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Delta Blues

The Delta with Mt. Diablo at sunset. Photo By Captndelta - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4519866
I'm a California boy, so people don't believe it when I tell them "yeah: I grew up on the delta." They think of the Mississippi Delta, with it's sloughs and backwaters and thousands of islands, levees, flood gates, bypasses, bass boats, house boats, houses on stilts, and Jazz--but that was Sacramento - San Joaquin River Delta in Northern California of my youth. Seriously: all we were missing were gators and Cajuns. We lived on the American River, which fed into the delta at Sacramento. We were on the parkway, a wide nature preserve between the levees. In my suburban back yard we had coyotes, black-tail deer, turtles, beaver, skunks, rattle snakes, and really good trout, steelhead, and salmon fishing. But more than that: we pulled crawdads out of the river by hand. We fished for catfish at night, using stink-bait and Coleman Lanterns. We hunted pheasants and rabbits on the Delta islands. My grandfather and great uncle hunted ducks in the causeway. And we gigged for bullfrogs. No: really. It was a common thing when I was in grade school and middle school (before I went and made my own way with other pursuits). Our parents would take us out to the sloughs on warm summer nights, with these huge bamboo spears--twelve feet long-- with spring-loaded grabbers on the ends (legal in California), and we'd spotlight bullfrogs and spear them all night long, while drinking really cold beer (ours of the root variety, while the parents was usually Olympia. Not sure why I remember that). People doubt my stories. They don't see California as having Catfish and Bullfrogs. But of course there were bullfrogs in Sacramento. We were right off of Jackson Highway, the road to Calaveras County, where the most famous bullfrogs of all time are still celebrated. Mom would take the frogs legs, dip them in egg, roll them in crushed saltines, and fry them in oil. (this was a common mom recipe. It was same recipe she used on abalone. Mom's abalone is the hands down best thing I have ever tasted).

The best grabber available is from O&H. You can stick it on the end of a long piece of bamboo, like we did, and go at it.


If grabbers are illegal where you are, the Danielson Quick Release Frog Spear with telescoping handle is a good option. It only extends out to 7-1/2 feet but, let's face it, 12 feet was a little extreme. 



If you live in a place where spearing is allowed, where there are bullfrogs, or where you can spear or grab fish, get one of these. You won't regret it. You will need one of these as well.

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