"Look at the parked cars!" muttered Joe. "If we've fallen for 

 a tall story, we've got plenty of company." 



Two hours and 35 minutes later they were back at the dock 

 with their daily limit of walleyes five each ranging up to 5 

 pounds. 



Por nearly half a century impatient anglers have used the 

 automobile to get to favored spots on the Great Lakes where 

 sports fishing is famous. But vast reaches of these inland seas 

 are still a neglected sports paradise, as the stampede to the 

 Bays de Noc in recent years has proved. Until 1946 almost no 

 one had tried to take walleyes there by hook and line. Then 

 local lads began trolling and coming in with their limits in no 

 time at all. The story got around, and last May, when the season 

 opened, cars were on the scene from southern Ohio and western 

 Nebraska. 



Early-season luck is the best here, and until late June the fish 

 are schooled on shoals. During July they go to deeper water and 

 are harder to locate. As summer wanes, however, yields pick up 

 again. 



Biologists are naturally interested in such an eruption of a 

 species. The peak 1950 year was apparently the result of excep- 

 tional spawning conditions in 1945. 



There was some decline in 1951, but many undersized walleyes 

 were observed recently, indicating another preponderant year 

 class developing. These are expected to show up in anglers' 

 catches during the next few following years. 



But the above is only one brief chapter in the story I'm trying 

 to tell. How excellent smallmouth bass grounds turned up under 

 my own nose will drive home the theme of this piece. Most of 

 my life has been spent within sight and sound of Grand Traverse 

 Bay, an indentation of Lake Michigan. We've taken Mackinaw 

 trout regularly; we've had excellent perch and cisco fishing; but 

 none of us dreamed we had bass until some lads, trying shoaler- 

 than-usual water for trout, accidentally boated a brace of lunkers 

 one summer afternoon five years ago. We at once gave the vicin- 

 ity a combing and found smallmouth fishing of a quality to 

 take away your breath. 



15 



