetics in them, but most if not all have domesticated appearances. Whether that be white spots, curly tails, short legs etc… Now if the pheasants that are wild in the Midwest grasslands were white like some domesticated pheasants are, I'd call them feral. However, these birds don't have any phenotypical characteristics bred into them by man, so I would classify them as introduced wild birds. Much like wild turkeys that are introduced outside their native range.

 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
What constitutes genetic change? Does it have to be man-made, or does it include the natural selection process that occurs in only a few generations in a sequestered group of individuals? In other words, if you willingly move fish from a creek to a pond, is that any different than moving "laboratory" fish into a stream? If the fish in the creek are selected to "creek life" after several generations, is that not the same as moving "laboratory" fish into a creek? Just wondering...


What really is genetic change? Is it the frequency certain phenotypes/genotypes are expressed? How much does the ratio of phenotypes/genotypes displayed have to change before it is considered genetic change? IMO, I think the key point is whether it’s caused by man or caused by nature.

Bruce's insanely fast growing bluegills, if they somehow escaped, they probably would have little to any affect on the wild fish population. They’ve been selectively bred to grow fast on a pellet diet. In all likelihood, the genetic difference between Bruce's fish and the run of the mill wild bluegill isn’t much. In a generation or two of them being back in the wild, you’d never know the difference. Now if Bruce kept selectively breeding his bluegill for 20 or even 50 more generations, perhaps those genes would become more ingrained in the population and he'd have 10 pound bluegills.

On a larger view, where did Bruce's original bluegill stock come from? Did they come from the same drainage Bruce's ponds are located in? If from a different drainage, do they have slightly different genetics since they are from a distinct drainage which has had different evolutionary forces? Is there really that much difference in genetics between two adjacent drainages? How about drainages 300 miles apart? I think we see that there sometimes is noticeable differences even amongst the same subspecies from different drainages. Odds would have it that the further apart the drainages are, the more likely the same subspecies from each drainage will have a larger genetic divergence. We’ve all seen the product of Bruce's selective breeding program and that is after only several generations. Drainages are often genetically divergent by thousands of generations… Perhaps it’s a lack of difference in the evolutionary forces from drainage to drainage that makes the subspecies genetically less divergent. Things like stream capture/piracy probably also play into keeping subspecies genetically similar even among different distinct drainages.

I am a realist and know that for the last 100 plus years stocking programs by both governmental agencies and private individuals has mixed fish from one drainage with another. This makes the identification of some subspecies from some species almost impossible today let alone trying to see if there are genetic differences between adjacent drainages.

Even more of a detriment is when closely related species are introduced into a drainage they are not native to. Prime examples of this would be rainbow trout hybridizing with other closely related trout when introduced outside their native range. Or the red shiner introduced outside its native range and hybridizing with closely related species.

 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
Since humans are animals too, are our actions considered "unnatural" just because we're human, or are our actions "natural" because we're part of nature? Why does human activity get special labeling? Is it because we're smarter? Or do we just think we're smarter?


This is absolutely nothing more than opinion as there really is no way to prove or disprove this. What is the definition of unnatural? How do you truly define it? Humans are a part of nature, but unlike any other animal, we have extreme ways of affecting nature. Where do you draw the line? Beavers build dams and can change a habitat.

Are the dingoes in Australia natural? They were brought there by the Aborigines thousands of years ago. The migration of Aborigines to Australia is thought by most scientists to have caused mass extinction in Australia. Is that natural or is it ‘man made‘? The same can be said for when the first Asian people crossed the Bearing Land Bridge into North America. Human presence in North America no doubt had great affects on the flora and fauna of North America. Is that natural?

When Europeans first came to what is now the eastern United States and through over hunting and habitat change cause the extirpation or extinction of the gray wolf, the elk, the passenger pigeon or the heath hen? Is that natural? I would argue it isn’t… I think the activity of modern man gets special labeling because of our incredible ability unlike any other species to alter the world we live in.

 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
If humans willingly eradicated elephants from the world in the next five years, which we undoubtedly could do, why is this considered tampering with, and negatively affecting nature? If we're part of nature itself, isnt' this natural? Just wondering....


I think this point is similar to what I spoke about before. Humans can affect the world like no other species. The world is nothing but a set of extinctions and the evolution of new species from more ancient species. Animals have been going extinct since the beginning of time. There’s nothing new there! What is new is the way species are going extinct, which most due to human activities…

 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
If a population of coyotes eliminated all of the worlds remaining black-footed ferrets, is this a "natural" or "unnatural" act? Is it different than the humans eliminating the elephants? Or do we just "know better"?

