firefrog

Hello OK everything you say is true............ however, I have renters living next door. They don't give a rat's ass about much. They have burned garbage and furniture because they were too lazy to take it to the land fill, for god's sake. At times they stoke a roaring fire. Now, they are just 10 feet away from my garage. My siding has melted before from their barbecue. If they put just one log too many on their fire, my garage could go up in flames and I may not even see it. So what laws do I have to protect me? There is limited visibility into the back yard and I can't watch their every move. It's sad that decent people have their privileges taken away because a few cretins. I don't have a good solution, but a simple rule that even these fools understand is 'no'. Cheers, I guess.

Hello Some good points, Sundance. We can make our voice heard to affect changes. I also agree that going baitless is good - the sooner the youngsters learn this, the better. Let's face it, in the future, most places will be baitless. I wish there was a better solution for the limits. A limit of 1 is an improvement, but considering the pressure at that place, there wouldn't be much difference between that and C & R. Either way, people will continue to fish for fun whether they keep their limit or not. I've seen the way many people handle fish. A lot of them would die anyways. True, the 5-fish limit is carnage. Are kids going to learn anything positive from this? I know this issue has been flogged to death, but further discussion and efforts may produce some creative solutions. Cheers

Hello Hey what's the worst drink you ever had? Did you get sick? Spill. Here's my yarn: While travelling, I try to take in the local goods for food, drink, clothing, etc. While in Japan, we were eating at a Chinese restaurant. On the drink menu was Chinese Sake. Now, the Japanese make great sake. But this stuff.............? If you took really bad scotch and mixed it with soy sauce, it would taste similar, but better, than this Chinese Sake. I had about 3 oz in my glass. I could not for the life of me finish it. I figured there was no sense in bringing up a perfectly good meal. Cheers

Hello I understand the frustration here. This way of camping applies to the majority of people, and it's going to tick some of them off. There is a silver lining, of sorts. I gave up on the long-weekend, popular-sites gongshow years ago. I do most of my camping back country. These campsites are rarely full. Camping this way gives one a different perspective and appreciation about heading out in the wilderness. It's not for everyone and I'm not saying my way is better - but it might be worth a try. Cheers

Hello I picked up the new regs guide. I see a photo of Ted Morton on page 2. See anything wrong with this picture? The guidelines go as far as to tell you to handle the fish as little as possible and keep it in the water. I can only hope this fish was dead - but we don't know. Assuming the worst, The Honourable Ted Morton is hoisting a live walleye out of the water, while hooked, by pulling on the line. He is beaming proudly about this right on front of his son. Can't say I'm impressed. Now, I've done some bad and stupid things, but I'm not an elected MLA.

Hello Dee Snider of Twisted Sister fame came up with a unique approach to issues like this. He would wear whatever new trends his kids were trying. This accomplished 2 things: 1 - Don't knock it until you've tried it. 2. When the kids see how stupid their parents look with piercings etc, they generally don't do it any more. This could backfire, though. Speaking of stupid, I once had a buddy who had just the right amount to drink in the bar and stuck a safety pin through the skin in his forehead. Lesson - booze and piercing are not a good mix. Cheers

Hi again I use an electronic tuner and by ear. Both work well. Yeah, the wolf notes happen with the acoustics. Sometimes they go away with different strings. I get sour notes on both electric and acoustic. I hear it in other guitars as well. Maybe I'm extra sensitive to those tones - dunno. It sure bugs me though.

Hey Thanks for the pointers, C. I did take one of them to a tech. Only helped a little. I was thinking more along the lines of changing to a thicker/thinner (tried this - not predictable) string or one made of a different material. What about those sour/wolf notes? Again, 9 out of 10 times, it's the damn B string. Playing technique? Possible, I suck. But I am aware of stretching and string tensions. Maybe I can convince my wife I need a $3000 guitar. Cheers

Hi Good for you to be concerned. But, look at the morons driving in this province. A test doesn't mean too much. Increase the fines severely. This administration system is already in place; it would not be much more costly. Nothing would make people smarter than loss of a week's wages. If one takes the approach that fishing is a privilege and not a right, it is the angler's responsibility to educate himself. This is an ideal approach as well. I doubt something like this would ever happen either. Cheers.

