Jackrabbits get out hunting, fishing

Coach Stig started a winning tradition for Jackrabbit football, and he also started a little known and unusual player interview session on media day. I interview a couple of football players who like to hunt and fish, and report my findings to the Brookings Wildlife Federation. Stig is a member of the Federation.

On his recent Monday night Coach’s Show, current Jackrabbit football Coach Dan Jackson said that he wanted the coaches and players to be a part of the Brookings community. For a few years now, the Wildlife Federation members have gotten to know several outdoorsman football players and have followed their college careers. This week, Football Operations Chief Ethan Beisner and I stood by the exit door of the S-Jac as tired players headed for the locker room after practice. Ethan had picked some players for me to interview.

Brayden Delahoyde (#10) is a sophomore, 6-ft, 5-in, 245 lb. tight end from Spearfish. He is majoring in exploratorysStudies and has been on the conference academic honor role for two years. He played in all games last year. When I asked what he liked to hunt, he quickly replied “Everything!” The Black Hills offers almost everything – white-tailed and mule deer, elk, turkey, waterfowl and pheasants, and Brayden hunts them all. He has also hunted bear in Alaska.

He has harvested both mule deer and white-tailed deer in the Belle Fourche area; says he’s proud of a 150 white-tail. The 150 refers to a standard combination of measurements of the antlers in inches, not the number of antler points. A 150 whitetail is a trophy for any hunter. Brayden butchers all carcasses himself and get this — one of the things he brought to school was a freezer full of elk meat.”

Brayden said that he really likes “reaping” turkeys. Brayden explained that turkey reaping is when a hunter stalks a tom turkey by crawling toward it while hiding behind a turkey decoy. They hope to trigger an aggressive charge from a mature male gobbler. Now, that’s hunting close and personal! “Successful?” I asked. “Oh yeah,” was the reply. Brayden says he plans to hunt on Sundays after Saturday football if he can.

Kyan Rauk (#63) is one of the biggest guys on the field. He is a 6-ft, 8-in 300-lb sophomore (sophomore!) from Northfield, Minn. He is majoring in exercise science, having earned Missouri Valley Conference academic awards for two years. Kyan wanted to talk about waterfowl hunting in Southern Minnesota and North Dakota, and pheasant hunting with his German Shorthair. His family is involved with Pheasants Forever.

He and friends hunt public wetlands, usually from a canoe that they drag full of decoys and gear for a half-mile to the water’s edge. They paddle the canoe into the marsh, set out decoys, and wait for the ducks. For geese, he looks for corn fields where they are feeding, and then asks permission. He told of one memorable hunt with a cousin in North Dakota when they limited out on ducks and geese on back-to-back days. Then he brought up fishing.

He’s from the land of 10,000 lakes and I think he has fished half of them, mainly for walleye. He has also fished the Mississippi River. He fishes for big walleye in the lake-like Pool 4 stretch near Red Wing. I asked if he cleans all of his fish. He replied “My brother likes to clean’em, so I let him.”

My next interview was with Cullen McShane (#5) a 6-ft, 2-in, 225 lb. senior from Marquette Iowa majoring in sociology. I first interviewed Cullen when he was a freshman and have seen him rise to All American status as a linebacker. He’s a river rat and has fished the Mississippi River a lot. He says the river was really low this year. The Corps of Engineers tries to maintain 9-ft-deep channel for barge traffic, but Collen said it might have been 7 ft this year and the barges just pushed the mud around.

The low water hurt fishing in the shallow, off-channel ponds and backwaters, but he remembers casting a surface buzz bait lure into the shallows. A buzz bait has a spinning propeller-like blade that creates a buzzing noise and surface commotion to attract fish; says the northern pike pounded it. When I asked about a memorable catch, he thought of nearby Brush Lake near Arlington, where he caught a 27-inch and 28-inch walleye on successive casts. He fishes with another Jacks linebacker, #28 Chase VanTol from Tea. I interviewed VanTol last year. He talked about mule deer hunting west river and walleye fishing in Canada – bragged about a 31.5-inch walleye he caught.

Cullen said “Live-scope fishing is amazing, you can find the fish, watch your lure near the fish and even see the strike.” LiveScope is the name of a sonar device made by the Garmin Company. It uses real-time, high-frequency scanning sonar to let anglers see what is happening below the surface. Collen said “Find the fish and put your lure near it and “bang!”
As I was wrapping up, All American Quarterback Chase Mason, 6-4, 240 lbs. from Hurlley said “Hi,” as he headed toward the locker room.

Chase is an avid hunter and I had interviewed him several times. Chase says Turner County is good pheasant country. I asked if he had any hunting and fishing news. He replied “Not much, I’m too busy!” I guess so, with all of the NFL talk when his name is mentioned.

I walked away from football practice with the usual appreciation for cordiality and good manners of the Jacks staff and players. Thanks to Ethan Beisner and Coach Jackson for agreeing to continue this unusual interview program. The Brookings Wildlife Federation is an affiliate of the National Wildlife Federation and has been promoting wildlife conservation in the Brookings area since 1980.