Photo of the Day: Fishermen on East Bay (and a Few Johnson Family Fishing Memories)

You know that Spring has arrived when the fishing boats show up on East Bay. Such was the case yesterday when we spotted a couple of boats in East Bay off The Bluffs on Bluff Road.

And they didn’t even have to wait for the ice to thaw out, since we really didn’t get much ice on the bay this winter. Or in the case of most fishing devotees around here, they didn’t have to wait to drag their ice shanties off the bay so they could get their boats out.

In fact, as I see by the calendar, it actually IS Spring now. The first official day of Spring is today, March 20, 2021. Happy Spring! Now we just have to wait for Bardon’s to open, and then everything will be fine.

We spotted two boats on our way to town yesterday, so we pulled off by the Eagle’s Landing pavilion, where I snapped a few photos looking north. As luck would have it, a truck was sitting there, and it turned out to be Mike Warren’s son, who said they’re likely fishing for perch.

I told him that piece of information would go into the Gazette, since even though I grew up on East Bay, we weren’t really fishing people, and to this day, I have no idea what people fish for and when.

Sometimes Dad would take us out to the drop-off in front of our house in Old Mission in our little fiberglass boat. When you got back to shore and got out of it, you’d itch like heck.

There were a few fishing poles around the garage, but being the youngest kid, I always ended up with one of those little flat pieces of wood with grooves in the ends where you’d wrap the fishing line around it. When we got to the drop-off, I’d drop the line into the water and wait for something to happen. I don’t recall that it ever did.

We also had some crab cages that we’d sink into the water in front of the house. I remember catching crabs in there, but have no idea what we ever did with them. I think it was just the fun of catching them, and after watching them crawl around for a while, we likely just threw them back into the bay.

We also had these big long spears in the garage, and sometimes my brothers would try to spear the carp that swam around in the tall reeds in front of the house. I don’t recall a lot of carp being speared, but I do remember one time when one of the brothers accidentally speared his leg. I won’t say which brother, but it was Ward. Oh, the power of having your own newspaper. 🙂

Anyway, that was about the extent of our fishing excursions in the Johnson family. There was always too much farm work to do!

Here’s another photo from yesterday. This one has both of the boats in it…