Winter and the Five Senses

A wonderful day on the river can stroke your five senses

Cultivating my five senses is easy during the winter months. Hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting and touching are what enables sportsmen to fully enjoy the entire package of being in the wintry outdoors.

Winter ice fishing turns me on but there isn't much safe ice yet except on a few small lakes and ponds, and so I have to forgo watching the lowering of my rod tip as a pug-nosed bluegill sucks my bait down. Though I may not see that sight right now, or at least until we get more ice, there are countless other things for me and you to watch.

Saw a mature bald eagle soaring on the thermals yesterday, gliding first one way and then another, and their vision doesn't miss a thing. Stand still next to a tree, and they will drift through the sky, but if they spot a human, they will head elsewhere.

Your five senses, when used on an outdoor trip, improves the outing

Well, that’s not always true. An adult bald eagle made his living on the ice of Green Lake at Interlochen several years ago. This bold eagle would swoop down and grab a perch off the ice with an angler only 20 yards away.

Seeing a cold lemon-colored sunrise with frost sparkles in the air and the glint of weak light off ice- or snow-coated branches provides a kaleidoscope of colors. Ever notice how much sharper your vision seems on a very cold day?

Hearing is another of the senses I rely heavily on because my vision is so poor. Put me in a room filled with people talking, and I can't hear a thing, but put me in a tree stand and I can hear a mouse or chipmunk run through dry leaves 50 yards away.

Many times I've heard black bear or deer approach from behind long before I saw them, and it offers ample time to slowly prepare for a shot. The clamor of Canada geese in flight can be heard for long distances, and like a fog horn in pea-soup fog, it is a lonely and haunting sound. It's a fact that a black bear can be as stealthy as a hunting house cat, but I've heard every bear I've shot long before I saw the animal.

Is there anything than smells better to an ardent hunter than the crisp and nose-tingling odor of wood smoke on the wind as we make our way home to the wood stove of a hunting camp. A close second is the smell of fresh-brewed coffee or the crackling sizzle of bacon frying. The latter tantalizes the ears and the nose and triggers the need to taste.

We're short right now of prowling skunks on the snow, but I can smell foxes at a good distance if downwind of the animal. I also can smell changes in the wind, and that is something some people question. The smell of an approaching rain is something many people have come to recognize, but the air takes on a faint change as a new snow storms begins to build nearby.

Think each day about what you can hear, see, smell, taste, & touch

Walk into a grouse cover near an abandoned apple orchard or a wild grape arbor, and if you are downwind from either one, the winter odor is unmistakable. That smell is one that ruffed grouse seek out, and I’ve seen a pair of grouse lately near a winter frozen grape arbor. The birds are still hustling their vittles based on their autumn feeding frenzies of tart grapes.

Taste is normally associated with eating but years ago before there was a problem of beaver fever there were a few springs and tiny inland ponds that had the sweetest tasting water in the world. To dip and sip from those ponds or springs now is not only foolhardy, but a bout of beaver fever would always be a constant reminder of how our world has changed over 50 years.

Taste is an enjoyable sensation, and for me, pan frying a brace of lovely and winter-caught bluegills or perch is something I gladly apply a stamp of approval to, and it’s something I do often during the winter. I gut and gill them, pan-fry them, and pick them up like an ear of corn and slowly strip the  flesh from the rib bones. It is a tempting treat that will be long remembered.

Touching the knobby bases of a buck's antlers at the tail end of the archery season always provides me with a sense of wonder. How and why can antlers turn out in so many different ways is just one part of God's handiwork. All antlers seem as individual as finger prints.

These five senses bring an added bonus to the day - Try it!

The magic of the outdoors is best enjoyed when outside. Learn to test your five senses on a daily basis. Listen hard for the jackhammer rattle of a pileated woodpecker; watch for the slow and cautious approach of a nice buck; listen to the clarion call of geese as they circle and look for open water or grain still laying in a farm field; taste the delightful flavor of a cup of good coffee on a bitter cold day on the ice as the cold and wind tries to suck the warmth from your body; and never forget to reverently touch the buck, bluegill, perch or walleye while fishing or the soft fur of a cottontail taken ahead of a brace of yodeling beagles trailing a hot bunny track.

Our five senses add a special bonus to every outdoor trip, and it becomes especially true on a winter day when bright sunlight glistens off newly fallen snow. These senses magnify the outdoor pleasures if we just remember to use them at every opportunity.

A proper winter day means more than fish or game. Drink deeply of your five senses, and we find a new thrill in giving our five senses a good workout.