Well, I killed it.
Fire in the hole.
I want to go out and get a black bear.
That's kind of important that I get one,
you gotta have so much meat to make her through the winter.
Well dang junior, that's pretty darn good I would say.
I think it's time for us to go see if we can get you your first bear.
Yeah, here's a bone, yeah, let's go, good boy.
Everything around here in port protection's dictated by the season,
mother nature waits for nobody.
There's a certain time to plant gardens,
there's a certain time to hunt and you gotta be there to do it
otherwise you're not gonna be successful out here you know.
Well, we're just kind of cruising the beaches right now.
Little area right up here that I see bears in there every once in a while.
Back many years ago one of the best bear I ever shot in my life,
I'd been watching it pretty much off and on all season
and all's he did was ate berries and I finally ended up shooting him and
he smelled just like a giant blueberry, and
he was one of the best eating bears I've ever had.
He was very good.
Well, I see something. Way across the bay there, up in the, up there,
there's something that seem to be moving.
I do believe it's a big old black rock.
Got my heart thumping a little bit there for a second.
You just gotta be covering ground and then eventually we'll get one.
I'm feeling very, very lucky today.
This is a definite challenge just because I
I'm just kind of doing things on the fly here.
- Sammy. - Troy.
Look what I brought.
You caught me in action. That's a. Nice.
Balls, balls.
This is a mystery to me, I've never seen such a contraption. Wow.
It'll be fun in the wet suit trying to get it down.
I finally got quite a few dives under my belt up here in port protection so
I want to go spear fishing because every time I've gone spearfishing
it's been one of the funniest memories in times in the world.
There you go. And just the more ways
that you know how to get fish up here,
the more ways you know how to get food up here, the better.
The thing that I'm gonna make is gonna be way simpler.
My concept is, is to make something that's comfortable for you to get into
and basically, I'm gonna make you a wrist rocket but it's gonna shoot a spear.
- A port protection sling. - There you go.
And this will go in the barrel, and you'll draw that thing back.
Anyways that's the theory.
I'm excited to get some blood on there. Preferably neither of ours.
We're thinking to go down with my big gun and kind of aim center mass,
hopefully that will kind of tire of them out for a while.
If I can make work with one band I'm going to.
The secondary gun that Sam's been nice enough to be building here for me,
it's kind of the kill shot.
It feels comfortable. Comfort first, looks second.
As long as it performs effectively.
In my lengthy career of being on boats and on the water I can honestly say
that I don't know squat about spear gun fishing.
Can almost use that as a sight.
But it's kind of been proven that as long as you,
you keep on learning and you're curious about things,
generally your mental health benefits from that
you don't turn yourself into a shut in you know so it's nice having a,
a new youngster around.
In theory this will go through any fish it gets poked into,
but hopefully young Troy won't end up with an arrow in his foot
or me with in my ass.
There's more than one currency in the world and
I may not have a big bank account, but I live a rich life.
Live like a king on pennies baby.
If you know what you're doing you can get there.
Hey top of the morning to you Donny. Morning Dave.
Looks like we're in for another scorcher today.
Yep, another beautiful day.
Well, I planning on going out and dropping my subsistence gear there.
I was wondering if you had a couple humpies, I could bum off of you.
Yeah, how many you think you need?
Well, maybe five or six.
Where you thinking about going?
Over across the other way back by yellow island.
That's been a good spot.
Well, I don't think it's been gone over by the
commercial boys or the tourists so, nothing like a little fresh bait.
Well yeah, I think that was what, six or seven that ought to do it.
Well cool, if I if I lay into anything I'll come by and drop you off
a little bit of supper there.
That'd be much appreciated.
You have a good one. Good luck. Thank you sir.
Well, you live on the ragged fringe you gotta live by nature's timeline,
so perfect time of year to be doing some Halibut fishing.
I love myself a good Halibut chowder, fish and chips, baked Halibut.
So, with any luck I'll pick up four or six nice little fish
and that'll be good start to refilling the freezer for the year.
So, this is the ground line, and this is what's gonna run along
holding my thirty hooks waiting for someone to come along and
take a nibble of some nice fresh bloody humpy.
There's many ways to catch fish, you can actively be jigging or trolling
but unless you're doing it commercially, you're likely limited to one hook.
Whereas, while I'm throwing out this long line,
I'm gonna have thirty hooks fishing for me on the bottom
while I'm going about my other business.
