It's been incredibly busy here at the ukey estate, but last night I finally got out fishing. It was a cloudy, very warm, humid night. There was no moonlight when I hit the water at 10:30PM. The battery that I had charged a week earlier wouldn't turn the prop on the electric motor but undaunted, I said to myself, "there was a time when humans used oars to propel a fishing boat," so row I did. Not having been out on the pond this year I had no idea of weed growth other than the 100 foot circle off of my yard, so I rowed down the lake to a strip of hard bottom that I know of, where the weedline ends at the spot that the bottom hardens up every year. The light south breeze would drift the boat parallel to the strip and maybe I would get lucky. Once I stopped rowing and began to drift I could hear bluegills kissing the surface and the occasional splash of something larger breaking the surface, I knew then that the night would be a good one, everything in the pond was active. One about my tenth cast with a black Valentine Lures Water Buffalo Spinnerbait, I got hit hard. Stopped the bait cold and I had a load of fun as my first boat fish of the year was landed weighing in the area of 3 and a half pounds. He had given a nice account of himself with some strong runs and two decent jumps. Best of all he crushed the spinnerbait when he hit it, I just love that solid hammer of a strike! He was hooked well and I tried to get a picture of the fish with my Blackberry. As I said it was an incredibly dark night and when I pushed the camera button on the phone I found out that the Brilliant LED flash was pointing directly into my eyes! Goodbye night vision. I took two pictures after that but it looks like a whitish thing on a very black background! I finally got the fish unhooked, a tough chore for a newly blind man when the fish has both the spinnerbait hook and the trailer hook in the hinges. That took a while and the breeze had pushed the boat on top of the hard bottom strip and out of the wind. It was then that I found out that the salt marsh mosquitos had just hatched and had blown up the tidal river to the pond in great numbers and appearantly I was the first piece of fresh meat they had seen. As I worked at unhooking the fish and defending myself from the attacking swarms while being temporarily blinded, I proceeded to swat the left lens out of my glasses onto the floor of the boat at the same time the boat bounced into the dock spooking at least five large fish that were under it in the shallows!! At this time I decided that the worst issue was the blood sucking flying bastages so I rowed back out to the wind and that solved that problem. I used my light to help get the hooks out, released the fish and then hunted down the eyeglass lens and put it back into the frame. It was covered in bass slime but hey now I at least had some depth perception!! I finally got back on my drift and took a few more casts with the spinnerbait. I switched to a 5/8 jitterbug and had a fish miss , and then I had a second miss, I let the bug sit for a few and when I cranked the reel to move the bug he was all over it! A little guy, around 14" and he fought like limp dish rag. I could still here fish busting in the bushes so I stayed on the drift even though it was past where I usually have action. Suddenly the lake was bathed in a flash of light so bright it was like daylight!! The biggest flash of lightning ever!, Wow, where did that come from? Well a few seconds later another not as big but two is enough for me. I don't like sitting in a metal boat on a lake waving a piece of graphite in the air so off I row for home like a man possessed! Since I have been blinded by the lightning I go past my house the first time and have to double back to get the boat in. Home at last, Shortly under an hour from when I started, but I had action and some giggles when it was over. Gotta love that first trip of the year! Hopefully there will be many more!
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Frank : Bassin' USA Prostaff : New York
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