Hey I've owned 5 or 6 guitars in my life. Every damn one of them had a B string that was a problem child. Why is that? Even on electrics with tunable bridges - they just don't comform. Can someone enlighten me before I convert my latest guitar into a crossbow? Thanks so much.

Hi Teck Had a few experiences with used vehicles. Watch out where you take it to get it inspected. Example: I took a vehicle to a place that specialized in brakes and tires. The tires were fine, but not new. The brake pads and shoes had many months left on them. They failed the inspection based on 1 tire having some kind of blemish and they measured the rear shoes in the wrong place - again, finding a spot where it was the most worn and saying they were all worn. Along with the inspection form they provided a estimate for the 'necessary' work. They would also re-issue the inspection for free. They didn't say squat about small cracks in the windshield. Contacted the insurance company for some documentation on what constituted a pass or fail. Had some whiney-voiced prune tell me that brakes and tires were very important safety features on a vehicles. It was entirely up to the mechanic. Advice - buy or get new tires and put them on for the inspection. Also put in new brake shoes and pads. If the mechanic sees these things, he's less likely to be so critical of other things. I'm not saying you're trying to get him to overlook things, but he may be less tempted to rip you off. Cheers

Hi My name's Firefrog and I ... uh.......... well, I used to listen to Dr. Lara. I thought she was SO-together. Then I saw her porno pictures on the internet (she said she did it for the money - sl*t). Then I found out she was a doctor of physiotherapy or something like that - totally unrelated to her 'specialty'. They also used to screen all the calls to the show to make it appear like nobody criticized or disliked her. Then I heard about some more of her shenanigans and realized that there was no hope to clean up the trainwreck inside her head. Now I want to kill her. Cheers

*** FLUIDS FOR DRUIDS! *** Please Your Trees Cheers

Hello Don Sorry for the mumb-jumbo. You really need more information to make a good comparison. I found an article that says 'TDS=Conductivity * Factor That factor is determined emperically and can range from 0.55 to 0.9' Big ballpark. Hope this helps. Cheers

So TFR and TDS are not the same. But can conductivity be used to express TDS? Strikes me that the larger amount of dissolved minerals [TDS], the higher the conductivity. As the bugs & plants use minerals for growth, the higher the TDS, the better the water is able to support biomass. Hello again Conductivity can be used to express TDS if the correlation is established (eg it's linear, logarithmic, etc). This is often done to shorten workloads where hundreds or thousands of tests have to be done. The conductivity only takes a few seconds while the other tests are more labor intensive. Once a lab proves this correlation, it can go ahead with the conductivity tests. However, the correlation for one river water, for example, is not the same as that for wastewaters, or even other river waters. TDS is not just dissolved minerals (but mostly); it can also be soluble organic molecules (like sugars). True, micro-organisms readily use some of the TDS for growth, but they can also use minute particles (TFR). You're right, it's a reasonable generalization to say that more TDS supports more biomass. But as C'us mentioned there is a delicate balance here. Enough chemistry, I'm going to go play. Cheers

Hello Don All 3 of the results mentioned are recognized laboratory tests. (getting explainations of the test probably won't help you much) However, the TFR expressed looks like an approximation - not the true definition of TFR. Most of the time, this is a good estimate. Actually TDS and TFR are mutually exclusive. One is dissolved; the other is insoluble solids. Can you express one as the other? Technically, no. Confused? If you have a bag of dimes, and someone asks you 'How many dollars do you have?', technically you have none. But if you added up all the dimes, you would have an equivalent of x dollars. You can express one in terms of the other, but they're not the same. Science - sometimes exactly useless. Cheers

Hello Rickr you are mostly correct. It's a balancing act - too much nutrients are toxic to the fish and will cause vegetation to choke off a waterway. Too little and it will be sterile. Combine this with ideal water temperatures, cleanliness, spawning and holding features, etc, and you get a stretch of river that is ideal for trout. Aren't we lucky? At any rate, the main objective of the wastewater treatment is to remove the pathenogenic microbes. Alberta Environment dictates allowable concentrations of nutrients and pathenogens the treatment plant can release. They are more concerned with wildlife and people dying than the ideal balance for the fish. The Pine Creek plant will (at least this is the plan) operate many times 'cleaner' than Bonnybrook or Fish Creek. It will be interesting to see just how this impacts the river. Cheers

Hello Knowing what to do and actually doing what you should know are two different things. Sure if you can see them from a distance, you have time to figure out what to do. I've only come right up on a bear once and I froze. As luck had it, it didn't see me. If it had, those seconds would have dictated my fate. I couldn't think fast enough - human nature, I guess. So what's my point? Prevention. Can't be emphasized enough. I have a suggestion to share. Wear a cow bell; not the cute little jingle bells - a big honking cow bell. I tied it to my daypack. I get teased about it, but I have NEVER came across a bear while I was wearing it. Play safe. Cheers.

