Tragic Fishing Moments 



we had chosen the smallest we could get, one-half 

 ounce ones, with the fewest possible hooks. Ignorant 

 as we were of the baits to use, and having yet to see 

 our first bass or pike, we really could cast very well, 

 as our streams, choked as they are with drifts and 

 overhanging trees, make accurate casting a necessity. 



Rowing out to the first stretch of rushes, we com- 

 menced casting. My husband had the first strike 

 a good sized fish that grabbed his underwater plug 

 and argued much as do the catfish at home. At last 

 he was landed and the wrecked plug removed. He 

 had us puzzled, as we had never seen a picture of 

 anything like this. About five pounds, a long even 

 ruffle of a fin, and such odd eyes. Later we learned 

 this was a dog fish. My first strike was a beautiful 

 walleye, caught on a porkrind. From then on the 

 strikes came often enough to keep us alert and excited, 

 and they were putting up good fights; still we could 

 not see that a walleyed pike, or a pickerel, was a bit 

 harder to handle than a channel cat of the same size. 

 There were no bass as yet. Both of us were using 

 underwater lures. It seemed so foolish to try to fish 

 on the surface. Yet we had come several hundred 

 miles to try out those freakish little plugs, so reluct- 

 antly I laid my underwater aside and put on a little 

 dark brown surface lure. 



Carefully I cast, trying to remember just how the 

 directions read. Some place I had read that the plug 



16 



