Jack O'Malley Interview w/ Dave Richey
Check the lake's contours and structure before fishing.
The channel had 11-12 feet of water near Portage Lake but the water got shallower the closer we came to Lake Michigan. A guy in a big boat came churning into the channel, coming directly at us, and we moved to avoid him, and was almost herded into the rip-rap along the pier. The idiot finally spotted us, moved over to the other side of the channel where he belonged.
"There doesn't seem to be any cover in the channel," I said. "Let's go back into the lake again and move south along the shoreline." We both wanted to try the lake, and had no great expectations, but hoped to come back in the fall and perhaps catch a few salmon. We left the channel, entered Portage Lake again, and headed south. R.J. had on a Vampire Rapapa, and I had on a small Shad Rap, and that allowed us to cover two different depths while moving at a slow troll. The boat was just 200 yards from the channel when his rod started bucking, and it pulled the in-line planer board directly behind the boat. There was a healthy splash behind the planer board, and gradually he worked the board close enough for me to release the line. "I think it's a pike," he said, with no proof except a gut feeling. We'd been working the edge of a weed bed, when the strike occurred. Two minutes later the fish rolled to the surface and he was right. "I've caught lots of pike and they have a particular sR. J. Doyle with a new brown trout from a new lake.
We soon discovered a strip of deeper water down the middle of the lake with weeds on both side, and soon I brought a undersize northern pike to the boat and released him. We sparred with dozens of rock bass, with a fish or two about eight inches long although the others were much smaller. All were quickly released.
We started to troll the edge of another weedbed not far from the boat launch ramp, and R.J. had let out his lure on a long line, attached the line to the in-line planer board and was running it out to the side, when he had another strike. We both heard the line peel off the reel, and he was on the rod with great speed. A deep bend in his rod, and more line ripped off the reel. We both looked up at the same time, and watched a silvery fish bounce into the air, smash back into the lake, and rip off on another short run.A guessing game for a moment.
"Brown trout or steelhead?" he asked. The fish was 50 yards away, and as I thought about it, the fish went into the air again. This time it was a bit closer to the boat, and although it was a chrome-colored fish, we both said "brown trout" at the same time.
He fought the fish well, and soon I unhooked the planer board from the line, and the fish was still a good distance away. He headed off onto another run, wallowed on the surface, and with painstaking care, Doyle worked the fish to the net where I scooped it up. "He's about eight pounds," Doyle said. "Look at how silver and pretty he is. He may have planned to summer here in the lake, turn a golden brown, before spawning during the fall." The sky clouded up several times, and each time the potential rain fell inland from us. And then the sun would come out. And we worked a shoreline dropoff hard without a single strike. It seemed all of the fish were weed-related on this day.We had a varied catch of brown trout, perch, pike and rock bass.
We hooked another fish we thought was another brown, but it was on and off, just that quick. Another pike was landed, another dozen or so rock bass were boated and released, and one yellow perch was caught.
The lesson here is to spend some time mapping out a lake before fishing. Look for sharp dropoffs, sand bars, shallow flats, weed-lined channels, and other structure that should hold fish. It had been over 30 years for me since I'd fished Portage Lake, and I guess we did a pretty good job of figuring out where to find fish. If only all lakes were this easy.
