NWC day one (long)

Late last summer we bought a cottage in the Rhinelander area so I got to spend my vacation week in early August fishing Mohawksin. I found a couple of patterns and was catching a couple of keepers every morning so I felt pretty good. The best thing was that they had a Dairy Queen on the water so my son came out with me every day with the promise that we would stop for ice cream. He didn't fish much but at least it was a start. I got a little concerned when I read Steve's reports about the numbers and size of the fish that he and Gil were catching as I wasn't on them that good. Thursday after work I made the 2 hour drive and got to meet up with everyone for supper. There were some new faces I hadn't seen the previous 2 years and some familiar one's as well. People were saying the bite had slowed but everyone was excited and ready to go. They had more boaters than non-boaters so I would be fishing alone on Friday.

Once on the water Friday I started with the pattern that had worked the best for me which was running crankbaits through shallow weed beds. I caught some short smallmouths and pike but couldn't find the fish I had in practice. Finally late in the morning I got 1 14 inch keeper. Early afternoon I moved up river to another weed bed and had a good hit. As I was bringing it in I could see that it was a nice sized pike. Once it was in the boat I reached down to remove the crankbait like I had done many times that morning but the fish started thrashing and I felt a pain in my right index finger. Looking down I saw one of the trebble hooks in the fish and one in me. The fish kept thrashing and everytime it did the pain increased. Finally I got my knee on the pike and stopped it from moving. Grabbing a needle nose I finally got the hook out the pike's mouth and threw it overboard. Now I had time to look at my situation. In all the years that I have fished I have never hooked myself but the hook was buried deep in my finger. I cut the line and tried to pull it out but it was too painful. So I sat in the bottom of my boat looking at this crankbait sticking in my hand and tried to think about what my options were. About that time my cell phone rang. When I answered it I got a computized message that said "this is an alert, your house is on fire. Please call the fire department, your house is on fire." Totally confused I finally heard my wife's voice yell "just ignore this, they are working on our temperature monitoring system. We have a system in our cottage to tell us if the furnace stops so we can do something before the pipes freeze. Apparently it will also tell us if the cottage is on fire.

Now I could think about my situation again. I decided to wait and talk to Steve or Gil. Since they are guides I thought that they might have removed hooks from clients before. I picked up a rod and tried to cast but it was too painful with the crankbait in my hand. I still had 2 hours to go in the tournament and didn't want to just sit at the boat landing. I picked up a spinning rod with a tube jig attached and tried pitching. That didn't hurt too badly so I decided I would find shorelines with overhanging brush and pitch to them. I did that for the next hour and it seemed to be OK other than no fish. Finally I pitched the tube into a fallen tree and had a solid hit. I set the hook and out shot a nice muskie. I fought it for a while on that spinning rod which was fun but then started to think about how I was going to get it into the boat. I couldn't use my right hand and the only net I had was a small rubberized one for bass. I decided I would try and get it in the net anyway. After several attempts with the muskie just flopping out of it, the fish somehow bent just right and went in. I lifted the net in the boat, dropped the muskie in the live well and cut the line. I wasn't going to try and handle it with the lure in my hand. At the landing I asked Steve if he had removed hooks before and he said "yes, but you won't like it." I just wanted it out of me at that point as I couldn't imagine spending the rest of my life with a lure hanging from my hand. Steve cut the treble hook of the lure and then as I looked the other way and grit my teeth he pulled it out. It didn't feel good but it wasn't nearly as bad as when the pike was thrashing around. Steve then took my muskie out of the livewell and measured it. At 36 inches I had the lead for the non-bass category.

At the weight-in only 5 fish were brought in with Kevin in the lead with 2 fish. Mine was the smallest so I was in 4th place after day one but still in the running as was everyone. My family was there for the weight-in and missed seeing the muskie as I had already released it but got to see everyone's bass. My wife came along with me to Al Gens for the Friday night supper and everyone made her feel welcome. Steve told us stories about Africa and other adventures that he has been on. The food was great as always and people talked about the day's events. At the drawing for Saturday I drew Brandon and we made plans to meet at the boat landing. On the way home my wife wished me good luck for the next day but I was a little discouraged about the fishing. I told her I had tried every pattern and spot out there that I knew about and with just the one fish I didn't know why it would be different on Saturday. Another front was passing through and the weather had been unstable. Being a Christian I went home and prayed and asked God if he would put fish in the boat for me on Saturday as I wasn't capable of doing it alone. Little did I know how that would turn out. I'll type out day 2 tomorrow.

Gary

I usually grab any fish that has hooks sticking out by the hook with a pair of pliers. I never want that to happen...unless it happens to Dave, then it's just funny

Great Job Gary!

Hold on a sec... The NWC was held on a lake that had a Dairy Queen "on the water"??? Dang, if Steve would have mentioned that...I'd been up there in a Hollywood minute!

-- Dwayne E. Cooper, Atty at Law Indianapolis, IN Email: dwayne@cooperlegalservices.com Web Page: http://www.cooperlegalservices.com Personal Fishing Web Page: http://www.hoosierwebsites.com/OnTheWater Dog Fishing: http://www.hoosierwebsites.com/onthewater/fishing040.htm 1st Annual ROFB Classic Winner

Did the dairy queen also sell powerbait?

Missed????????? I'm still missing it

;-(