The one that should have gotten away.

[sporting-gent]

Every year like clock work the sturgeon make their migration up stream to spawn and most years around February we try to head them off on a charter boat in San Pablo bay. We muster a salty crew of weekend fishermen and meet at the launch with high expectations and a cooler full of beer and snack food. On a good trip we may bring in eight or nine keepers on a boat of twenty-five anglers. The size limit is forty-eight to seventy-two inches so a keeper will weigh in excess of thirty-five pounds and as much as a hundred. Even though the odds aren't great that an individual might land a keeper, we always treat the trip as a team effort and split the take at the end of the trip. I have been on many trips were I laughed and cheered for the other guy as he landed a nice keeper sturgeon and at the end of the day came home with a nice sized chunk of fish and an empty feeling in the pit of my stomach. After eight plus years of such trips I had yet to land a keeper.

A few years back we were on such a trip. We had been fishing for several hours and a few fish had been landed but I was still patiently waiting my turn. I was positioned at the bow of the boat watching my line intently. The problem was the current. A sturgeon bite is little more than a slow pumping action and can be very difficult to detect. The boat swinging to and fro on the anchor causes the line to tighten and slack and drag along the bottom making the bite even more difficult to detect. Add to that the likelihood of getting bit is fairly small in the first place which leads inevitably to the fact that one has a tendency to loose focus.

So there I was sitting on the bow, beer in hand, watching the boat swing, completely de-focused. Then about hundred or so feet in front of the boat I saw a nice sturgeon rolling on the surface. It is not uncommon to see these giants roll and even leap from the water but is always an awesome spectacle. I pointed out to one of the other fisherman on the boat the location of the roll but by then the fish had disappeared beneath the surface. Then a few moments later it happened again. I pointed again but the fish had once more disappeared. We watched intently at the location for several minute to see if the fish would repeat his roll and he did. Finally I had witnesses. The captain of the ship notices our intensity and came forward to see what was going on. I explained that we had been watching our quarry toying with us in the distance and pointed to the location. With in moments the fish rolled again and the captain let out a fearsome cry. "He is on your line" he shouted. I hesitated in disbelief for a moment and then reached for my rod and began to real frantically. The fish had been working his way toward the boat and rolling to try and free himself from the hook and I had thirty or forty feet of slack line accumulated. I feared at that moment the likelihood of catching this fish was miniscule. Then the line grew tight and rod bent under the strain. I gave the rod a few twitches as if that would some how help to secure the fish to the hook after all that.

Sturgeons are hard fighting and it took some time to land the fish. I had to follow and circle the boat several times to get the fish into position for the landing. All the while the captain and deck hand shouting orders and insisting I lean more over the edge of the boat as not to let the line get cut or the fish get loose. At time I felt as though I might fall over but eventually the fish tired and I eased him into the net.

The fight over and the fish landed the sentiment on the boat quickly turned from support to ridicule. There were comments about my ability to tell the difference between tidal action and a fifty pound fish. Some one commented sarcastically on the new top water techniques for sturgeon and, I think, there may have been disparaging comments about my lineage. All of these things were lost on me as I basked in the glow of my victory, and besides that's just the way we men show our affection. By the end of the day there were several keepers on the boat and I laughed and cheered and went home with a big chunk of fish and a nice warm feeling in my stomach knowing that I had been successful even though this is the one that should have gotten away.

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"It has always been my private conviction that any man who pits his intelligence against a fish and loses has it coming". ~John Steinbeck

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[allingeneral]

What a nice story. Your signature's not too bad either!

[DeathMitten]

So you had your very own "old man and the sea" moment there.

Fish may not be very smart, but they're often very tenacious - possibly because they're not very smart.

A man who pits his intelligence against a fish and loses may have it coming, but one that pits his tenacity against a fish and wins is worthy of my respect.

I tip my hat to you good sir.