If you want a good life reflecting moment, clean-out your tackle box.
It seems every lure had a memory attached to it as I inspected each hook and eye for rust and damage. One in particular caught my attention buried in the ‘nether’ regions of my box.
It was yellow, with black and red dots scattered over it. It had 4 treble hooks coated in rust and dried lake ‘goo’. I had to reflect a moment on a time where this yellow flat-fish was the best and most sacred lure I ever had.
I am not sure why we headed to that spot first, but the canoe my cousin and I were paddling just took us to where we were going – as if by fate. We had been paddling for 20 minutes and I think we were to anxious to fish to paddle any longer. We ended up in a place we called “the corner”. Two shorelines met in almost a perfect corner. It was laced with weeds and water-lilies. It just ‘felt’ right. I managed to drop a small anchor over the side of the canoe to hold us in this flight plan. We quickly assembled our rods and then it came to the time where we had to pick the right lure for the first cast.
That simple decision can be so intense sometimes. Almost super-natural, ritualistic…agonizing! For some reason the first lure that caught my eye at that moment was the yellow lure I described earlier. My ‘fish-sense’ was tingling. In this case it was not a good thing. I remember saying to myself (silently), “I think that’s for Lake Trout.”
Yet despite my own objections I tied it on anyway. I spied ahead of us a large stump head that angled almost 90 degrees below the surface. My ‘fish-senses’ tingled again with some words my father said.
“Fish like structure. Something different in their environment.”
In agreement with my thoughts, I launched that lake-trout lure towards the stump. Suddenly, everything went slow motion.
The hiss of my line leaving the spool.
The slight splash the lure made on the surface.
The click of my bail.
One crank. Two cranks. WHAM! A large smallie (smallmouth bass) inhaled the lure and the fight began. The acrobatics were incredible! The sound of drag whining brought warmth to the soul. Fortunately, we were able to net that bass. The excitement in my eyes and the gleam in my cousin’s eye was priceless! It was all I could do carefully take the hooks out of the bass so that I could get back at it. My cousin quickly put on one of his yellow flatfish lures. Whammo! He reeled in a beauty. We were only there for 1 hour and we hauled in more bass that I have yet to beat.
We visited the stump several times that summer and always brought one in with the flatfish.
One morning a change in water-height silently stole our stump away. It has not been the same since. Except the time I used a green flatfish and hauled in a MONSTER pike…but that is a different story.
The lesson here: Be prepared to try the unconventional in your favorite fishing hole.
-Bill Anderson
Muskoka Outdoors
