harvesting the world's best superfood....

Organic Veggies?? Yeah yeah they are okay but if you ask me they are health food wimps compared to the incredible ramp or wild leek. Lets check out some facts. Ramps are the ultimate organic. No pesticides ever... heck most ramps grow in ground that has never even been cultivated for anything ...ever. This is a big deal since farmers harvest crops and in removing them thus take trace minerals trapped in the plants out of the soil, while in the woodland habitats that ramps grow in, nutrients are recycled in a loop and are not depleted. Let's look in more detail at ramps nutritional value.

Wild leeks are high in antioxidants. Ramps have a high Total Polyphenol Content (TPC) which is the way foods are graded on their antioxidant capability. Ramps are higher than tomatoes and red bell peppers and carrots. These polyphenols are considered active cancer fighting agents. Ramps help support brain function and development because they contain choline which is a used as a neurotransmitter in the brain. Adequate amounts of choline in the diet have been shown to support proper cognitive function and facilitate learning in adults and children. Ramps or wild leeks help prevent high blood pressure and stroke because they contain folate which is an essential B vitamin that keeps our bodies levels of homocysteine in check. Homocysteine is a protein found in the blood that contributes to atherosclerosis when it is in high amounts.
Being closely related to garlic, ramps contain the same sulphur compounds including kaempferol. Kaempferol works to protect the lining of the blood vessels against damage while supporting the liver in elimination of cholesterol. Ramps have basically all the well known health benifits of garlic or onions without the danger of pestacides and mineral depletion.
Ramps are an excellent source of vitamin A (immune-supportive) and vitamin K (anti-inflammatory). They are very good source of manganese as well as vitamin C, and vitamin B6. Ramps are also a good source of dietary fiber, magnesium, calcium, and copper; enzyme-generating molybdenum; and potassium. Ramps are rich in the B9 vitamin known as folate (folic acid), thus helping the body build new cells and keeping the blood healthy so that it can oxygenate the body. Everyone needs folate in their diet, but it is doubly important for woman who are pregnant. By eating folate-rich ramps, women can prevent some birth defects such as problems associated with the baby's spine (spina bifida) and brain (encephalitis).
Ramps are also a great source of potassium, a mineral that balances the body's pH and water levels and contributes to muscle growth, brain function and nervous system stability. Potassium also plays an important role in the body's metabolic rate and is critical for proper functioning of cells, tissues and organs. Besides their basic nutritional benefits, eating a mess of ramps also aids the body in certain medicinal ways. Ramps have natural antiseptic properties, which help the body fight infection, as well as laxative benefits. Ramps also help lower LDL cholesterol and increase HDL cholesterol blood levels. Ramps reduce the risk of prostate, colon and ovarian cancer and contain diuretic and anti-arthritic properties.





So where do you find this wonder food? In moist woodlands and in shady hollows and creeks. Good wildflower and ginseng woods are usually good places to find ramps. Among the first plants to emerge in spring, ramps let you get back in the woods before turkey hunting season or even before the start of morel hunting season. In good woods, patches of ramps show up as islands of green in an otherwise sea of early season brown. As spring wears on and trees leaf out ramps begin to yellow and die back. As the leaves yellow and die a smooth stalk appears with a small purplish tip. After the leaves have completely died back this tip opens into a small globe of delicate flowers. This stalk then bears small seeds and then dies. In my experience you can, if you know what to look for, still find ramps in late summer and fall by looking carefully for this dried stalk which stands even when dead. But by then the ramp bulb is very very strong, too strong for my tastes. For me early spring is the time to gather ramps. Besides, the leaves themselves are as usefull as the bulbs. You can use the leaves green in salads. Or gather them and fill the dehydrator with them for later use. We usually use a big mason jar full of dried leaves every year as seasoning. Almost everything thats grilled at my house gets sprinkled with dried ramps. Chicken, venison steaks, zucinni and squash all taste better grilled when liberally sprinkled with a pinch or two of ramps. A baked potato is better when slathered in butter and sprinkled with dried ramps too.
The classic meal for ramp lovers is fried potatoes and ramps. Fry your potatoes till they are just about to start to brown and then throw in about half as many ramps as potatoes and brown both. Simply the best fried taters you will ever have. Want a dip that's actually good for you? Make ramp hummus with a cup of chick peas thrown in the food processor with a heaping spoonfull of chopped ramps and a spoonfull of chilli powder. A great campfire meal is ramps and mushrooms sauteed in butter. The bulbs can also be dried like the leaves and added to soups or added to anything that could use a strong garlicy flavor. Or as Pulitzer Prize nominated food writer Jane Snow once described it, "like fried green onions with a dash of funky feet". Ramps were called chicagou in the language of native tribes and local abundance gave the city of Chicago it's name. The name ramps is one of the many dialectical variants of the English word ramson, a common name of the European leek.









And if you think I'm the only person crazy enough to love the pungent ramp think again. All along the appalachians (the very heart of ramp country) every spring small town after small town have their own ramp festivals extolling the wonderful ramp and the coming of spring.

More record breaking weather

80 degrees in march? Simply amazing, i'm now deep into springtime fishing madness having went four out the last five days. With even warmer weather expected in the coming days. Hammered the smallies in the Great and Little Miami's on crankbaits on back to back days. Then twentyseven largemouths in three hours at "the pond whose name cannot be spoken" on a rebel minnow plug and roostertail. And winter isn't even over four two more days. After last years floods and awfull fishing I'm hoping I've paid enough dues to enjoy a good year.









