I’m Tired, a Quacky Fish Story.

I’m Tired, a Quacky Fish Story.

by:  Mark Schram

Every fishing trip is an adventure, especially the first voyage in the boat each year.  My 2011 maiden voyage in mid March was no exception.

After hastily reassembling my fishing machine on Friday night, one of my good friends, Greg Grandinetti of Grafton, Wisconsin, joined me for a trip to the Upper Fox River in De Pere, Wi.

Our original plan was to arrive around 3 am on Saturday to hammer the walleyes prior to day break.  The best laid plans were scratched as the De Pere dam was opened earlier in the day, allowing the melting snow to change the water clarity from gin clear to chocolate milk.  No need to arrive early now, so we launched at about 9 am.

The boat launch went well; however, the parking did not.  Although I had paid my launch fees there were absolutely zero parking spots and zero boats waiting to come off of the water.  The warmer weather had brought out approximately 250 boats in this stretch of the river, and we were the late arrivers.  After I found a location which I could leave the truck and trailer (with hopes of not being towed), I made the quick three block jog back to the dock, where Greg had the boat fired up and ready to fly.

My prescouting locations were full of boats, and offered us no opportunity to work my game plan.  Initially, we worked the shallow areas of the river bed which produced only one swing and a miss between the two of us.    We quickly transitioned to the mid level depths to find active fish.  Our locator was full of fish marks, and we were fairly certain that a school of walleyes was just below.  We worked the school with no luck, changing our presentations several times in an attempt to find the right formula.  We yanked the anchor and decided to drift the edge of the deep water.

About a minute later, wham…..I had hooked into something solid.  As I reeled the line in, I comment to Greg how this just felt like “dead weight.”   He grabbed the net, not sure as to what I had going on.  In De Pere, when a net is flashed, it is an automatic center of attention.  A held net is similar to a naked supermodel standing on the bow of the boat sing the national anthem….people are going to take notice.  With water visibility limited to less than two inches, I reached the end of the line and raised the prize……a dead and decaying duck.  Greg wisely asked, “Should I net it?”  In the meantime, laughter can be heard coming from the surrounding boats as we explain our unique catch.  My 2011 season has now started.

Greg and I made several more passes along the transitional zones, and I made another bait change.  Greg looked at me like I was a mad man as I assembled a green 3/8 ounce Fuzzy Grub, with a pretty green glitter tail, tipped with a 4” Berkley Gulp minnow and a live fat head minnow.  I figured no fish could miss this huge presentation in the heavily stained water.  My Loomis rod was equipped with Berkley Fireline for strength and sensitivity.  The other rod had a small thumper jig spooled with mono looking for smaller fish.  With a rod in each hand (working the jigs vertically) the Loomis rod just about flew out of my hand when a fish hammered the oversized presentation.  It caught me so off guard when the rod lunged forward that the fireline actually wrapped around the open face reel, making it impossible to reel.  Quickly I dropped the tip of the rod into the water and moved forward in the boat to work on the tangle.  As soon as the line released from around the reel the fish ripped off about 10 yards of line making the drag scream.  The fish changed sides of the boat, and I chased the fish around behind the Mercury motor and then around to the other side of the boat.  Greg, caught up in the moment, was watching the events unfold, as he blindly searched for the net.

My biggest fear arose.  This better not be a catfish, carp or white fish.  A quick flash of the fish’s body near the surface gave me hope that this was a good sized walleye.   Greg worked the net perfectly to handle the big walleye into the boat.  Once measured, she registered just a hair under 27 inches and 8 plus pounds.  With a few quick pictures, she was released to the wild to take care of her intended business.  Greg and I shared a few high fives and went back to fishing.

A period of time passed and Greg boated a wonderful stick (I would call it maple), and a small Catfish.  He had gotten the skunk out of the box for the year also, and that put a smile on his face.  But not as big as the one he would have in the next few moments.

Greg was releasing his catfish when I hooked into something big.  At first I thought it was a snag, except there was some movement while bringing the line up from the depths.  The feel was very different than the last walleye, so we quickly eliminated that scenario.  I had never felt anything like this before.  Cautiously I worked the line in not to break the eight pound monofilament line on this reel.  I stared into the water as the object rose out of the murky depths.  What the heck….It’s not a fish, it’s not a piece of wood…..It’s a tractor tire inner tube?  And there it was-- the legendary tire.  The one depicted in thousands of cartoons for the past fifty years.  I finally had achieved tire nirvana.  So does tire taste like chicken?

We ended the day with what I will call a five species day.  A tire, a catfish, a piece of wood, a near trophy class walleye and a duck.  Regardless of the result, I was in my boat fishing with a very good friend, who will never let me forgot the day we just had.  To me, that is priceless.