Saturday, May 10

Same schedule this morning as yesterday. Up at 7, on the water by 8 etc. We caught a total of 8 Sturgeon and were unhappy when we had 2 nets get messed up.
One of our nets was so full of pine tree branches it looked as if we murdered a Christmas tree, and the other got caught on some unknown object at the bottom and ripped in the center. Luckily we got both halves of our ripped net back into the boat, this is important because if we had lost a length of net fish could have gotten caught in the net and died, but we didn't so all was well. Though, re-tubbing took about 2 and a half hours because we had to fix the ripped net and untangled every piece of pine tree from the other bad net.
I wasn't too unhappy though, because we had caught a fish about five and a half feet long. The only down side being that sturgeon are fairly slimy fish, which means you have to hug them close to your body when holding them so they don't slip away and a five and a half foot long fish has a lot of slime to go around. My rain jacket will never be the same.
We decided not to set nets for the afternoon as we didn't catch too many yesterday so we took it easy for the afternoon. I spent some time looking at the sturgeon tracking system they had working with 2 computers upstairs. Last year they put acoustic tags in about 40 fish and they put 2 sets of 3 buoys in place which send out pulses which get signals off the tags if that fish is in the area and it shows you on the screen exactly where the fish is between those 3 buoys. It's pretty cool but only about 6 of the fish that were tagged are around right now.
I also discovered that there are plenty of Grouse in the area and those birds are really stupid and kind of perverts. I gather this from the fact that they will not run away or move until you are about to step on them and because I had one come up and look at me while I was going pee. We go to the bathroom in the bush out there because there is no running water so the toilets have to be filled with water manually and it is a long haul bringing water up from the river. So if you really have to go at night, you don't have to go outside but mostly you take a charming walk to the bush.
By the time we had reset 5 nets for the night and were back for supper I was tired and dehydrated but thinking of what a solid fitness program I am now on. I also found out that though we are going home tomorrow evening, we will be coming back up Monday afternoon for another 4 days. I don't know how I feel about this yet as catching fish is fun and interesting but it is pretty hard work at certain points.
Tomorrow is also mothers day and I tried to call home this evening but my parents had taken off for Riding Mountain without warning, how terrible. Haha, I'm kidding, but they better be home tomorrow!