So, it's pretty good ergonomic use of time.
Okay. I am set to rig.
There she goes.
Here fishy, fishy.
She's on the ground so hopefully she'll find me something.
I miss my fish and chips.
The most amazing part about living in port protection is that
I have a whole world of knowledge at my fingertips
with everyone that lives here,
and they're willing to teach me and show me the ropes.
I'm out of breath. I think I need a new hip but it's fine.
Yeah. It's really recent.
Matt offered to take me out hunting, Carl is out fishing right now,
he's working and never gotten a buck before
and that's something that's really exciting for me.
What is it? Fresh little baby Fawn print right there,
you can just barely see the outline where the hoof cuts into that.
A little fresh one.
I grew up with my dad who hunted to feed us,
but I've never had the responsibility of actually shooting.
From this point on everything opens up, we'll have clusters of trees
with big open spaces, there's a lot of wind, should be going against us.
Well into the south. So that's fortunate,
just always be checking behind you and all around you.
It seems like a whole new world up here.
It's, it, it transforms pretty dramatically so, let's get going.
I've been hunting since I was pretty young,
but I didn't actually shoot a deer till I was twenty-seven.
I went out on multiple hunts with my dad and never saw horns so
it's just kind of the way it goes but I'd like to show Morgan how to read
a little bit of the forest, give her an idea of where these deer hang out
that'll give her a good chance to go get something.
I haven't seen one of these guys in years.
I haven't seen one since.
My god. He's a. I got a story about these guys.
They're supposed to be really good luck.
- Really? - Yeah.
If you see something that you think looks like a deer, scope it you know.
Cause, when they're not moving and they're bedded down actively pan,
don't ever stop looking for movement, we're gonna go over that here.
My god!
Yeah, that's her.
- Stop. - My god.
She's still looking at us from behind the trees.
Yeah, I can see her.
Beautiful Doe right in front of us.
It's kinda hanging out.
Doe season isn't open right now for prince of whales,
I've never taken a Doe personally.
Just something my father taught me never to do.
I'm okay with that.
Woman and children get a hall pass.
Might as well just leave them alone.
She's looking right at us.
This place is, this is where they are.
Dude, we saw something.
Now we just got to find her brother. All right.
Let's just take it nice and easy.
We're just going to keep moving across.
I'm pretty optimistic right now, it's looking pretty good,
there's lots of sign, there's deer beds everywhere,
there's deer poop and I'm pretty excited.
Ho, what's that junior.
There he is there's a mink.
Junior, you're gonna scare all the bears away.
Square knot. Moment of truth here dude.
- Version 1.0. - Set this up on this.
We're doing this inside here, good. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Sounds smart.
Now you can see the shaft kind of bends in here a little bit, so you get,
you gotta kind of pull in.
Just,
I was, I was afraid when I let go, I'd close my eyes and flinch.
On a crutch.
On three.
All right, new rule, once we've had a beer, we cannot touch this thing.
Yeah, obviously. Yeah, we lock this thing up in the gun case.
Let's get our act together and go try this stuff out, see what happens.
To the boat.
Well, nice, hard to say what he got hit by rest of the skeleton isn't
anywhere nearby but you never know what you're gonna find
beach combing, treasures and tragedy abound.
The beauty about the long line fishing is that it allows ample time
for other project.
I'm gonna take a little stroll up and see if the firewood gods have left
a little treat for me up on the rocks somewhere.
Well, what we got here?
I think she's just half assed piece of hemlock.
Success.
We're in high summer by the time end of September rolls around,
the days get much shorter and it gets much darker,
and the weather gets much crappier.
So, if you were sitting on your ass in the middle of July,
June you'll be paying the Piper when she comes due.
So, it's do or die time right now and we've got the daylight to do it.
Come on. Stick.
All right, you stubborn, heavy bastard.
Woo! Firewood, gets you warm three times.
Getting it off the beach, splitting and stacking it,
throwing it into the wood stove.
All right I've gotten close enough to the water now.
Should be giving me enough scope on my line that I can give it a good rolling hitch
so that when I go and tug it out it'll roll the log down to the beach
and get her in the water for me.
As soon as I pull on this it'll spin the log down these rocks.
All right, see if we can't give this thing a jerk.
One jerk waiting on another.
Here we go.
Almost down there but she is a pretty heavy log.
Came up against a nice rock. So it goes.
