This humorous yet serious posting is courtesy of Patrick Kelly...
Someone more famous than they deserved once said everyone gets 15
minutes of fame in their lifetime. Nothing beats learning from a
mistake like public humiliation and ridicule. I've learned this first
hand from many years of hard knocks as a government employee, parent
and former child...in that order.
In case you're not up on the Darwin Awards, you can play catch up here:
http://www.darwinawards.com/
http://en.wikipedia....i/Darwin_Awards
The intent is to officially honor and validate a truly stupendous
feat(s) of Sporting Conservation stupidity in a calendar year by the
nominee by this notorious annual award...whether the awardee has
survived (physically, mentally, emotionally, professionally or
financially) said feat notwithstanding. Think of this new annual award
as Jackass meets Field and Stream magazine.
That said, I would like to officially nominate Phil Durocher of Texas
Fisheries as the 1st annual recipient of the USA Sporting Conservation
Darwin Awards for his plans to promote and designate Town Lake in
Austin, Texas the first Carp Sanctuary in not only the USA, but the
ENTIRE WORLD. Phil, as a surely dedicated public servant, is not
content to think and act just locally but attain renowned overachiever
status by reaching for the brass ring and taking on This Planet Earth
for the lowly common carp.
Our 2008 Awards nominations are already in the works owing to the
Water Commissioners at Santee Resevoirs in California banning ALL carp
harvest, even for food...not intent on being one-upped by Phil in good
ol Texas.
Native to the far reaches of Asia millenia ago and accounting for not
much more than an overgrown minnow on steroids, the common carp
associates as dinner to millions and yet, even in its native lands and
where it is intensively recreationally angled it has never received
anything close to a Recognition Dinner where its not the fish du jour.
And don't confuse scientific fact with carp-lover
emotion-conquering-nature swooning where the Common Carp is classified
as one of the most invasive/nuisance and damaging aquatic species in
the USA (and the World) only after man himself. Yet somehow the
uber-abundant non native carp escapes a Texas-style roundup. Our
exotic hero escapee flees a broad-brush recreational and resource
utilization fate and is instead micro managed, coddled, pandered to
anglings' high-rollers and has its self esteem stroked and declared
owed special protections and conservation akin to Bald Eagles and
Condors NOT just in Texas but, by example, now for all 50 United
States for an attendant angling throng of...tens...at the recent
annual dinner meeting and awards for members of the Carp Anglers Group
and the American Carp Society. Announcement of the designation of Town
Lake as a global first for carp protections, epicenter for
"conservation of the carp species" and Sanctuary were met with a
standing ovation for Phil; drinks were toasted; tears fell.
Were this April 1 I could take this line-puller as a bit of a
leg-puller but the dateline is July 2007; new carp protection status
for Texas and the nation goes into effect in 2008 and America's
Funniest After Dinner Video doesn't lie...its plays more like a tragic
Police dashboard cam. A lot of years and water under the bridge have
passed since the young American Government, in its naivety blindly
dumped carp by the rail car load in America's virgin waterways to
latter-day echoes of "that carp mistake" to feed a growing immigrant
nation. My relatives carp fished and hunted for over 100 years minus
new and overbearing regulations for lowly overabundant coarse fish,
but then the story goes people were a lot tougher in those days.
Evidently the fish, and anglers, are more sensitive today.
Some of the same waterways today feature introduced Northern
Snakeheads by a (still) growing immigrant nation and I am forced to
ponder, for 2009, will someone speak for the Northern Snakehead?
Unsurprisingly its the same "tens" advocating that snakeheads are mere
victims of circumstance and misunderstood and we as a nation are
stronger than be pushed around by a bunch of big 'minners and mythic
Frankenfish...they just want to be loved and accepted. The fish AND
the tens, that is.
All I can say is heaven help us if snakeheads make it to California
and Texas, but then California has invasive exotic Asian Mitten Crabs
that sportsmen are prohibited to harvest, remove from the environment
and dispose allowing the bank-burrowing creepy-crawlys to thrive
another day...in effect a protection. I have an uneasy feeling 2010 is
also gonna be a good year for the Sporting Conservation Darwin Awards
nomination but at this rate we will be relegated to a vegetarian
entree' Awards Dinner; drinks will be toasted; tears will fall.
And some will still thank Phil, and his carp.
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