My Big Fish Story

     Fishing in the mountain lakes and rivers of Plumas County is a popular form of recreation, but I’ve only been fishing once since we moved here.  I guess I’m all fished out.

            When I was a boy, my father took my brother and me fishing regularly in Monterey.  He had a favorite boat captain named “Sam,” who had a couple of fishing boats and guaranteed a good catch.  He always kept his promise and I remember coming home with gunny sacks full of fish.

            Much later, I would go fishing most weekends with two buddies who owned a fishing boat in Santa Cruz.  It was an old diesel thumper that required ether to start the engine.  Combined with the smell of diesel fuel, I was always on the verge of sea-sickness before we left the harbor. Despite the woozy feeling, I never got sick, no matter how rough the sea.  Never - except once.

            That “once” was during a particularly rough sea on a foggy morning.  When you can’t see the horizon, you become more vulnerable to getting sick and turning green.  I actually saw a guy turn green once.  I don’t know if I was green that day, but I spent a significant amount of time hanging on the boat railing straining to see a horizon line.  I was on the verge of losing it.

            Some of my “good buddies” are very skilled at pranks.  As I was struggling to keep my breakfast down, I got a tap on my shoulder.  The late Glen Dennee, a friend since high school, was a foot from me when I turned around.  He was grinning with a slimy squid hanging and dripping from his mouth.

            I have a fairly well developed diaphragm from playing the trumpet most of my life.  When I spun back toward the ocean and let loose, I swear I sent everything I had eaten since my tenth birthday party straight at Japan.  And I mean “straight.”  The trajectory defied gravity and shot in a straight line as far as the eye could see. I felt a sense of pride at my power. It was like hitting a high C on my trumpet.

            More recently, I did some halibut fishing in Alaska.  Reeling in a large halibut is like pulling a minivan up a hill. But the largest fish I have ever seen was right off the deck of our previous home in Discovery Bay.  Right in my own back yard. 

            We had decking that extended out over the water and you could fish right off our deck.  I was working on the deck railing when I heard a commotion by my dock.  When I looked, I saw two ducks under the boat lift and one seemed to be very agitated.  I thought he was just in love until I suddenly saw a monster fish come out of the water in an arc and take that full-grown duck in one swallow.

            That would require a huge mouth.  I was startled at the length of that fish.  It was six to eight feet long with a head over a foot across.  Hitting Japan with an abdominal purge may have been slightly hyperbolic, but this description is accurate.  The fish I saw was even bigger than the one in the photo below.

            At the time of this incident, I was writing a weekly column for the newspaper and asked my readers if anyone in the delta area had ever seen a fish that size.  I was amazed to get reports of other sightings that confirmed what I saw.  It was a relief to realize I wasn’t delusional. 

            I don't know where the fish in the photo was caught, but you never know what lurks below the surface - even in the delta.  Well that’s my fish story for today.  Some of you may have even better stories.