Murphy in fine form.
Well, I didn't get quite of enough of a rolling hitch in it, so I put a few more,
try her again.
All right, one more time for the win.
Yay.
So, I got her off the beach, small act of congress as it usually is, and
I'm gonna go ahead and drop an anchor on it so she'll stay put and be where I left her.
Hopefully, I'll have fish and at least one stick of firewood for my day's adventure.
All right. You stay.
What do you think, junior?
Are we gonna find a bear today?
We'll move down the beach further.
Well, well, well. Here's Gary's old float house here.
When I first came here he was living there, that was twenty-four years ago.
A lot of good memories there.
We'd go over there and drink all of Gary's homemade beer.
One time they ran out of bottles,
and they had a bunch of beer they called it "bucket beer."
We drank a half a five-gallon bucket of beer that night.
That dang Gary.
It's the call of a Doe and the bucks are attracted to it.
Matt is calling for a deer and it's what the Doe call sounds like.
Just take a leaf and kind of pinch it a certain way and then you blow on it,
I don't know how to do it, it's a skill I have not acquired.
But it sounds amazing.
I've never really been hunting before.
I've never gotten a deer so I'm a little nervous but overall,
I'm pretty optimistic.
- You ready? We'll go. - Yeah. Yeah.
Well Troy, I know that from here on in once you get in that little crack
you'll be in real shallow water.
So, you just gonna have to go to a place where you can, you know,
coast along and see the bottom well.
And then it's gonna be up to you, but we need to get you in the suit now.
Favorite part.
Spear fishing is the most selective type of fishing.
You're seeing that fish before you shoot it and,
and you get to decide what you're shooting.
Get your dollar bills ready, Sam.
Sam and I just went subsistence Gill netting
and got a ton of salmon so my main goal would be
to come back up with a smaller Halibut.
Jeez, I think you've lost a couple of pounds
but you're still a couple of pounds shy.
Excellent.
You see that there was a seal right there, chasing fish right over there.
Yeah, I see it. You should have a live bottom.
Most of the fish, Halibut included, don't like the bubbles.
A lot of times it reminds them of the sea lions,
so I'm gonna try doing this all, all free diving.
Okay, I'm ready for you to go in the water there, lad.
I am definitely ready for me to go in the water.
Spearing a Halibut while diving,
I would call it some kind of like an extreme sport.
Probably a hundred times harder than fishing you know.
You gotta have a giant spear gun
and you gotta have a tether on it with a buoy. Okay.
You're on your own there, lad.
Hopefully we're not in over our head here.
And if he's successful he'll come to the surface and just to make sure we, you know,
can get the fish back up in one piece,
he's gonna dive back down with a smaller spear gun,
it's kind of like the kill shot.
Free diving I'm definitely a little more restricted than
diving with my tanks and actually doing scuba,
so ideally we're gonna find clear water so I can actually see the Halibut.
They are pretty well camouflaged.
So I'm really just looking for the shape.
There you go. Now you can see him out there.
Now you can see him out there.
I look down and I, by golly I see the outline of this Halibut.
Sammy!
He just waved at me I think, I think I need to get over to him,
I need to pull my anchor.
He's about a hundred and fifty yards away from me.
- Sam! - I'm coming!
Well, I don't know what the hell Sam was doing over there. But
there is a Halibut with a nice hole in it.
- Sam! - I'm coming!
And I've got all the kelp in the world hanging on this frickin' anchor.
He might need that, I'm gonna get this out of the way so I don't, fall on it.
He's definitely got something.
What it is, what species I do not know.
I'm gonna be taking him this little pea shooter that I made.
- What do you got? - A little tiny baby.
You got a Halibut though?
It's still breathing. Let's get a shot of the other gun.
Still swimming, I can feel it pulling on the line. Okay.
Yeah, it's straight, it's almost straight back.
But careful, he's pulling.
Okay. Do you want this?
Troy? We lost him! Damn it! You sure?
He said the Barb fell off and so he just speared him with this
and there's no Barb on here to hold the fish on.
He was not close, took a while to get over here
and I think the Halibut got off the spear
before we got our kill shot down there.
Probably should have just dove down
and cut the gills with the knife but very frustrating.
But hopefully now that I've spotted and shot one I will spot some more.
Woo, sorry I'm cold.
Well, you sure you don't need a break?
If I get a break I'm not jumping back in.
