My thoughts are first and foremost of family and friends here and the Teche Area’s great people as Hurricane Gustav steamrolls into the Gulf of Mexico and toward the coast of Louisiana.

Hopefully, and prayerfully, the hurricane spares this region of the kind of grief usually associated with such a natural disaster.

 Then my thoughts turn east toward the Atchafalaya Basin, where the fisheries was annihilated in August 1992 by Hurricane Andrew. It took years to rebuild the devastated populations, particularly those of the bass so many of us like to chase in the swamps, bayous and pipelines of the Spillway.

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And my heart goes out to the residents and people who have camps, boats and other possessions at Cypremort Point.

Several people checked in during the week with decisions made on planned events, such as the 50th annual Kay-Cees Saltwater Fishing Rodeo scheduled to be held this Labor Day Weekend. The Knights of Columbus councils that stage the grand fundraising event decided Tuesday night to postpone the fishing rodeo until Oct. 3-4.

That fun event was scheduled to start Saturday and end Labor Day Monday. But New Iberian Ronnie Boudreaux, veteran fishing rodeo chairman and weighmaster, said at midweek the hosting organizations couldn’t even think about putting people in harm’s way.

“That’s friends of mine and yours, too,” Boudreaux said early Wednesday morning.

Hurricane Gustav was a remote threat then, its eventual path mostly speculation with many models giving it shotgun-like movements. Those fishing rodeo officials made the right decision.

They originally were going to make a decision Wednesday night. But while meeting Tuesday night to load equipment to bring out to fishing rodeo headquarters, Quintana Canal, they didn’t like what they saw on one of the members’ laptop computer when they looked at hurricane forecasts.

Dozens of area saltwater fishermen regularly fish the last major saltwater fishing rodeo of the year around here. Sure, they must be disappointed that it won’t happen this weekend, but grateful the right call was made by the Kay-Cees.

On Friday, Tommy Lipari of New Iberia called Friday to say no decision has been made on the Hawg Fight Classic, a culmination of the Hawg Fight series that was scheduled to take place Sept. 7. Chances are it will be postponed.

“If the storm comes I think we have no choice but to postpone the Classic to a different date,” Lipari said. “If the storm doesn’t come our way, everything is going to stay as it is — meeting on the 5th (at Lipari’s Sporting Goods new location on U.S. 90), Classic on the 7th.”

“Myself, we need to wait and see what happens. Monday or Tuesday we’ll all know more about what’s going to be happening. It’s all on the storm,” he said. “If it hits us Tuesday or Wednesday, it’s probably not going to be able to do anything. Everybody’s going to be trying to pick up the pieces. We’ll see what happens.”

Lipari, Hawg Fight director, said the approaching hurricane is everyone’s “worst nightmare.”

“The fish are out there. The fish are plentiful. The last thing we needed was a storm,” he said.

Like many concerned outdoorsmen, he is worried that Gustav will cause a fish kill there and in other local waterbodies, such as Lake Dauterive-Fausse Pointe.

We hope everyone emerges safely from the hurricane expected to impact this area. Godspeed.

DON SHOOPMAN is outdoors editor of The Daily Iberian.