Largemouth on the River

April 15, 2006
Sylvan Springs, Alabama

Warrior River 

The Black Warrior River runs through Alabama's black belt and is a fishing destination for many residents of central Alabama. The river is named after an Indian chief named Tuskaloosa. His name means "Black Warrior" in Muskogean. There are several species of game fish in the Warrior river including Largemouth Bass, Striped Bass, Spotted Bass, Bluegill and various species of catfish. This river is special to me because this is where I learned to fish. I've spent countless days on the banks of this river casting a rod and even more days navigating the tributaries on fishing boats. One day especially stands out to me.

It was early spring, when the bass start making their beds and laying their eggs. This is one of the few times in the year that you can spot large bass in shallow water. I was at one of my favorite fishing spots casting my favorite lures in the freshly made beds when I had a huge female bass swallow my bait. I didn't have to fight the bass long before I knew I had a good one on the line. I caught a nice 7 lb. 11 oz. Largemouth Bass. I had the fish mounted on a piece of driftwood that I found in the river.

Archer’s Delight

October 25, 2005

Sylvan Springs, Alabama

This was one of my most memorable hunts. I hunted from the ground, which is my favorite style because its the most engaging. I was dressed in full camo (except for my orange hat that I wore to get to my stand). I crouched down beside an early season green field and waited for the action to start. Admittingly, I had dozed off in the afternoon sun when a familiar leaf crunch caught my attention. It takes years spent in the woods to understand the difference between how birds sound fluttering in the leaves, the intermittent sound of a squirrel splashing in the leaves as he moves tree-to-tree and the sound of a deer trot. Deer typically make a the splashing sound of a squirrel but it's usually at a constant pace. Before I could determine whether the leaves were squirrels playing near me, I saw this small buck standing 20 yards in front on me having his afternoon dinner. I slowly moved to a crouched position and left an arrow fly. Then nothing happened. The deer didn't move and I saw the fletching sticking out of the ground beneath his belly. The deer was so close that my closest pin wasn't close enough. I knocked another arrow and this time I looked down the shaft of the arrow and thought to myself that this had better work. I let the second arrow fly and heard a hard thump right after. The deer bolted into the woods and almost jumped over me in his pursuit to leave the area. I trailed him for about a hundred yards before I found my first bow hunting trophy. This isn't the biggest deer that I had killed but it's so rewarding to have a successful hunt with a primitive weapon like a bow.

The Garner Legacy

Central Alabama

Hunting is a tradition that has been passed down through my family for many generations. My passion for hunting and the outdoors started around my 10th birthday when my dad gave me my first gun - a Remington youth model pump-action 20 gauge shotgun. This was much better than the pellet guns and BB guns that I had used to learn how to shoot. I couldn't wait to get in the woods and see what it could do. During deer season, my dad and I spent most Saturday mornings driving to the local management areas and ground stalking whitetails. Dad taught me what deer tracks looked like and the difference between scrapes and rubs. I also learned that an early morning hunt in January could be pretty cold. We were always trying to find new ways to stay warm. We put heating pads in our boots and our gloves so we could site longer. We never saw or killed any deer for the first few seasons. But looking back, Dad was there to spend time with me and teach me about hunting. It didn't matter whether we saw anything or not. My first deer came a few years after my 10th birthday.

My first deer was a hunt that I'll never forget. My granddad had an old friend, Ben, that he knew from his rabbit hunting days. I convinced my grandad, or Pawpaw as I called him, to give his friend a call and ask if we could come hunt with him again. He did and we got an invitation to come hunt. We struck out in the morning well before dawn headed to Millport, Alabama. We had our lunches that my grandmother had made and our rifles. We got to Ben's house before sunrise and started talking about the hunt. Ben let me use one of his rifles that morning because I only had my shotgun. Ben walked us to the blind that morning over a frost-covered dirt road. The road was frozen and I was having trouble not crunching the ice with my boots. We made it to the blind and watched the sun come up. The blind was overlooking a huge food plot - several hundred yards in each direction. We saw 3 or 4 deer that morning but they were all does. We came down from the stand and met Ben back at his house for lunch. Ben razzed me for not shooting one of the deer that morning, telling me there is no size limit for my first deer. We got back in the blind that afternoon and saw the same deer and this time they were not so lucky. Pawpaw tried to convince me to wait a little later for a bigger deer but I had an itchy trigger finger combined with Ben's earlier criticism. I was ready to shoot. I picked the biggest deer in the group, lined up the rifle, put the crosshairs on her shoulder and squeezed the trigger. It was over so fast and there was my trophy laying in the field. My granddad later admitted that the only reason he allowed me to shoot was because he thought I would miss. 

After my first deer, I couldn't get enough. I had waited so long for my first shot opportunity and couldn't stop thinking about my next. Over the years, I learned how hunting is a social event. I made some of my closest friendships in the field. I started hunting with my best friend, Jonathan, shortly after this and we plan to continue this tradition throughout our lives. We've hunted local hunting clubs and management areas. We've hunted dog drives, tree stands and box blinds. We even started travel hunting together - we took a week-long trip to Michigan to get a taste of hunting in the snow. I remember nights where we would stay up for hours after we had cleaned a deer so that we could grill the backstraps that night. I also have been able to pass on this tradition. I taught my buddy Blake everything he knows about hunting. I even let him borrow my boots and wore my tennis shoes one evening so he could get in the woods with us.

Hunting was not only a way to make friendships but was a way to strengthen family connections. I can remember countless Christmas parties where my granddad would tell stories about when he owned rabbit dogs. He would also tell us funny stories about my dad and my uncle how they fell in a creek or couldn't hit a rabbit. These stories remind me of my heritage and where I came from.

Our family also has a rich history in industrial work: my great granddad was an industrial carpenter for U.S. Steel, my granddad was a crane rigger for U.S. Steel, my dad is a machinist, my brother is an electrical motor specialist and I've worked as a chemical engineer in the paper, oil and petrochemical industries.

Not that any of that is related to the outdoors but it also reminds me of my heritage. I also hunted several times with my mom's brother, Tim, and his son, Jordan. I even went to his camp in south Alabama one year. We always had a good time when we hunted together. The last photo is of my Uncle Joey who killed a very nice elk while hunting out west.