{"id":18600,"date":"2024-02-18T10:03:43","date_gmt":"2024-02-18T16:03:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/?p=18600"},"modified":"2024-02-18T10:05:17","modified_gmt":"2024-02-18T16:05:17","slug":"darwin-minnesota","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/?p=18600","title":{"rendered":"Darwin Minnesota"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

WLBOTT <\/strong>recognizes the controversy surrounding the title “World’s Largest Ball of Twine”, and we take no stand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, friend-of-the-BLOTT JA#2 has suggested a visit to Darwin, Minnesota.
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Darwin<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Wikipedia<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Darwin In Pictures<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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A Cry for Help<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

We find it a bit presumptuous that if you are considering visiting the Twine Museum, they encourage you go get help, but upon reflection, we agree. (Explore Minnesota<\/a>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Getting There<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Getting There: Challenges<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It is challenging to get to Trouble #2 from a few of our WLBOTT <\/strong>satellite offices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Qaanaaq<\/strong>
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Lake Titicaca, Peru<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

We suggest you depart from Lima, Peru.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Many Moods of the Darwin Water Tower<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Inspired by the Wikipedia image by Based on the original work by By Self-created photograph by Jonathunder – Own work, GFDL, https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/w\/index.php?curid=64092752<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Details<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Hey, Look What We Found!
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Will There Be a Buffet?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

We’re excited to check out Trouble #2<\/strong> in downtown Darwin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From their Facebook page<\/a>, the Trouble #2<\/strong> looks like a good meet-up place for the Elders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Friend of the Smelt<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

WLBOTT<\/strong> has long been a friend of the smelt. This dovetails perfectly with our visit to Darwin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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For 61 years the Darwin Rod and Gun Club has continued a tradition of serving up baskets of a small species of fish with a unique taste at its annual fish fry.
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As the fish fry season gears up during Lent, area clubs, churches and organizations host a plethora<\/strong><\/em> of fries around the county. However, Darwin Rod and Gun Club\u2019s one-day fry has a specialty: smelt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The crunchy, chewy, beer-battered fish, potato salad and coleslaw draw a crowd of more than 1,000 to the annual all-you-can-eat fish fry each year. Around 2 p.m. Friday, the Darwin Rod and Gun Club was packed to capacity with members, non-members and smelt enthusiasts<\/strong><\/em>.
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Peeling potatoes for hours sounds tough, but the volunteers are incentivized. When someone peeling potatoes raises their hand, Cropp brings them a bloody mary,<\/strong><\/em> Franzen said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey enjoy doing it,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not work to them. Most of them are 70-90 years old. They can\u2019t do as much activity as frying demands, so we have them peel potatoes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The volunteer crew peels potatoes for around 12 hours \u2013 from 12:30 a.m. to noon. Franzen said the recipe has been tweaked over the years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Franzen said the problem with having a smelt-only<\/em><\/strong> fish fry is that the smelt are disappearing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe fish in the Great Lakes are eating them, such as salmon,\u201d he said. \u201cThere was an old tradition where we would go up to Duluth and get buckets of smelt. Now, we have to go as far as Michigan or Ontario.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Minnesota Sea Grant, an extension of the University of Minnesota, the \u201csmeltdown<\/strong><\/em>,\u201d or disappearing smelt, can be attributed to a few factors. Stocking efforts by Michigan fishery managers of smelt to maintain the Atlantic Salmon population in the Great Lakes in the early 1900s failed, but in 1912 when smelt were introduced to the Crystal River in Michigan, the population expanded. The fish quickly spread to the Great Lakes but experienced an unexplained decline in population in Lake Superior in 1979. The report contributes the lack of smelt to the increase of predator fish. Predators are feeding heavily on smelt and even prefer smelt to the more abundant cisco as food, the report states.<\/p>\nCrown River Media<\/a><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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The Smelt are too small? Really?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

From a Restaurant Guru<\/a> review:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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WLBOTT recognizes the controversy surrounding the title “World’s Largest Ball of Twine”, and we take no stand. However, friend-of-the-BLOTT JA#2 has suggested a visit to Darwin, Minnesota. Darwin Darwin In Pictures A Cry for Help We find it a bit presumptuous that if you are considering visiting the Twine Museum, they encourage you go get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5,77,42,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-destinations","category-minnesota","category-the-land-the-people-the-culture","category-will-there-be-a-buffet"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18600"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18600\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18675,"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18600\/revisions\/18675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wlbott.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}