Uncommon Fishing Experiences

Strange things happen while fishing, and many are remembered long after a limit catch has been caught, bragged about and eaten.

It was about this time of year 30 years ago when I was trolling Manistee Lake near Filer City with brother George, and Randy Colvin of Flint. We were trolling X-4, X-5 and U-20 FlatFish at putt-putt speeds.

I was trolling a U-20 silver FlatFish off the starboard side, Colvin was pulling a U-20 in grey-pearl off the port side, and George was using some weight and was fishing a chartreuse with red spot U-20 right behind the boat while running the outboard motor.

An against all-odds catch

It was a cold and blustery day when Colvin had a jarring strike. I began reeling my line in immediately when I felt the boat rock as he set the hook, and his line broke from a too-tight drag and too much hook-set. I'd made about 10 turns on the spinning reel handle when my rod tip shot down, and I was into a jumping fish that cleared the water behind the boat.

George reeled up, Randy reeled in his broken line, and that steelhead and I had a good battle. I gradually worked him out into deeper water, and soon he was swimming in circles 10 feet below the boat. I eased him to the surface where George slid a net under the fish.

No big deal here. But imagine our surprise when we learned that one small treble hook point of my lure went through the line-tie of Colvin's FlatFish. The odds of such a thing happening are well off the charts.

He howled that it was his fish, and me being a reasonable gent, suggested that his over-zealous hook-set and my finely timed retrieve was what led to my cleverly inserting a hook point of my lure through the line tie of his lure. Thus, any reasonable person should know that not only did I land the fish but also gained a new fishing lure.

I relented, after further reasonable thought, and gave him back his lure. I kept the fish. That seemed only fair to me.

Hooking the same big Chinook salmon three times

Another time, during my river guiding career from 1967 through 1976, I had occasion to fish the Betsie River with a fly rod and wet flies for chinook salmon. My clients had caught a bunch of fish, and being thoroughly tuckered out from running up and downstream after fish, had pulled up stakes after two days and went home.

A huge king was spotted upstream from a tree that had toppled into the water, and he was holding court with a big hen. I hooked that old boy once, and he ripped and snorted downstream, tangling my line in the fallen tree branches, and broke off.

I fished elsewhere for an hour, went back to the big king, and he was back out guarding the redd. I changed fly colors, rolled the dark fly in front of his nose, and he darted out to grab it. I set the hook, he uncorked a tremendous leap that landed him in the tree branches again. The line broke like sewing thread.

Two hours passed before I stopped by to pay him another visit. There he lay, alongside the nearly spent female, and they rolled up on their sides in unison, she discharging a stream of golden eggs while he let loose a cloud of white milt. They spawned until her eggs were exhausted and he could only muster one tiny puff of milt.

They had ended their spawning chores, and death would soon follow. I eased into the river again, made one cast, and the big male moved forward to intercept it. I set the hook, set it again, and literally forced him across the surface toward me. He slipped past me as I steered him clear of the tree branches and into the open river.

He headed downstream like a barge drifting out of control, and I followed him as fast as humanly possible. He rolled to the surface, thrashed around, turned sideways to the current, and he let the swift water carry him down to a deep hole. I knew the hole was clean of debris, and carried the fight to the now sluggish fish.

It was perhaps not the most noble end to his life, but he had fulfilled his destiny and would soon die, his carcass tumbling end over end downstream until it lodged in a log jam. I eased him toward shore, skidded his massive head up on shore, picked him up by the tail and it was over.

That fish, two hours later, weighed an honest 38 1/2 pounds on certified scales, a major catch on a fly and fly rod and 10-pound tippet. It's said that salmon are born orphans and die childless.

And that is a true fact, and I'd like to think this great fish (the largest Chinook salmon I've landed on a fly rod) graced my life and died in an honorable fight rather than succumbing to the wasting-away process that befalls all salmon. He blessed my life with his presence and his strength, and that memory will live with me until my death.

Three big brook trout from Algonquin Provincial Park

One last topic concerns a trip to Ontario's Algonquin Provincial Park for brook trout. My wife Kay and I hiked into a sparkling little lake as I carried a canoe on my shoulders. We began a slow tour along the first dropoff out from shore, and cast copper-color Devle Dogs toward shore.

Kay hooked the first brook trout on one of those Eppinger spoons, and it fought a stubborn battle on six-pound line, and I eventually netted a 5 1/2-pound lake brookie. It had broad shoulders abd within five minutes she caught another fish of about the same size.

Two hours later we pulled up to a big boulder along shore, and got out of the canoe to stretch our legs. My third cast produced a jarring strike, and a few minutes later I eased a five-pound brook ashore.

We fished the rest of the day without a strike but the size of those three brook trout have seldom been equaled elsewhere. It produced wonderful memories we'll both remember for many years.

Uncommon Fishing Experiences ((tag: Dave Richey, Michigan, Outdoors, brook trout, canoe, Chinook salmon, Devle Dogs, FlatFish, fly fishing, trolling))

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