Just wondering....


IMO it would be a combination of “natural” and “unnatural” acts. Coyotes naturally prey on black-footed ferrets. However, before humans turned the grassland plains of North America into farm fields, cities and kept fires controlled allowing trees to take hold where they never did before and mercilessly hunted the prairie dog population the prey of black-footed ferrets, the population of black-footed ferrets was so high that coyotes could never eliminate them all. Due to the previously mentioned human activated that caused the extreme reduction of black-footed ferrets, coyotes could now possible eat them all since their numbers are so low. At one point there was only one small population left in the world. They were all captured and raised in captivity. There they were then released back into the wild and there are now several healthy populations of ferrets. Most extinctions caused by man are not caused by over hunting but rather habitat destruction.

 Originally Posted By: Bruce Condello
BTW, we'll never be able to answer these questions....only speculate. Our part in nature makes it impossible for us to objectively view the questions. JMHO.


We are fortunate in that we have the ability to think and reason. We can look at what our activities are doing and realize the consequences of what we do.

I think this thread is very timely with Mr. Lusk's recent post:
 Originally Posted By: Bob Lusk

To this day, that's what Pond Boss does.
But, beginning about 2004, I truly saw how important our entire universe is becoming. This discussion forum and the magazine are vehicles to spread the word about stewardship.
JHAP...you've got! It's our mission, all of us on the forum, to help people nationwide to become better stewards of our land and water. It's not because we are radical, it's because we are prudent. It's not because we want to solve the issues of global warming or stop the extinction of any creatures, it because we CARE about what we are charged with. When we understand how the dramatic changes we make can influence that land for 5 generations beyond us, it gives us pause to think. That's our mission. Pause to think. Then, be wise with our choices.
I'll always remember what happened to Mike Mitchell, from Longmont, Colorado.
He has a client who charged him with improving a mile of stream to make it a trout fishery. It was full of silt, spread out, not much water deeper than 8 inches. No pools, rocks were covered with mud. This wealthy client paid more than a million bucks with a thoughtful renovation of this stream. Mitchell methodically danced down that stream with a trackhoe, dump trucks and big rocks and created a pristine stream with riffles, holes, rocks that guided the water where it needed to go and built a beautiful trout fishery. Stocked the trout, fed them to large sizes. One day, a few years later, the landowner called him. Said, "Mike, I just saw a bald eagle come, grab a trout that weighed at least 5 pounds and eat it." Mitchell's sphincter puckered so fast it could have cut cold butter. He wasn't ready for the punch line.
The landowner then said, "Last year, bald eagles started nesting along the stream. In my 25 years here, I have never seen that. My wife and I love those eagles and because of what you did with the water, eagles are now thriving. Go get us some more trout. We love the eagles."
At that point, Mike began to see that what he does for a living transcends the water. It transcends the simpleness of fish.
Folks, this thread exemplifies what we do.
Nope, we don't just go hire Otto to push some dirt, do a rain dance and then call someone to toss in a few fish.
Just here at LL,2, I have seen some amazing things happen on this 12 acres. New creatures all the time. I just heard a turkey gobble, not 20 minutes ago. I've not seen an osprey anywhere within miles of here and had a young one land on the dead tree on the far side of the pond.
We've got ferns growing naturally on the rocks in the waterfall we made.
Wood ducks are nesting. All we did was provide a few boxes and some corn every day.
I must say, "It All Depends" is the place to start, because it's the truth. That tag line gets us started in the right direction of evaluation. But, stewardship is the name of the game. If we think only about the pond and its inhabitants, we miss some of the most important stuff.


Mr. Lusk says it well... We as humans have a lot of power to help or hinder wildlife!

Humans, whether we like it or not have changed the natural landscape of North America more in 300 years than probably the last 30,000 years! The use of a bulldozer to move a lot of dirt and build a pond is not natural. However, we can do it in way that respects the land and turns it into a place that not only we enjoy but wildlife enjoy as well. We stock fish in our ponds that aren't native to that drainage or even that continent. I am a realist though, and feel that to try to make a big deal out of a bluegill from one drainage getting moved to another drainage or a small valley being dammed up to form a 5 acre pond is ridiculous. Far worse has already been done.

Living not more than a mile or two from the shores of the Potomac River not too far outside Washington DC I have become quite fond of this fabled river. What a history it has! What great fishing it provides. Many would argue it as the greatest tidal largemouth bass fishery in the world. Yet, I doubt many of the professional tournament anglers even know that largemouth bass are not even native to the Potomac River!

