Missouri River Adopt-A-Fish

Missouri-Yellowstone Adopt-A-Fish

Letter to teachers and kids – April 10, 2008

Bandit is a terrible swimmer. Smokey paddles easily.

Dear teachers and kids,

“Hey you, old bald guy, we’ve got to talk.” It was Smokey, my old dog, nuzzling my leg and letting me know that I had better pay attention because he had something important to say.

“I’m worried about Bandit,” Smokey continued, telling me about his young dog partner. “Do you remember last summer? Do you remember when Bandit was trying to swim? It was terrible. I was afraid the little dog was going to drown!”

Ah yes, I do remember. For a Labrador retriever, Bandit is perhaps the worst swimmer I have ever seen. He was long on enthusiasm. He’d charge into the water. He’d start flailing. And he wouldn’t go anywhere.

Dogs are supposed to lay down on the water, let the buoyancy of their bodies support them, and simply dog-paddle along. That’s what old Smokey does and he’s good at it.

But young Bandit? He tries to stand on the water. He’s upright. His nose reaches for the sky. He thrashes with his rear legs and flails the air with his front paws. He splashes a lot. He gets horribly tired. But he doesn’t do much moving in a forward direction.

“Hey you, old bald guy, this is your problem,” Smokey said. “You brought that little dog into the house – my house. It’s your job to teach him to swim. And if he starts splashing and flailing again, I just want to let you know that it’s your job to jump in and save him. I don’t care how cold the water is. I don’t care how far you have to swim. It’s an old bald guy’s job to save the little dog.”

Me? Save Bandit? Teach him to swim? Jump into that ice-cold springtime water to rescue a Labrador retriever who’s supposed to be a good swimmer on his own?

Smokey had spoken. And, apparently, he hadn’t just spoken to me.

When Bandit wandered over, he started saying, “Swim! Swim! Swim! Me and old bald guy are going swimming!! Hooray!! Splash! Splash! Splash! Then it's old guy to the rescue! Hooray!”

So I don’t know what I’m going to do. I really don’t want to go swimming in ice-cold spring water. But I don’t want Bandit to drown either. Will I have to wait until mid-summer when the water warms up to go fishing? I hope not. Maybe Smokey will relent and help his little buddy. But I wouldn’t bet on it. He usually says exactly what he means. I’ll have to keep you posted in the coming weeks how things go.

If you have any questions of the biologists or want to send an e-mail to me, or Smokey, or Bandit, just send it to walleyes@walleyesforever.com. We'll answer you as quickly as we can.

Talk to you next week.

Signed,

Mark, the old guy who doesn’t want to swim
Smokey, the fish pointer
Bandit, "I wanna splash NOW!"

Click here to Find Your Fish

Click to close window