Week of Sept. 13th 2025: Protect Your Neck

Beautiful, but beware!  

The days of positive, fun reports can’t come soon enough.  The drought conditions remain and now, with fall encroaching, the Hickory Tussock caterpillars are on the march.  Like many other insects and animals, caterpillars have spent the summer growing among the plants they eat and now are searching for their winter digs, a place to hibernate or metamorphosize into their best life.  Wooly bears are an example of cute, fuzzy caterpillars that indicate the change of leaves, but some of their peers are less cuddly. 

After a busy week, I was excited to check out a “new-to-me” pool I learned may hold a few trout.  I got out early and found the stretch of the Pequest I had often passed, but never fished.  Expectations were low after checking the gauge Saturday morning and seeing 57 cfs, but curiosity and ego helped get me out before the sun was up and I trekked from the lot, heading downstream, towards my target area.  The pool looked promising and I may have spooked them or they were forced out over the course of the week, but no dice this morning for me.  

We are better off fishing for smallies on the south side of Route 78 for awhile longer.

Heading back I decided to walk on the bank through the high goldenrod and ducking a few overhanging branches rather than slip on the algae patches in the river.  Somewhere along the way I picked up our white tufted hitchhiker whose protruding hairs, called “pencils,” have barbs covered with a substance causing a skin reaction similar to poison ivy. It dropped onto my car bumper with a strap that came over my head which I hoped was brushed off my cap or the bag itself. A few years ago one of these fell into my collar and slipped further down my shirt until I pulled it out and the rash began. Then, the burning…

Soon after this memory came back I was dancing around on the side of R46, shaking phantom punk-rock-pillars from my hair and from inside the hood I simultaneously cursed myself for not wearing. So far, I think I’m okay, but keep your eye out and protect your neck if you’re walking under low-hanging branches or through vegetation grown tall reaching for each day’s waning light. 

See you out there, Roy B.