Michigan 2013 - "The Catch"

Each year the fishing in Michigan is different for different reasons. The weather: it's hot, it's cold, it's windy, it's sunny, it's overcast, it's rainy, or it's stormy. This year the ice did not melt until a week and a half before our trip. The weed growth was delayed. The spawning had not taken place. The frogs had not mated. The dragonflies were nowhere to be seen. There were no little fry looking for places to hide. We didn't catch a single fish off the pier. We didn't see and fish swimming around the pier. We caught little in the channel. We caught no perch, bluegills, or crappie. We caught only one rock bass. Three of us fished for two hours and caught nothing. There were not even many taps or follows.

 

With these difficulties, we tried to find the pattern. Every night Tommy would bring in his ten rods and he would select new lures for the next day. Lures that worked in the past did not work this year; stick baits that were always so productive caught NOTHING this year. So we tried surface lures, swim baits, and jigs tipped with plastics. No pattern emerged.

 

We decided to try the islands on Thousand Island Lake. It was getting late. Tommy tried slowly retrieving a perch colored number 7 Rapala tail dancer. He bounced it off the bottom. He paused when he hit an obstruction. The lure floated free and Tommy felt the fish. He lowered the rod and took up the slack. He pulled hard on the rod and set the hook. This was  at 7:45 p.m. when a thirty inch walleye took his bait. He reeled and could feel its weight. I could see the rod bent with the tip almost in the water. Tommy got it to the surface and his heart was pounding. He didn't want to lose the trophy fish. Tommy asked for a net. We were both calm.

 

I got the big fish in the net, but she flopped out. I tried to get her a second time and I kept her head in the net. We had her in the boat.

 

Adam got his camera and he pushed me out the way saying, "I've got to get in there." We were all excited. We were all happy. We were all glad for Tommy. It was the largest walleye any of us ever caught in over forty years of fishing. Tommy deserved this magnificent fish. This picture will be hanging on the wall in his office with the actual lure hanging down off the wooden frame.

 

 30" walleye are believed to be about 20 years old. Walleye are thought, at the most,  to live 26 years. The largest walleyes are female. Tommy's catch was probably a pre-spawn female due to the unseasonably late ice out. I predicted we would catch large walleyes. But I thought it would be me catching them with jigs, deep divers, and snap much for that.

 

We looked in town at several tackle stores for tail dancers. None of the stores up here sold them. We'll get more next year.