Oh how I wish I could go back to 1492 and fish it with modern fishing gear.

To see the river turn silver in the spring spawning season with anadramous shad and striped bass so thick you could nearly walk across their backs from one shore to another. Full of Atlantic sturgeon so big 6 men couldn't carry them! There wouldn't be any largemouths, nor smallmouths to fish for though. No bluegills, no channel catfish or blue catfish either... What a different ecosystem it was.

The Potomac River was the dumping ground in many ways. The USFWS had many reproduction ponds on it’s banks in the 1800's and with floods and actual stocking, much of what was raised in those ponds ended up in the Potomac. With all these new fish being introduced it truly is amazing that so few species have been extirpated from this river. Only one species has been confirmed as being extirpated, the lowly trout-perch. Who cares about a trout-perch anyways? 99.999% of the population who call the DC region home wouldn't even know what a trout-perch is!

The lowly Trout-Perch:


This is just referring to just the fish, not all the pollution, sedimentation and other man caused detriments the river has faced. In recent years, water quality has improved on the river. The anadramous shad runs seem to grow with every year with reintroduction efforts, the striped bass are coming back as well. The Atlantic Sturgeon no longer reproduce in the river but a stray one from another drainage may occasionally enters it’s waters. Then you hear about new challenges, male bass producing eggs, snakehead fish establishing a reproducing population in the river. How will these recent changes affect the river? Who knows...

The man made world we live in is still very wild. We must strike a balance between living a modern world and enjoy modern convenience buy also realize what we do does have an affect. Giving back to nature can be very rewarding, whether its putting up duck or bluebird boxes, planting native trees for wildlife, helping clean up your local river or financially supporting a conservation organization like The National Wild Turkey Federation or Trout Unlimited.

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Pogo said "We have met the enemy and he is us.".

Weighty stuff with the need for more and deeper thought than I can handle this time of the morning.


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

Boy, if I say "sic em", you'd better look for something to bite. Sam Shelley Rancher and Farmer Muleshoe Texas 1892-1985 RIP
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as long as we're waxing philosophical, here's my 2c...

from a typical point of view, wild fish are those that have adapted to a particular environment and have a successful self sustaining population, they may have been introduced some time ago or be native. wild vs. native is another interesting question. native probably being defined as that which was here before modern man had the ability to affect his immediate environment (although isnt man wild and native too?). despite the semantics and values such as "is it wrong or bad, or is it good and healthy" that one could "argue" about forever......cj and bruce, i think about it this way.

its a scale problem. of both time and space. on what scale do you perceive yer life and the life of all the critters around you, the trees, the soil, and especially the ROCKS, i.e. our environment.

are bass not native to earth?

and humans?

is not everything we eat, drink, see, view, touch, or manufacture of the earth? ok, maybe not tectites (pieces of meteorite), but as you expand yer scale, everything is native to the solar system, the universe, the cosmos and beyond.

for a time, we humans can surely and dramatically affect things around us here on earth but on what scale?

rather than stumble along as so many of you are used to from me, here is an eloquent piece of prose which illustrates the scale problem (and my points of view as a geologist.....i am suddenly amazed (or i've lost my mind) that such a simple question...."what makes a fish wild" would generate so much philosophical crap):

I wish i could put an audio link here, but i'm not that smart, so you can just imagine the following........A Charlton Heston reading of the Forward from the book Jurassic Park, by Michael Crichton:

