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  Teva A Dog's Fish Story There are funny parts to living that sometimes we forget over the years but they come back to memory, prompted by who-or-what-knows. Such is the case of the time, about 5 years back, when I decided to do some fishing from the shore of Cayuga Lake in Upstate New York. Without exception, along with me invariably is my German Shepherd Teva, who is usually well-behaved unless the fishing is poor or she'd rather swim than watch Papa cast and cast again from the dockside. That day dawned differently, for I was using a live smelt, a baitfish that once was very common in these waters of this region - and this involved rowing out some 25 yards from shore and utilizing hook, line and sinker and allowing the smelt to swim unhindered in circles some 30-40 feet down. One would row the boat back to the dock after letting out line with weight sinker and smelt attached - and, you guessed it - Teva simply had to attend this little project while sitting in the front of the kayak while I got all the stuff together. Panning out line from the spool, we headed back for the dock. At that point, it was a simple matter of letting line out and soon, the rod was propped up on the dock piling and a small rock was laid across the line upon a still-open spool. Reading a book while waiting for a fish to strike (and these fish, let me tell you, can get above fifteen pounds or more, and there have been factual stories of poles being launched off of boats and docks and out of people's hands by vicious strikes by trout and salmon), I thought to use a combination of fishing pole and rock to hold the line in place...this way, if the fish hit, the spool would let line out freely behind the rapidly departing fish and the pole would remain alongside. To help things further, I took a piece of aluminum foil and attached this to the very top of the pole where the line exited the ferrules of the rod...this would visually indicate to me that there was a fish to be brought aboard the dock. The day went fairly quickly with no fish and seated in a chair at the end of the dock, I bathed in the late Spring sunshine and found an angle that let me visualize the rod and line peripherally from where I sat. By this time, the dog had had enough. "C'mon, lets go for a swi- ",she seemed to beggingly say (sure...sure...the temperature of Cayugan waters in late April is like 45 degrees I kid you not) but she was absolutely serious. Dead serious. Now mind you, there is something about the face of a German Shepherd that will melt people's hearts and willpower after 30 minutes of dog cajoling, whining, grinning, etc. I have seen it all. And this dog was not letting up. She began to be a pest, sitting alongside my chair, sticking her snoot in the middle of the Sunday paper you'd have across your lap, the big snoot working its way up the middle crease of the Sports page and interfering with the latest box score of Yanks-Sox. Just as I was about to firmly put her in a downstay, I noticed that she had this faraway look in her eyes and was peering directly over my shoulder skyward. Strange, I thought, there is no one here behind me...we are at the end of the dock. Turning around, I saw, in quick succession a gull wheel on a dime, and swoop directly down onto the water, apparently being attracted to some fish.... Near instantly, it hit.....the gull wanted the smelt but there was NO way that the smelt could have swam to the surface for the barrel sinker would do its job perfectly and keep it closer to the bottom of the lake. No such luck. The smelt somehow had swam upward and the gull had by then swallowed the smelt and hook in the flash of an eye. Quickly reeling in, I thought perhaps I'd have the chance to pull the bait out of the bird's mouth and s#%#, no luck there either. THe gull had, in all reality, been hooked just inside the mouth and for those of you who might be horrified at this, do know, the bird was released with very little intervention. The dog, however, had seen a succession of miracles that day. She had floated on water in a kayak and now, she sees Papa beginning to reel this bir-.... Indeed, the gull, alarmed by the tugging of the line, had gone airborne. A good 30 feet or so in the air. And in the eyes of a dog, here was Papa, slowly and with what must have been tremendously powerful abilities, actually PULLING a bird OUT OF THE SKY!!! Now mind you, the gull was P.O.'d that she was being reeled in...and yet, the bird faithful readers was not in full panic mode. It was an older gull, big too and in the 15 or so seconds it took to get my hands around its wings, it was fairly sedate at that and with the exception of a few pecks here and there, soon all was forgotten. NOW CAME THE NEXT MIRACLE.... My dog would tell you that miraculously, not only could Papa pull a bird from the sky but with even greater powers, could actually THROW a bird BACK into the sky again!! Way amazing! This is one for the books! The dog was s-t-o-k-e-d, dudes. THIS was something totally out of the ordinary and i could surmise that she was beginning to believe that Papa just .......might......be.......a god. Dog and god walked back home without fish that day but we bonded big time in other ways. Such is my friendship with her to this day.
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