Miss-Delectable
New Member
- Joined
- Apr 18, 2004
- Messages
- 17,160
- Reaction score
- 7
Omaha.com Living Section
He has no idea how the frigid Missouri River water sounds as it splashes against its banks. He's never heard chunks of ice scraping against the boat. He doesn't know the hollow plopping sound a weighted net makes when it hits the river surface.
But the 50-year-old fisherman knows a stretch of the Missouri River connecting Nebraska and South Dakota as well as anything in his life.
Being deaf and mostly mute, Sudbeck has been relegated to the fringe of small-town society in and around Wynot.
Sudbeck - at least 6 feet tall and 220 pounds with a mischievous smile - gets his share of back slaps, nods and invitations to play gin rummy at the local bars and restaurants. But relationships don't go much deeper than that for him.
He's had trouble holding onto work, losing jobs as area meatpacking plants and cheese factories have closed. His mother is dead, and his father is incapacitated with sickness.
All that melts away when he steps into his 18-foot boat and points its silver tip upriver, steadily chugging against the current. Navigating this stretch of water near Wynot - a town of a couple hundred people roughly 20 miles southeast of Yankton, S.D. - is the one constant in his life. With its subtle currents and tides, the river speaks a language Sudbeck understands.
It's always been his refuge.
Sudbeck went deaf at birth. Antibodies in his mother's blood began attacking his red blood cells, creating a buildup of the toxic byproduct bilirubin. The bilirubin poisoned Sudbeck's auditory nerve.
His younger brother, Keith, had a similar condition, but a blood transfusion saved his hearing.
The condition didn't stop their father, Orville, from taking Ralph fishing whenever he could. The son still finds comfort there.
Winter - when wind and frozen water make the river uninviting - is one of the best times for Sudbeck to fish.
After downing coffee or Diet Mountain Dew and playing cards at the Green Diamond restaurant, Sudbeck pulls on his "Got fish?" cap and rumbles north down rugged dirt roads in his mud-caked Chevy Silverado.
Its odometer has logged more than 200,000 rough miles. The cab reeks of fish guts. Crumpled clothing and food wrappers litter the back seat.
It's early afternoon when he parks near a thin thicket and jumps out. He bounds down muddy steps cut into the riverbank. At the bottom, a frayed rope shackles his boat to metal poles.
Once on the river, Sudbeck pilots the vessel from a worn seat bolted to the back. With a cigarette parked in the corner of his mouth, he squints behind dark glasses as he tries to maneuver around sandbars and ice.
Occasionally, he stumbles on both. The boat easily breaks through most of the ice, its ragged edges scraping against the boat.
The vessel doesn't fare so well with shallow spots. The motor's blades cut into the sandbar, tossing mud, water and chunks of ice into the boat before roaring to a halt. Sudbeck attacks the problem with nonchalance, pushing the boat toward deeper water with long wooden poles.
Sometimes he has to climb out and push, the murky water hiding his yellow hip waders.
Once the boat gets moving again, Sudbeck plays tour guide. He salutes one of many bald eagles that nest in the tall trees framing the river. He points out the spot where his dad caught the largest flathead catfish ever snagged in Nebraska - a 76-pound, 54½-inch behemoth.
He stretches his fingers into horns as he shows where he once found a buffalo skull in the water.
Eventually, Sudbeck finds what he's looking for - a large, frozen patch of river. Using hand signals, he explains that the fish tend to camp out under the ice.
He pulls close to the ice and drops in a trammel net, which resembles a volleyball net with a rusted weight on each end.
He slowly chugs upstream, dropping dozens of feet of net behind him. He tosses in the final weight. He's essentially created a netted barrier on the downstream side of the ice.
Sudbeck eases the boat onto the ice. He grabs a short pipe and slams it into a metal hand railing on the boat.
The shrill ping echoes through the air. He keeps banging. Then he grabs a hammer and starts beating it against the railing. The boat shimmies from the force.
Fish aren't known for their hearing. They can process a limited range of sounds but have a heightened sense of vibration. The banging causes the ice and the water below to vibrate, frightening the fish. They scatter downstream - right into Sudbeck's net.
Sudbeck glances back toward the net. It's bobbing and shifting. That's a good sign. He steers the boat back to his net and starts pulling in the net.
"Uh, uh," he yells. "Uh, uh."
He grunts each time he sees another trapped fish.
Most are big buffalo fish, their silver scales flecked with pink. Still caught in the net, they thrash against the inside of the boat, their sharp gills grasping for water. Sudbeck piles them up, still grunting each time he sees more.