HESTON: You think man can destroy the planet? What intoxicating vanity. Let me tell you about our planet. Earth is four-and-a-half-billion-years-old. There's been life on it for nearly that long, 3.8 billion years. Bacteria first; later the first multicellular life, then the first complex creatures in the sea, on the land. Then finally the great sweeping ages of animals, the amphibians, the dinosaurs, at last the mammals, each one enduring millions on millions of years, great dynasties of creatures rising, flourishing, dying away -- all this against a background of continuous and violent upheaval. Mountain ranges thrust up, eroded away, cometary impacts, volcano eruptions, oceans rising and falling, whole continents moving, an endless, constant, violent change, colliding, buckling to make mountains over millions of years. Earth has survived everything in its time. It will certainly survive us. If all the nuclear weapons in the world went off at once and all the plants, all the animals died and the earth was sizzling hot for a hundred thousand years, life would survive, somewhere: under the soil, frozen in Arctic ice. Sooner or later, when the planet was no longer inhospitable, life would spread again. The evolutionary process would begin again. It might take a few billion years for life to regain its present variety. Of course, it would be very different from what it is now, but the earth would survive our folly, only we would not. If the ozone layer gets thinner, ultraviolet radiation sears the earth, so what? Ultraviolet radiation is good for life. It's powerful energy. It promotes mutation, change. Many forms of life will thrive with more UV radiation. Many others will die out. Do you think this is the first time that's happened? Think about oxygen. Necessary for life now, but oxygen is actually a metabolic poison, a corrosive glass, like fluorine. When oxygen was first produced as a waste product by certain plant cells some three billion years ago, it created a crisis for all other life on earth. Those plants were polluting the environment, exhaling a lethal gas. Earth eventually had an atmosphere incompatible with life. Nevertheless, life on earth took care of itself. In the thinking of the human being a hundred years is a long time. A hundred years ago we didn't have cars, airplanes, computers or vaccines. It was a whole different world, but to the earth, a hundred years is nothing. A million years is nothing. This planet lives and breathes on a much vaster scale. We can't imagine its slow and powerful rhythms, and we haven't got the humility to try. We've been residents here for the blink of an eye. If we're gone tomorrow, the earth will not miss us.

so while we can argue about the significance of man's impact on the planet and whether or not those impacts are good or bad, healty or unhealthy, natural or unnatural, realize that we all live in our little domains as individuals on this planet. we create laws to live and abide by that are based to support our values for those things we deem good or bad. we get attached to things in this domain, in this scale, that which is our environment for the time we are here to witness it.

we as pondbossers try and do our small part, as bob mentioned, being "good stewards" with what we have for the time we have here to do it. hey, it makes us feel good. killing elephants doesnt make most of us feel good, putting up wood duck boxes does.

Last edited by dave in el dorado ca; 04/30/09 01:57 PM. Reason: typos, it was natural, or was it unnatural??

GSF are people too!

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Sometimes I sit on the Barge in the evening when the wind is quiet and contemplate these things. Sometimes I just sit there and listen to the birds or cast around a bit. Though in some small way I may be a steward of a tiny piece of the universe, it is inconsequential in nature’s grand scheme. What I know is these are the best of my private times, and that is good enough for me. \:\)


Life is Good on Bremer Pond

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 Originally Posted By: Dwight
Sometimes I sit on the Barge in the evening when the wind is quite and contemplate these things. Sometimes I just sit there and listen to the birds or cast around a bit. Though in some small way I may be a steward of a tiny piece of the universe, it is inconsequential in nature’s grand scheme. What I know is these are the best of my private times, and that is good enough for me. \:\)


Well said Dwight.



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Thanks, DIED...


Just do it...
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Alright Bruce, get on here and weigh in... ;\)

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So many words. I'm gonna go feed my wild fish that I've hand selected in my natural backyard pond...

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Since we are quoting Bob - not selectively,

Bob said :

"When Pond Boss was born in 1992, in the very first meeting at that Whataburger on Hwy 121 in Lewisville, Texas, Mark McDonald and I came to only two conclusions..after we knew a magazine or newsletter was needed. We concluded that this little magazine would never lead to peace in the Middle East or feed the hungry. Second, we knew we needed to dispense good information that people could actually use and do it in a fun way, because ponds are fun.
To this day, that's what Pond Boss does."


Some of the fundamental problems of philosophy are no closer to being solved today than they were at the time of the Greeks: Why is there something rather than nothing? Why is this something not something else? What is mind, and are we unique? Why are we here ?

Consider that all material that exists was here at the beginning and it has merely changed form. The carbon in your body could have been in some distant star billions of years ago.

As Saint Paul said: "Now we see through a glass, darkly." The phrase is interpreted to mean that humans have an imperfect perception of reality.

Life itself is enough to be happy about.
















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 Originally Posted By: Dwight
Sometimes I sit on the Barge in the evening when the wind is quite and contemplate these things. Sometimes I just sit there and listen to the birds or cast around a bit. Though in some small way I may be a steward of a tiny piece of the universe, it is inconsequential in nature’s grand scheme. What I know is these are the best of my private times, and that is good enough for me. \:\)


Damn Dwight that some impressive writing. You should frame it below a picture of your self on the barge with the pond in the background. I mean it!


If pigs could fly bacon would be harder to come by and there would be a lot of damaged trees.






