Red Ear’s, Bluegills, and White Hot Anger

Red Ear’s, Bluegills, and White Hot Anger

 

            There is a certain time in the spring that the red ear (shell crackers) go on beds and it is right about the same time the bluegill do the same. It is the first or last full moon of the first or last week in May or April…I really don’t keep track of when exactly this natural phenomenon happens, I just wait for dad to say, “Shell crackers are on bed.” Then I know to buy a couple tubs of worms, a tube of crickets, and plenty of Vienna Sausages and Mountain Dew to last us a day on the lake. For you readers who have no idea what I am talking about right now, I am talking about fishin’.

The best, most fast paced, adrenalin pumping, fishin’ on the face of the planet!

Well, not really. It is pretty laid back, a cork in the water, a worm drowns, and a minute later your bobber goes under and you will have the prettiest pan fish you have ever laid eyes on, not to mention the best eatin’. So anyway, a few years ago, in-between my deployments to Iraq, dad said the magic words.

“Shell crackers are on bed.”

            So, we loaded up the boat, along with all the gear and goodies and headed out to Crane Lake. We always go to Crane Lake to do our shell cracker fishin’ cause we know where all the beds are so it saves us time and gets us right into the thick of the heart racing action that is panfishin’. That day we were pulling them in the boat as fast as we could get our worms wet. Every time we lifted one of these little titans into the boat, we would lift the metal fish basket out of the water and place the unlucky booger in with the rest of his family that we had already imprisoned. By midday, the basket was nearly full and we still had plenty of bait. The problem with catching so many fish is that you have to clean so many fish, but this thought did not bother us because it was turning out to be one of the best fishing trips we had been on in a long time.

Then it happened.

            The problem with finding a honey hole of a fishing spot is that some dipstick is going to see you catching those fish and want his piece of the pie. Normally, I am a nice guy and will make an effort to give the guy a little room to fish where they are hitting. Not today though. But it wasn’t because I was hording them all for myself, no, it was because these two dim-wits parked their dad gummed boat right over the top of the fish beds!

“Hey! What the crap is a matter with you!?” I hollered and dad started laughing. I looked at him and said, “Do you see what those idiots did!”

“Yep. Wasn’t very sportsman like.”

            I started digging around in my tackle box; I needed ammo to defend my Garden of Eden from these evil fish thieves.

“Whatcha doing?” Dad asked smiling even though I knew that he knew what I was doing.

            I started crimping on every lead sinker I could get my hands on to my fishing line. Dad started laughing again. With nearly 50 lbs of lead now securely attached to my 8 lb test line, I launched my assault. I casted in the direction of their aluminum boat; the rig sailed like a projectile launched from a cannon and collided with the side of their boat with a crack that could have doubled for a gun shot. Not to mention, my plastic bobber exploded sending plastic shrapnel in all directions. The two dummies ducked their heads down and started hollering at me. I don’t know what they were saying but I think it was something along the lines that I wouldn’t do that again. So I did and got the same result. Though this time they must have assumed that the next cast was going to hit them so they tucked tail and paddled to another cove. Me and dad laughed and did not catch another fish out of that stinking hole of water. Apparently, shell cracker and bluegills do not like the loud noises of combat and we were forced to find a new spot if we were going to catch any more fish.

Laughing we decided to cut across the lake and try some of the coves on the other side. While heading across I hear dad say, “Uh oh.”

I said, “Uh oh what?”

“Where’s the fish basket at?” He said.

            We couldn’t help but laugh. Everyone one of those fish that we had caught was now trapped in a metal basket somewhere thirty feet at the bottom of the lake. Dad started laughing and said, “Boy, who taught you tie a knot?”

“Wo wo, hold on now, you tied that knot!” I said, we both started laughing.

Dad smiled and said, “Well, we don’t have to worry about cleaning all those fish now.”

We didn’t come home with a mess of fish after all but it still was a good day fishin’ which beats a good day at work.