He tosses back a few random bass or sturgeon. His permit doesn't allow him to keep those. Within a few minutes, his boat is full of buffalo fish and a few carp.
He heads back toward the landing. When he arrives, he picks the fish from the net and tosses them into burlap sacks or plastic barrels. Then he hauls them up the steep, muddy steps, stopping every few yards to stick out his tongue and gasp.
He pretends to smoke an invisible cigarette, then clutches his chest and shakes his head. The habit makes hauling fish hard.
After loading the fish into the Silverado, the first thing he does is rummage for a real cigarette. He finds a green-and-white box.
Empty.
He grunts and tosses it into the back seat. Then he laughs.
He revs the engine and heads down the worn road. Within a few feet, he abruptly turns into a cornfield, cutting a path through the mud and snow. He draws a road with his hand in the air, then flips his wrist as if he's throwing it away.
Sudbeck doesn't believe in roads. He prefers to make his own.
He eventually finds his way to a gravel road and decides to take it. After going more than 60 mph over steep hills and around tight curves on the lonely road, he emerges at the farm where he was raised. It's a classic Nebraska farm with a big house and barns, situated close to Bow Valley, an unincorporated village a few miles from Wynot.
In a little red shack, he places his fish one-by-one on a stone cutting board.
He slices through the silver scales to pink flesh, tossing spines, guts and heads against weathered walls. His hands are wet and slimy, but he cuts with easy precision.
What once was a fish quickly turns into neatly trimmed, fleshy fillets ready to be battered and fried.
He places the fillets into plastic buckets and heads to the Green Diamond, which features his catch at its Friday fish fries.
A piece of buffalo fish with scalloped potatoes and slaw goes for $6.90. Patrons tend to wash it down with $1.25 draws of Busch Light.
His day done, Sudbeck bellies up to the bar and unfolds a few dollar bills. A bartender slides him a Jack Daniels and Coke. He takes a few sips.
The door behind him opens. Before anyone else reacts, Sudbeck turns and looks.
He didn't hear it open - he felt it.
Like the fish, he makes up for his deafness with an acute sense of vibration.
A couple of guys at the bar wave. Sudbeck finishes his drink and heads for the door.
He'll take a nap, maybe clean some more fish.
Every minute he spends on small-town land, he's, well, a fish out of water. He bides his time until he can get back to where he belongs.
Back on that river.
He has no idea how the frigid Missouri River water sounds as it splashes against its banks. He's never heard chunks of ice scraping against the boat. He doesn't know the hollow plopping sound a weighted net makes when it hits the river surface.
But the 50-year-old fisherman knows a stretch of the Missouri River connecting Nebraska and South Dakota as well as anything in his life.
Being deaf and mostly mute, Sudbeck has been relegated to the fringe of small-town society in and around Wynot.
Sudbeck - at least 6 feet tall and 220 pounds with a mischievous smile - gets his share of back slaps, nods and invitations to play gin rummy at the local bars and restaurants. But relationships don't go much deeper than that for him.
He's had trouble holding onto work, losing jobs as area meatpacking plants and cheese factories have closed. His mother is dead, and his father is incapacitated with sickness.
All that melts away when he steps into his 18-foot boat and points its silver tip upriver, steadily chugging against the current. Navigating this stretch of water near Wynot - a town of a couple hundred people roughly 20 miles southeast of Yankton, S.D. - is the one constant in his life. With its subtle currents and tides, the river speaks a language Sudbeck understands.
It's always been his refuge.
Sudbeck went deaf at birth. Antibodies in his mother's blood began attacking his red blood cells, creating a buildup of the toxic byproduct bilirubin. The bilirubin poisoned Sudbeck's auditory nerve.
His younger brother, Keith, had a similar condition, but a blood transfusion saved his hearing.
The condition didn't stop their father, Orville, from taking Ralph fishing whenever he could. The son still finds comfort there.
Winter - when wind and frozen water make the river uninviting - is one of the best times for Sudbeck to fish.
After downing coffee or Diet Mountain Dew and playing cards at the Green Diamond restaurant, Sudbeck pulls on his "Got fish?" cap and rumbles north down rugged dirt roads in his mud-caked Chevy Silverado.
Its odometer has logged more than 200,000 rough miles. The cab reeks of fish guts. Crumpled clothing and food wrappers litter the back seat.
It's early afternoon when he parks near a thin thicket and jumps out. He bounds down muddy steps cut into the riverbank. At the bottom, a frayed rope shackles his boat to metal poles.