Finally Sunday a small bump in the road. Overnight storms have the streams running muddy so I headed to small pond tucked away in the back of Ceasars Creek State Park.
But there were four portly shirtless guys lounging around drowning worms and getting sunburned in the spring sun. I managed to get four small bass before giving up and looking for early mushrooms. I'm hoping this hot wet weather will bring some morels out early this spring. No go today but I have high hopes since low eighties are forcast for the coming week. The river though muddy is not high so hopefully Ill be right back fishing in just a day or two.

fish photography

this weeks exceptional warm spell has the fish active and biting like it's two months later...

Short Eared Owl

Another winter visitor to southern Ohio is the Short Eared Owl. These cool guys are much more active in daylight than most owls and can be seen coursing low over grassy open areas. The best places I know to see one around here are VOA park in West Chester, Ceasars Creek State Park and Gilmore Ponds. Short Ears use the same habitat as Northern Harriers and twice at VOA I've seen Harriers harrass Short Ears in flight. Ive never heard one make a sound and don't think they call in winter.

A real hoot.

A long eared owl! Here in southern Ohio one of the rarest critters you might run into is a long eared owl. Mostly a creature of northern woods every year several of these cool birds overwinter here. But they are oh so hard to find. The long eared owl is strictly nocturnal and spends the day tucked into heavy cover like the cedar this one is hiding in. My friend naturalist Bill Lindauer found this guy in Hisey Park where the Little Miami River is joined by Ceaser Creek. The crow-sized long-eared owl has prominent ear tufts that sit near the middle of its head. These nocturnal predators hunt in old fields and scrubby grasslands feeding primarily on voles or deer mice. Hisey Park and adjacient Ceaser Creek State Park have an abundance of this type of habitat. Other common names for the long eared include brush owl, cat owl, lesser horned owl, and cedar owl.

Since Long-eared Owls are strictly nocturnal and hunt for small animals in the dark, they have to hear very well. The facial disks funnels on the owl funnel sound to the owls ears, which are located behind the eyes and are asymmetrical. The left ear opening is higher than the right, which helps the owl pinpoint noises in the night.
Long-eared owls have some of the best hearing even among owls, they can capture prey in total darkness. The long "ears" on a Long-eared Owl are not ears at all. The long tufts help provide camouflage for the owl by breaking up its shape and helping it imitate a broken branch and possibly make the owl appear bigger when confronted with another owl.
The Rev. James Smith's familly settled here at the mouth of Ceasars Creek around 1798. The Smith familly tapped sugar maples in late winter and the father drove a wagonload of maple sugar and bacon from pigs fattened on acorns from the surrounding woods a couple times a year to Cincinnati. He slept in the wagon at the market where fountain square now stands before returning. The famous hunter John Sublett was one of the earliest settlers and lived with the Smith familly at the mouth of Ceasars Creek around 1798. John Sublett built chairs and furniture in a log workshop but was most famous as a hunter and fisherman. John was famous as a hunter and fisherman in a time when everyone was a hunter and a fisherman. At the head of the riffle complex a mile downstream from Hisey Park at the ford he built a stone fishtrap to catch the plentiful fish of the river. This stone trap stood for many years and gave the place it's name, "Fishpot Ford".
The ford itself was well known long before John Sublett though as the main indian trail from Old Chilicothe to the Ohio river crossed the Little Miami here. General George Rogers Clark led his army across the river here also in 1780 in his campaign against the indian villages in Ohio. General Josuah Harmar also crossed here in 1790.
Simon Kenton was a captain in that army and Daniel Boone was a scout.
With the Little Miami River here and and Ceaser Creek Nature Preserve next door this is still one of the best places around to get away from it all and explore.

Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge & Ewing Bottoms

...Dawn in Ewing Bottoms


Two of my favorite places that I try to visit at least a couple times a year are Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge & Ewing Bottoms in south central Indiana. At Muscatatuck nine miles of gravel roads are open sunrise to sunset seven days/week plus eight hiking trails ranging from a fifth of a mile to four miles. These wind thru 7,802 acres of river, creeks, and wetland. In 1966, Muscatatuck Refuge was established using money obtained from the sale of Federal Miratory Waterfowl Stamps, commonly known as Duck Stamps. Muscatatuck is the place to see a river otter BTW. River otters were officially considered extinct in Indiana in 1942. In 1995, state wildlife officials began releasing otters captured in Louisiana into several locations in Indiana. The 25 otters released here have reproduced with such success that several hundred of the critters now call the area home. If you spend any time at all here you will see a river otter. Plus over 280 species of birds have been seen at Muscatatuck!







Waterfowl abounds here



A big piliated woodpecker trashing a dead tree





A familly of otters on the ice



And then every winter there is the spectacle of the sandhill cranes at nearby Ewing Bottoms.








Low wet fields stretch for miles and miles and thousands of sandhill cranes overwinter here. This trip a freight train came thundering by and as I watched several thousand of these huge birds took to the air at once filling the air with their odd cries in a spectacle right out of National Geographic. If you live anywhere within driving distance and like birds this is a cant miss show. Just fill up before leaving town this is literally the middle of nowhere with one lane gravel roads being the main way to get around. In winter when the cranes are there many of these roads flood so its best just to have a full tank and wander around rather than have a set route. And listen every now and then the sound of four or five thousand cranes in a field carries for miles.









If your like me and love old barns you will be in heaven here.

Trail camera whitetails

A trail camera set up on a bucket feeder filled with corn. The weather so far has just been too nice for the feeder to really draw in many deer so far but they are starting to use it.





An old doe showing another whose boss



Whats that blinking light on that tree????