Okay. He's been in the water for a while now and, keep an eye on that safety.
It's damn cold water. Papa speared a fish.
I feel a little guilty being inside the warm dry boat.
Well, we're gonna come in here and
get out and take a peek and see if there's been any bears going
back and forth through here. Okay, junior.
This is the type of area the bears like, they really like this beach grass,
it's kind of what they feed on.
Ooh, what's that?
Not very old either.
From the size of that pile he's a pretty good sized bear obviously.
Pretty much everything you do out here in port protection takes Patience.
You just gotta put your time in and it'll happen.
Well junior, maybe we'll just plop our butts down here
and wait and see what happens.
Chances are pretty good we'll see something.
We step, we step toe-heel, that way your, your last leg when you come up,
don't come up with your, if it gets stuck make those sick, sucky sounds.
Morgan, she is absolutely charged up,
she wants to get a deer really bad and that's cool.
I like the drive, I like the energy,
I think it's gonna work out well for her in the long run.
There's a deer. I think.
He's a long way off. See? All the way across.
I can't see.
I just see its body.
- It's laying down. - Yeah.
Don't know if we can but we need to try to sneak up on it.
- That's all we can do. - Okay.
Stay low. Nice and low.
All right. Moment of truth.
See what we managed to procure.
It's a pretty short soak but we shall see.
Come on, half a dozen forty pounders.
That's what we're looking for.
And we have the anchor.
Yeah, I feel tugging.
Yeah there's some tugging. There's some tugging on the line, somebody's down there.
There's somebody.
A little chicken. It's a keeper.
Got another. Come on buddy. Ope, you're looking good.
Stay, stay, stay, stay.
Well, the second one here is a nice forty pounder,
which is exactly the perfect eating size fish.
So far so good.
Now all we need is another four pack and we'll golden.
We definitely live in a place that's not for the meek at heart.
It might be somebody big. If you're not willing to roll up your sleeves
and make your way through the mud, the muck,
the weather, this probably isn't the environment for you.
Come on baby.
Ughhh! Ughhh!
Well, that's about an eighty pounder.
But for those of us that actually thrive, love and live in all this beauty,
it's a dangerous life but high risk, high reward.
Boy it's a banner day in the neighborhood.
Little boat, big fish.
Well, we got four keepers, I'm happy as a clam.
Got him in some relatively clear water,
he's already speared one it just got away.
I've done my job to the best of my ability,
plus figuring out how to make that damn spear gun work properly.
You be quiet.
Nothing's really happening you know my mind kind of wanders off and
I think a lot about dinner and what I'm gonna do with that bear.
I could have smoked bear, I could have bear ribs.
Hell, I could even have a piece of bear ass.
I don't know, it's looking pretty grim
around here I've been sitting here for hours,
and I haven't seen anything. Well, let's move on, junior.
Well, I got this thing right where I left her which we planned,
now I'm gonna slap this tow line on my yoke on the back here and
make my way back to safe harbor.
One log richer, a little bit knowledge and a nice little fish.
Here we go, nice.
There's definitely a few little local pink salmon jumping here so
any fish at all when they move inside,
the Halibut follow them, right into the shallow water.
By the end of the day, it might be easier for him to squeeze into that suit.
He burns a few calories.
Cramping.
Started in my right calf and anytime I'm using that calf muscle to kick
it's getting tighter and tighter and pretty soon after
then it worked its way into both hamstrings.
If I keep pushing myself, I can do some serious damage to my legs.
Last time I cramped they were dead for three weeks.
So, it's a very, very serious thing, cramping in the water.
Can't move my legs.
Young Troy has stopped his swimming,
he's actually looks like he's waiting for me.
- You cramping up? - Yeah.
Can you make it out to deeper water?
I don't want to clobber the damn rocks.
Spear gun first. Well, we'll get you aboard.
- My god. - Just relax.
At this point I am very ready to go sit in a hot shower and warm up,
drink lots and lots of water, get some electrolytes in me.
You look like you're in pain, dude.
It's definitely the worst cramps I've ever had in my life.
Not, not exaggerating.
Well, I, I think you can dive into my shower.
You gonna wash my back?
Muttsky can do that, he's pretty good at that.
I haven't trimmed his nails yet today so.
I have no doubt that the spear fishing is gonna work out
really, really well here in, in port protection.
Once Sam and I get trained up on it more and more,
absolutely gonna become a, necessary tool for me to thrive and survive up here.
