hard time topping last year. Our guests last summer complained that the Salmon were too easy to catch! We finally asked guests and friends not to leave any more Salmon with us. We ran out of freezer space and we ran out of people to give Salmon to. We are still eating King, Red and Silver Salmon at least twice a week.
     Local fishing guide, Andy Couch of FishTale River Guides predicted the 2000 
Salmon season would be better than normal in July, August, and September. His prediction certainly was accurate. Andy expects that 2001 should be about normal for Red, Silver and Chum Salmon.

     The Agate Inn and FishTale River Guides offer Salmon fishing packages with 3 or 5 six-hour guided fishing trips starting at $625.00 per person.. Give us a call at 800-770-2290 or check out the Salmon Connection link at http://www.agateinn.com.

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A few weeks later, Jasper had a bloating problem. Reindeer and Moose for some reason are attracted to plastic shopping bags. Occasionally plastic shopping bags blow into the pen. We were convinced Jasper had eaten plastic and it was lodged in one of the four compartments of his stomach. During the holidays, our large animal vet visited and tubed Jasper to relieve the gas build up. He improved, but again on January 6, Jasper bloated. Later that afternoon, Jasper died from heart failure. Two vets and a wildlife biologist performed a necropsy that evening. There was no sign of plastic. Jasper had a deformity of the esophagus.

(Continued on page 4)
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Our reindeer herding skills improved throughout the past year, although we never managed to teach our deer how to fly....let alone how to pull a sled. With our confidence level high, we acquired a young bull reindeer, Jasper, and hopes for little reindeer on the horizon. The truth is, if we couldn’t teach Agatha Christie and Crystal how to pull a sled, we would just have to start with younger pupils!
     We had fun learning how to handle a male reindeer during rutting season. Harvey quickly learned how to show Jasper who was the boss. In wrestling this might be termed pinning. We seriously wondered what next year would be like when Jasper gained 150 to 200 pounds.
     Unfortunately, we soon experienced the downsides of
reindeer herding. On November 1, we moved the deer to their winter pen between the guest house and our home. As darkness fell, after only a few hours in the new pen, a stray dog found its way into the pen. Agatha Christie and Crystal fled toward the old pen and jumped the six foot fence. Jasper never left the pen. Crystal, other than losing a 12 inch square area of winter fur, stayed near the pen and was standing at the gate the next morning waiting to be let back in. Agatha kept on running, became hopelessly lost two miles from the Inn and was struck by a car. The dog was caught a few nights later and turned over to animal control. Catching the dog was no consolation to losing Agatha Christie and her unborn calf.