Once on the river, Sudbeck pilots the vessel from a worn seat bolted to the back. With a cigarette parked in the corner of his mouth, he squints behind dark glasses as he tries to maneuver around sandbars and ice.
Occasionally, he stumbles on both. The boat easily breaks through most of the ice, its ragged edges scraping against the boat.
The vessel doesn't fare so well with shallow spots. The motor's blades cut into the sandbar, tossing mud, water and chunks of ice into the boat before roaring to a halt. Sudbeck attacks the problem with nonchalance, pushing the boat toward deeper water with long wooden poles.
Sometimes he has to climb out and push, the murky water hiding his yellow hip waders.
Once the boat gets moving again, Sudbeck plays tour guide. He salutes one of many bald eagles that nest in the tall trees framing the river. He points out the spot where his dad caught the largest flathead catfish ever snagged in Nebraska - a 76-pound, 54½-inch behemoth.
He stretches his fingers into horns as he shows where he once found a buffalo skull in the water.
Eventually, Sudbeck finds what he's looking for - a large, frozen patch of river. Using hand signals, he explains that the fish tend to camp out under the ice.
He pulls close to the ice and drops in a trammel net, which resembles a volleyball net with a rusted weight on each end.
He slowly chugs upstream, dropping dozens of feet of net behind him. He tosses in the final weight. He's essentially created a netted barrier on the downstream side of the ice.
Sudbeck eases the boat onto the ice. He grabs a short pipe and slams it into a metal hand railing on the boat.
The shrill ping echoes through the air. He keeps banging. Then he grabs a hammer and starts beating it against the railing. The boat shimmies from the force.
Fish aren't known for their hearing. They can process a limited range of sounds but have a heightened sense of vibration. The banging causes the ice and the water below to vibrate, frightening the fish. They scatter downstream - right into Sudbeck's net.
Sudbeck glances back toward the net. It's bobbing and shifting. That's a good sign. He steers the boat back to his net and starts pulling in the net.
"Uh, uh," he yells. "Uh, uh."
He grunts each time he sees another trapped fish.
Most are big buffalo fish, their silver scales flecked with pink. Still caught in the net, they thrash against the inside of the boat, their sharp gills grasping for water. Sudbeck piles them up, still grunting each time he sees more.
He tosses back a few random bass or sturgeon. His permit doesn't allow him to keep those. Within a few minutes, his boat is full of buffalo fish and a few carp.
He heads back toward the landing. When he arrives, he picks the fish from the net and tosses them into burlap sacks or plastic barrels. Then he hauls them up the steep, muddy steps, stopping every few yards to stick out his tongue and gasp.
He pretends to smoke an invisible cigarette, then clutches his chest and shakes his head. The habit makes hauling fish hard.
After loading the fish into the Silverado, the first thing he does is rummage for a real cigarette. He finds a green-and-white box.
Empty.
He grunts and tosses it into the back seat. Then he laughs.
He revs the engine and heads down the worn road. Within a few feet, he abruptly turns into a cornfield, cutting a path through the mud and snow. He draws a road with his hand in the air, then flips his wrist as if he's throwing it away.
Sudbeck doesn't believe in roads. He prefers to make his own.
He eventually finds his way to a gravel road and decides to take it. After going more than 60 mph over steep hills and around tight curves on the lonely road, he emerges at the farm where he was raised. It's a classic Nebraska farm with a big house and barns, situated close to Bow Valley, an unincorporated village a few miles from Wynot.
In a little red shack, he places his fish one-by-one on a stone cutting board.
He slices through the silver scales to pink flesh, tossing spines, guts and heads against weathered walls. His hands are wet and slimy, but he cuts with easy precision.
What once was a fish quickly turns into neatly trimmed, fleshy fillets ready to be battered and fried.
He places the fillets into plastic buckets and heads to the Green Diamond, which features his catch at its Friday fish fries.
A piece of buffalo fish with scalloped potatoes and slaw goes for $6.90. Patrons tend to wash it down with $1.25 draws of Busch Light.
His day done, Sudbeck bellies up to the bar and unfolds a few dollar bills. A bartender slides him a Jack Daniels and Coke. He takes a few sips.
The door behind him opens. Before anyone else reacts, Sudbeck turns and looks.
He didn't hear it open - he felt it.
Like the fish, he makes up for his deafness with an acute sense of vibration.
A couple of guys at the bar wave. Sudbeck finishes his drink and heads for the door.
He'll take a nap, maybe clean some more fish.
Every minute he spends on small-town land, he's, well, a fish out of water. He bides his time until he can get back to where he belongs.
Back on that river.