Fishing White Lake 4

One day we were fishing about where the red dot is. Things were slow and it was raining as usual. Not a pouring down rain but just a on and off type of thing. We would look at the sky, we did a lot of that and every lite spot gave us hope that the weather was breaking.

We never took a radio with us on these trips and had no idea what the weather was going to be. In fact we knew nothing at all about the outside world. One year we were up there through the entire Six Day War. Came out and heard that there had been a war. Sorta made us stop and think.

We were fishing and not doing very well, as I remember in. I was running the motor, heck I always was running the motor and we were trolling. That lake had great fishing in it but not just anywhere. You had to know where to go. Orie had told me that most of the fishermen fished at the mouth of the Shabodic River and camped down there too. He said that in the spring there would sometimes be 20 or 25 boats of fishermen down there and almost all of them camping. He said that in the spring especially the storms can make it impossible to return across the lake. Because of that, I always had a popup tent and food and fixings with me. I didn’t the first year but sure did afterwards. There were islands, as you can see by the map but when you were out on the lake it was hard to distinguish them from the far shore. Almost impossible for those of us that had never been there.

I have talked to fishermen that would never think of camping on shore because of bear. One guy told me that they went fishing and left a perfectly useful camp and when they came back the place was distroyed. A bear or maybe more had gone in the door of their new tent and made a back door. Their food was scattered all over the place and nothing much was usable. We were sure lucky that those two bear had not given us problems.

Anyway, we were trolling and nobody catching anything. One of us said we ought to have a contest. First big fish won a pot made up of five bucks each. Five bucks was a lot of money back then. Well I was up for it! We headed over to the island and started trolling.

We caught a few small fish, almost all the pike we caught were at least two feet long back then, some 36 with a few 40 inchers. The walleye usually ran smallish but great for eating. Most were maybe 12 inches or so with many of them running 16 or 18 inches. My biggest was 6 ½ lbs but it was not on this trip. My buddy Jay caught a 9 Pounder and I heard of fish over 12 lbs-Walleye- being caught on the Shabodic in the spring. Big females full of eggs.

Well we caught a few walleye and my cousin was riding the heck out of me that he was gonna win my money. It was part of our fun to ride eachother like that. Gary was quieter but still got his jibes in at us both.

Finally that hairball Bruce hung into a big sucker. It fought hard and from the way it fought it was a pike. Walleye fight deep and usually when you get them to the boat the line is straight down. The hug the bottom until you pull them off it. Pike will fight hard if you ram the hooks home and with the big ones you can actually feel them shake their heads, trying to rid themselves of the hook. It will not be a fast shake either, it will be a slow back—and ---forth with the big ones. That is what Bruces dang fish was doing. The dang runt was gonna get my money. He was laughing and hollering, “I win you rat Bastud! I win you Rat Bastud!” I told him that he didn’t have the sucker in yet but he had it hooked good.

I got out the net and his big mouth kept a going. Laughing and stupid going ons. The boy had no pride going on like that. A person should be humble I always figured :D

He brought that dang fish over to the side. It was a big one. Dang big for us newbies. I would guess about 36 to 38inches. He said, “you see that? You see that? You Rat Bastud?” I saw it.

I slipped the net under that sucker and with a heave brought it aboard. It was a nice fish. “Gimme my money. Gimme my money!” the stupid arse kept a going on. No grace at all in that boy..

I had the pike rag in the fish. I call it a pike rag because them dang pike are the slimeist dang fish I ever tried to hold down. We decided to carry a towel and throw it over the fish and then we could hold it down. Worked great. Anyway, I toss the rag over the fish and pinned it. It was trying to wreck the dang boat and they can make a mess out of your tackle. I pinned it and got out the needle nose pliers and went to work on that Rapalla. I Worked the hooks loose and held up the fish. Bruce was a grinning and I threw it overboard. Too small I told the boy. The look on that boys face has me laughing as I write this 42 years later. He sputtered and stammered and you know what? I thought I was gonna have to fight the boy. Gary was laughing his arse off and I was laughing and watching Bruce pretty close. Seems I might have been wrong in the boys eyes when I said it was too small.

Man Rat Bastud was the nicest thing he called me for the next few hours. In fact Bruce died last spring and he still was bitching about that fish after all these years if fishing was brought up. I brought it up a lot actually. By that time the dang fish was a hundred pounder.

He finally settled down but we had to quit laughing for that to happen. It ended up that he screwed me out of the kitty too. I didn’t want to have to watch my back the rest of the trip and what he heck, he was a Marine and I was a feared the boy would cry.

I think that was probably the biggest pike he caught the whole week too. Too bad it wasn’

Gary was not much of a fisherman like Bruce and I and he hung in the like a trooper. He was a trooper and never butched a bit, I did but he didn’t. A little while later we were trolling and gary hung one on. Another pike and it was a nice one. Maybe 30-32 inches. Man that fish fought. Gary was holding the rod against the gunnel of the boat instead of up in the air and just a cranking that bad boy in. The fish was fighting like mad and Gary was a cranking.

I was watching and holding the net, prepared to scoop the fish up when I could. I looked down and the pike was right at the tip of Garys rod. Gary kept a cranking. He cranked tha dang pike right up to the tip of the rod and kept cranking. That dang rod tip went into the pikes mouth and he kept a cranking. He must not have noticed what had happened. All fo a sudden the end of his rod broke right off at the second eyelet. I looked at Gary and told him that I thought he could quit cranking now. I will never forget the look on his face! We got the fish in and were lucky that we had a spare rod.

One day we were fishing Pike Island and doing pretty well. The pike were hitting and hitting hard. I have no idea how many fish we caught but we threw most back anyway. I only kept count of my fish on one trip. I marked them on my tackle box for some reason. I just counted pike. I caught 76 that week, not counting one heck of a bunch of walleye. That was not White Lake though.

We were not trolling that day but casting the shallows. We were having a ball too. We were casting to the fish and watching them come to the lure. Many would not take but many did. I was fighting one in. a fish about 28 inches as I remember, and looked closely. I yelled for them to look a that dang fish. There was not a hook in it but when it had sturck the Rapalla it had flipped the lure and the hook caught the line. In doing so it had looped around the fishes mouth plate or lip or what ever you call it and there he was, ready for neting without a hook in it.

We had a ball that week but it was because were were in wonderful country and were friends. We were miserable some of the time but it was the trip of a lifetime for me. I made 19 more trips to Canada but neither of them went again.

I will have many more aditions to this series of posts but they will be from other trips. I am ging to stick with White Lake until I run out of things that I feel will be of interest to you folks.

Five coming soon :D