Well friends, this trip has been running 20 years and produced 1,000 articles on everything from bluebirds to buzzards, bass baits to bilge pumps and bird dogs to bugle calls in the high Rockies. I have had the pleasure of writing from Buffalo, Wyo., to Buddha Falls, Ontario; Ogunquit, Maine, to Luckenbach, Texas; the wild Kissimmee to west Kansas and on every waterway in Kentucky and Tennessee that was capable of harboring a fish or a fowl and a couple that weren’t.

I owe a debt of gratitude to hundreds of fine friends that I have met, written about and shared countless adventures with.

They have given me access to secret hot spots, and taken me fishing for everything from pike to pumpkinseed perch in freshwater and tried to help me catch every creature in the sea – black snapper to squirrel fish.

Though I never hooked a tarpon or a blue marlin, it isn’t over yet.

I have hunted or fished in most every state east of the Rockies – except Nebraska – and a few in New England too small to count. I have climbed deer stands in zero-degree weather and hunkered in -22 wind chill goose blinds on the Chesapeake Bay.

I have canoed into the Canadian wilderness so far that if you got lost they wouldn’t even be able to find your tracks. Actually I did get lost once – but then I wrote about that already. Thanks Jerome.

I decided last spring that when I hit the 1,000 article mark I might lay it aside and let a new person entertain you for a while.

It has always been my sincere wish that my writing did entertain you, inform you or even inspire you to get outside and have some fun. If you did, I am well pleased. If I didn’t there may be hope for you yet.

I still recall how this adventure began on Long Creek during a smallmouth bass fishing adventure with Pipes Gaines (now publisher of the Daily News). He simply mentioned that there was going to be an opening for an outdoor writer and that I might want to apply.

The next thing I knew I was sitting across the desk from Don Stringer (then managing editor) and facing one of the most pointed interviews I have ever had. It ended with Don saying that despite my Ph.D. he was going to give me a try anyway. It was tough at first, but Don gave me a few tips that helped.

I would share one of those tips with every aspiring writer that I would meet over the next 19 years. You cannot tell the whole story in a newspaper column. You can only tell about a smaller, significant piece of the story. Focus, that was good advice.

Well up until now, when I am taking the privilege of rambling. Thanks Daily News.

Jack Austin and Sam Robertson, both longtime outdoor writers and personalities in Tennessee, became my unofficial mentors when I joined first TOWA, Tennessee Outdoor Writers Association and then the KOWA – you guessed it – Kentucky Outdoor Writers Association.

They introduced me to dozens of other writers, radio and TV outdoor communicators throughout the Southeast. In fact, I met one of the all-time greats at an outing on Dale Hollow Lake at the KOWA fall conference. Soc Clay is a Kentuckian who has made a remarkable contribution to outdoor journalism and is one of the best storytellers and photographers I ever encountered.

A quick story: I was attending the Cincinnati Outdoor Show and ran into Soc right before he was to give a lecture standing atop the big bass aquarium where he was going to demonstrate a jigging technique. This was about the time that “Achy Breaky Heart” was a popular hit.

Soc climbed the platform and greeted the audience and said, “Folks, I want you to meet a very dear friend of mine, Tom Pearce. You may not know it, but Tom discovered and promoted Billy Ray Cyrus.”

All eyes turned to my chair and gazed at the most red-faced fellow in the place. I didn’t have to wait in line the rest of the day. Thanks Soc, Sam and Jack.

Soc later sponsored me when I joined SEOPA, Southeastern Outdoor Press Association.

What a group of kind, helpful and supportive people. You would think that there would be a lot of competition among writers, and there is, but in SEOPA they truly run on the notion that “the more there is the more there is.”

By helping folks get started in outdoor communication, the industry actually grows, giving more opportunity to all. It is a code that the group has lived by for 40 years and it is still working. A real privilege to have been among them. Thanks SEOPA.

Paying tribute to everyone who ever helped me might take a whole edition of the Daily News, but I can’t hang up my keyboard until I name a few, either by name or reference. Forgive me if I left your name out, your friendship and help were no less significant, it is just that I can’t recount and thank every individual.

I think early on, one fellow more responsible for helping me become somewhat credible in fishing circles was Bob Steen.

Bob is probably one of the best naturally talented fishermen that I have ever met. It is his gift.

Everywhere we have ever gone he caught fish when nobody else could. I learned to talk the talk from Bob. Thanks.

Wing shooters are a special breed of folks and when they talk guns and shooting it is a special language. Boyd Truelove, my old college roommate and a Grand National Class shooter, was my mentor in all things shooting. Thanks.

Deer camps abound from northern borders to the Gulf Coast, but I have visited few or none more congenial, welcoming or engaging than the Harpending Hilton and the Rough Riders Olympians, a source of many inkable stories. Thanks Dixie.

For most memorable adventures category, the Green River Boys canoeing down rivers and creeks pales most anything else ever done on or near the water’s edge. A veritable plethora of stories to tell and yet untold but surely remembered by all. Thanks.

Fishing, hunting, camping, canoeing or just knocking about, Ed Brodt has shared more adventures and misadventures with me and has been the most companionable partner that I ever had or deserved. And I mean some of them were truly misadventures of my design, and Ed never groused about the last one or declined the next one. He always has been able to find the humor in the most miserable situations. Thanks.

My boyhood in Alvaton spent fishing and with the Kirby families, Wilson brothers and others gave me a background of tales and experiences to draw from that are still precious. Clifford Wilson, Willard and Hester Kirby and all their sons and nephews contributed to my love of the outdoors.

I will have to credit Clay Pearce, my father, with instilling in me the sense of stewardship that allows us to carry on our outdoor heritage. Thanks Alvatonians.

Of course my best outdoor adventure partner turns out to be my own son, friend and sportsman, Phil Pearce. That says it all.

It has passed to the next generation and well done. My daughter Kate never got to go on as many trips with me, but the few we have had have all been memorable. Her daughter, Elizabeth Blaine, joined us this summer on her first adventure on Trammel Creek fishing for trout and shiners and whatever.

She picked up a spinning reel and deftly proceeded to catch her first fish – turns out she is a natural as well. On to the next generation. Thanks.

None of this could have been accomplished without the most important ingredient in the mix – a spouse not of the outdoors who came to understand that they were fishing trips, not catching trips; not killing trips, but hunting trips.

Without that support and unconditional forgiveness for leaving early and coming in late, grimy, cold and muddy and a host of other combinations, I couldn’t have done it. Thanks, Marti, you’re my best partner of all.

So friends, always remember a few good stories to share when we next meet and let me hear from you now and then, especially if you need a partner in the great outdoors.

Here is my last fishing report.

All lakes in all places, the fishing is great. Get out there and get after them. The catching might not be what you had hoped for, but the mere being there will be well worth the effort. So long and most gracious thanks to you all, most faithful readers.

Editor’s note: After 20 years, Tom Pearce is retiring as the outdoors writer for the Daily News. As he said, he is passing the torch to the next generation, and that generation is represented by 23-year-old Geordon T. Howell, a Warren County native. Geordon’s first column will appear next Sunday. And to Tom, thanks for a job well done.