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Wow, what a heavy thread. When I first clicked on this thread I thought that CJ was preparing to make a zillion dollars making a new video series "Good Fish Gone Wild" but low and behold we are waxing philosophically (as opposed to waxing physically).

 Originally Posted By: DIED, taken out of context
maybe not tectites


I got kicked in the tectites once, man did that hurt.

Oh come on, who couldn't see that coming.

Good stuff everyone. There is a special that is going to return to one of the TV stations (real helpful here) I think it is either Discovery or the history channel that describes how Earth would change if man suddenly vanished. It is a very interesting special. I don't know the name of the show and I don't know the channel (I'm a wealth of good information). I saw the show last year and yesterday I saw a commercial for it in which they (who ever the "they" is that is producing the special) are brining back the series with new shows. If I see the commercial again and happen to have something to write with then I'll make a note and update this post.

Great comments Dwight.


JHAP
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"My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives."
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i thought for sure i was gonna kill this thread.

actually, to answer the original question......what makes a fish wild?



;\)


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She's a very special fish, the kind you won't take home to mothaaaaaaa.


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Dave, answer your phone, dang it.


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Hmmmm, so JHAP doesn't pass through call screening?

Note to forum members, I noticed that DIED posted a few minutes ago so I rang him up (sorry been watching the BBC too much lately). So what happens? I get an answering machine on both his home and business phone. I'm telling ya I don't get any respect.


JHAP
~~~~~~~~~~

"My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives."
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Geologists make sense !!! Good thoughts Dave .

The show - "Life After Man" - I think.

Last edited by ewest; 05/01/09 12:56 PM.















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I guess I'm kinda weird but seeing the cities go back to nature on the series was kind of cool for me. I'm not a city fan at all. I had to live in town with a little yard and no ponds I'd shoot myself. I know big cities are needed but some of the worst examples of mankind are in the cities IMHO. I'd love to be here about 3000 years ago, but of course with all the modern amenities like modern fishing tackle, clothes, transportation, homes, etc.

I thought about writing a book where people go back in time and are able to observe history in the making, but of course invisible to stay safe and not alter the time line. It would be complete with revelations that some of our history is revisionist and not accurate. Then of course the book would be made into a series complete with the observation of something different that was history making in each episode. If done well enough it could get school kids more interested in history.

Last edited by Cecil Baird1; 05/01/09 01:01 PM.

If pigs could fly bacon would be harder to come by and there would be a lot of damaged trees.






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sorry jhap,

i was comtemplating my navel.

as always, nice chattin w/ you \:\)

IIRC, in that show (Beyond Man....thanks eric) a computer simulation depicts what happens to a city in the absence of man. at an alarming rate, it decays to a point at which you could barely tell anything was there.

on the flip side however, as we have learned from such epic movies like "terminator", sometimes the smallest man made perturbations will cause the great ripple effects in the future. so despite all my mumbo jumbo up top, we need to keep sheperding our slice of heavan as we see fit and maybe, long after we're gone, some dramatic good will arise from our effort.


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 Originally Posted By: jeffhasapond
Hmmmm, so JHAP doesn't pass through call screening?

Note to forum members, I noticed that DIED posted a few minutes ago so I rang him up (sorry been watching the BBC too much lately). So what happens? I get an answering machine on both his home and business phone. I'm telling ya I don't get any respect.

Maybe he was in the loo (a good navel contemplation zone).


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navel fuzz ties nice flys

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"I thought about writing a book where people go back in time and are able to observe history in the making, but of course invisible to stay safe and not alter the time line. It would be complete with revelations that some of our history is revisionist and not accurate. Then of course the book would be made into a series complete with the observation of something different that was history making in each episode. If done well enough it could get school kids more interested in history."

Cecil, I think "LOST" stole your idea........


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 Originally Posted By: Cecil Baird1
I guess I'm kinda weird but seeing the cities go back to nature on the series was kind of cool for me. I'm not a city fan at all. I had to live in town with a little yard and no ponds I'd shoot myself. I know big cities are needed but some of the worst examples of mankind are in the cities IMHO.


I thought the series was great also Cecil so we're both weird. (Probably no major revelation there).

Having grown up in the city I'd have to agree with your statement "some of the worst examples of mankind are in the cities."


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Why do all the people that contemplate their navel end up in California?


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 Originally Posted By: Theo Gallus
Maybe he was in the loo (a good navel contemplation zone).


Loo = toilet for those of you that don't watch the BBC. \:D


JHAP
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...Hedley Lamarr (that's Hedley not Hedy)
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