Hello Many months ago, I discovered this great sweetener called stevia. It has very few calories and does not trigger the insulin response. (I detest sugar. I wish more people would see it for what it is - a manufactured, purified chemical that the body doesn't handle too well. But I digress.) I like to use the ground leaves, not the purified crystals (There they go again, processing a perfectly good food :derby racer: .) Problem is that stevia has a unique taste. There's not many foods it tastes good with. So far I've found that it makes a great tea and sweetens cranberry juice OK. Has anyone else found a good use/recipe? Do tell. Thanks. Cheers

Hello We never see bones, or hair, or anything because sasquatch is a hologram created by the aliens. These little buggers have a great sense of humour. They sit around dreaming up these 'alter egos' - they have a complex, you know. Oogoopoogoo, sasquatch, ghosts......... just imagine them pissing themselves watching us poor humans freak out over these things. If I ever get abducted, I'm gonna ask real nice if I can download some of their programs. Seriously(?), we are always going to have myths and legends. Ya gotta love 'em. Cheers

Hello I used to use Telus. Then they charged me $5 'administration fee' for long distance . Ferchristsakes, sometimes that was more than the long distance fees. We often call all over the world, and other times we rarely use long distance I found Dial n Save. They were good for a while. Then their connections didn't work and the sound quality was poor. Every time I called their customer service, their reply was 'try again later'. What a waste of a good mouth. I turfed them. Now I'm looking around. The calling cards are OK, but I don't want to bother buying and carrying them. Not interested in cell phone service, just landline. Any suggestions? Much appreciated, thanks. Cheers

Hello Sorry to rain on the parade but this is another example of creative interpretation of data. We've all seen studies that 'indicate' this or that. Another 'expert' will come along and use the same data and come to a different conclusion. As far as plants needing CO2 to grow - yes, of course. Problem is at night and when they die, they give off almost all of that CO2 back to the atmosphere. Having more plants is part of the solution, but they don't contribute enough to solve a global increase in CO2. Also, to suggest burning fuels yields CO2, which increases plant growth, and is therefore not so harmful, is quite a stretch. Combustion is simply not a good source of CO2 because of the other byproducts - CO and NOx just to name a couple. Obtaining those fuels is not a harmless process, either. Before you cry foul, I'm not a supporter of the global warming scare and the CO2 control scheme. I DO, however, support efforts and thinking that aim to reduce the destruction of our environment - that includes reducing all air pollution. We do our part when fishing to reduce our footprint on nature. We should certainly do so in our everyday lives as well. This is going to be expensive. There are some good plans and some hairbrained, money-wasting fiascos as well. Which ones are which? I don't have all the wisdom or information to know and even if I did, would I be able to convince others that I'm right? The problem with beliefs is that they are almost impossible to change. It's pretty much a given that governments efforts will be inefficient and be taken advantage of by opportunists. It's also obvious that indivduals, even collectively, have only made a small dent. We all have to keep plugging away at this. Cheers

An old couple are sitting at the kitchen table. The old boy is reading a fishing magazine. 'Do you like Grayling?' he asks. Without much thought she replies, 'Don't know. I've never grayled before.'

Most of the time I've bumped into a CO, they were alone. Unlike police, they are unarmed and hardly experts in hand-to-hand combat. Now, are these poachers, losers, and clowns that break the law likely to be well behaved? Put yourself in their shoes. Would you be willing to lose a few teeth over some fish? Is it wise to play Clint Eastwood when you're outnumbered? I'll be the first one to agree that these violators need to be taught a lesson. But for that to happen, the COs are going to need some clout - and they should have it. On their own, sometimes all they can do is issue warnings. I applaud the good work they have done. Cheers

Hello I've been using K-way for years. They're very light and fold up to the size of a grapefruit. Very waterproof up to a point, then they are quite clingy. Not too expensive. Cheers