Looking Back at 2011: Part 2

After tackling the personal section yesterday, I am going to take a look at general outdoors and fishing goals for  2011. This is the second part of three posts looking at how my Goals for 2011 went.

General Outdoors

I've wanted to have my own garden for years, but it always seems to just end up being a potted peppers and tomatoes. This year I want to have a garden that actually makes it into the ground.

• I managed to have my first garden this year. There was a great learning curve, but something tells me there is never going to be a perfect garden. 

I learned to make jam for the first time last year, so this year I need to find more places  with black berry thickets and/or any (edible) berries for that fact.

• I did manage to find a few additional places to pick berries and those places have raspberries also. But the best news is I got permission to pick addition fields within a few miles of my house.

This past year I skimped on my ramp hunting/digging, but now that I am able to can them, I want to be able to have enough ramps canned to last me three-fourths of the year.

Cleaning Ramps

• For what I missed in the previous year, I made up for it this year. I went on quiet a few ramp digging trips. Cassie and I both whipped up a few new and old ramp recipes: Pickled Ramps, Ramp Potatoes, and Ramp Burgers. I didn't manage to keep three-fourths of a year, but I did manage to keep a bout half a year. 

As much time as I spend in the outdoors, I need to continue to learn more about the native flora and fauna of West Virginia.

• This is something that will be on my list every year, I learned a good deal this year but still have a lot left to learn.

Continue learning and using the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving that I got for Christmas to make more Jams and Jellies.

• I didn't expand beyond my Black Berry Jam this year, but I did manage to make Pickled Hot Dogs and Banana Peppers and even dabbled with some pickles. 

As long as I follow through with my first objective on this list, the last one shouldn't prove to be too difficult, can and give away part of the produce from my garden.

• Check this one off the list, but I've learned, it seems you always seems you get twice as much as you give away.

Fishing

I'm not one for remembering to count every day or every fish I catch, I wish I was, I've tried keeping journals, taking pictures, just about everything, but it doesn't seem to work. I thought this year I keepmy goal simple -  I want to fish at least 9 out of the 12 months this year. Doesn't sound to hard, but I need to start somewhere and if we get the snow like we did last year, the water around here won't be clear or at normal levels till March. 

• I called this one from the get go, the water conditions were terrible for the beginning part of the year and I wasn't able to fish until March, I did well and fishing every month from march to August. As with every year though, that's when bow hunting and whitetails took over and I haven't seen my fishing pole since.

This is one I'm not sure I'm going to be able to attain, but I've love to. I want to catch four different types of trout: Rainbow, Brown, Brook, and Golden Rainbow Trout. I've never caught a Rainbow Golden trout before, so why not make it a goal this year.

• Ehh.. Although I got a out a few times I mainly stayed close to home (or went salty). That means that it was strictly Rainbows this year. 

When I got to Florida this summer I would like to try one of the following three types of fishing: Surf Fishing, Pier Fishing, or fish on a Charter. Another one that isn't that hard, but sometimes on a time crunch things like this take a back seat, unfortunately last year that was the case.

• This one I managed to pull off. This past summer while visiting my parents I was able to go surf fishing. This was a great experience and one that I will soon be repeating as Cassie and I are heading towards the beach this evening. 

This is something I've been trying to do for years, but I haven't got lucky enough to catch a trout that qualifies for "The West Virginia Trophy Fish Citation Program". 

• This one I might had pulled off, but I did a lot of catch and release fishing at the beginning of the year. There were a fish or two that I caught that were close, but they are still swimming as far as I know it so no chance of them getting me my state citation.

Lastly in the fishing section, I bought a fly fishing outfit and fly tying equipment this past year. I would like to become more proficient in tying flies and catch my first fish on a fly fishing.

• I took my fly pole with me almost every time I went fishing, but yet no luck on the fly yet. As for tying flies, well maybe that's why they haven't been biting. Who knows. Haha.