Well, you got to shoot a Halibut, you didn't quite get him in.
I should have made my big wish, bring a Halibut on board with a spear gun.
- Yes. - I blew my wish.
Morgan and I saw from maybe two hundred yards off a deer in its bed.
Its head was down, and we couldn't tell if it was a male
or a female from that distance so we have to quietly get a little bit closer.
I'm thinking we need to get over here.
If we go over there we're gonna maybe blow ourselves.
That's a good buck. It's a buck! Stop!
Doe.
Big buck.
Up halfway the mountain, halfway up the hill.
Right there. He's moving to the left.
That's a Doe.
But he's up higher.
We're gonna be looking for a shot constantly.
I'm pretty mentally prepared to take a shot at a deer.
He's in the bushes.
They're together, he's the dark red one.
She's moving that way. Go over there.
He's log right now.
All right, if I see him again and I get a clear shot I'm gonna take it.
He's here though.
We don't know if he went that way, that way, this way.
Sometimes they ditch the Doe, and they go into a really rough patch
or really rough country and she kind of stays out in the open,
it's almost like they're playing distraction or whatever.
- Yeah. - There she goes.
She just took off. They're on to us.
Are we gonna go down this way? No.
I'm just taking a, I'm just looking and we're gonna,
we don't want to get down caught in this other side.
That's nightmare country down there. Yeah.
And I don't like nightmares. No.
Feels like we might be just about at the end of the line here.
I feel like we may have been out maneuvered.
We still got a lot of ground to cover to get back home, and it's,
it's getting a little late now so, and I don't want to be stuck in the woods
in the dark cause that's when things get confusing and dangerous.
Well, I think it's probably time to call it I think.
So.
Yeah. Okay. Good work though today.
Yeah. That was awesome.
We may not have gotten a deer but this hunt has been really beneficial.
I've learned a lot and I think it was a really good idea,
I know where the deer are now
and it's gonna help me for future hunts.
- You ready? - Yeah.
All right, let's go.
Sure, smell that skunk cabbage in here.
First roughage. They get for, of the year usually and they really hit it hard.
Acts as a laxative for the bear
to get regular again after not going poop all winter long.
Well, junior I think it's time to change the view.
I recognize this tree.
This is one of Gary's Martin sets
that he's had for many, many years.
God only knows how many Martin he's caught off of this set,
he said he's been using it for forty plus years probably.
Might take his trap just for a keepsake.
Have something to remember him by this way.
Yep, sure gonna miss you Gary, damn it.
I'm definitely gonna keep Gary's memory alive and that, and I'm gonna,
December first I'm gonna be out here setting traps
and around here you know I mean that's the way things kind of work,
you know you take over the things that the old timers have done around here
to you know just to keep it going if nothing else.
Life does go on, you just gotta move forward.
I'll have to get me a Martin hat just like Gary's, make it official.
Well, junior, we can go home now. Come on.
It's always fun learning things and the older I get it's real important
to keep your little gray cells active.
So, I can imagine in the future I'll be bobbing around in the boat waiting for him
to spear another Halibut. Maybe drink a beer, wait for Troy.
I don't' mind being on the surface. You ready?
You want to, you want to carry me up the ramp or.
No, I think. Bring down the hand cart?
It'll do you some good to stretch out.
Another marathon.
Yeah. Even with all the years' experience of hunting I've got,
sometimes you know you get to that point where nothing seems to be working,
but it was a pretty bittersweet day today.
Brought back a lot of good memories.
If I had one last thing, I could tell Gary it would be thanks for being Gary and,
and just being there for me.
Well, thank you for your, taking me out.
Sometimes it can be kind of like a letdown
but you're learning new ground, you're getting experience,
it just ups your chances every time you come out in the woods.
Living in town, you don't realize what kind of work it takes to actually
live out here, so for me to come out here and move out here
and actually do this has been such a hard hill to climb for me,
but it has been very rewarding to be able to learn these things.
Whenever you lay into a good harvest like this it's
local custom to share the wealth especially when,
my neighbor was kind enough to gift me with the bait that got me here.
That's a basic safety net of a small town is the camaraderie
between the individuals that live here.
Hey Donny!
Yeah.
Well, I had some pretty good luck today.
Water for supper there, man.
That, that'll make a, that'll make a good meal.
It's always nice to be able to make your neighbor smile.