For the past month, my regular fishing partner, Don Hettrick, and I have been having a ball, fishing from his boat at Lahontan Reservoir on Thursdays.
We have a set routine worked out for each of those Thursdays: Don H provides the boat, Don Q provides the snacks, lunches and drinks, he picks me up at my home at 6-6:30 a.m., Don H and I tell each other all kinds of lies and stories while driving to the reservoir (the inbound bumper-to-bumper traffic to Carson City at that hour of the day is absolutely incredible!), we launch his boat at the Nevada State Park boat ramp located just off U.S. 50, Don H quickly takes us to our favorite trolling spot, we rig up our fishing poles with small flasher blades and lures, Don H and Don Q tell each other all kinds of lies and stories while catching and releasing an unbelievable number of White Bass, we quit for the day at about noon-1 p.m. (when the wind begins to come up) and return to Carson City (we tell each other all kinds of lies and stories on the trip home) and Don H drops me off at my house.
Last Thursday was no exception to our routine, except for the very end of the day (more on that later!).
When we arrived at the boat ramp, we met Rich Bachle of Fernley and his grandson, Rich, who would spend the morning fishing in Rich's boat, near us.
On our boat, we were joined by John Holloway of Carson City, a longtime friend and fishing partner of Don H and Bachle.
Both boats quickly sped over to our regular fishing location.
Once there, we rigged up with small flasher blades, a small lure, let our lines out, began to troll and Bam! White Bass hit the lures.
The bass would be brought up to the side of the boat and released.
This process was repeated, time after time. How was the fishing?
Well, in the first 45 minutes of trolling, I caught and released 43 White Bass! Yep! 43 in 45 minutes!
On several occasions, a Bass hit my lure just as it entered the water, before I could even let the line out.
The catching and releasing was virtually non-stop for everyone on both boats.
On a number of occasions on our boat, we would have a "Triple Hook Up," with all three fishermen catching a fish, all at the same time.
I stopped counting my Bass at 80 caught and released, and then began to change lures to see if I could find one they would NOT hit.
I tried three different colored Kastmasters, three Roostertails, two TOR-P-DO's, two Apexs, two Thomas Buoyants, two Rapalas, a Super Duper, a rubber minnow and even a Spin-N-Go from Alaska, and they all caught fish!
Don H and Holloway were experiencing the same success, as was the Bachle's boat. It was wild!
The Good News is that for that morning, the five of us in the two boats caught and released hundreds and hundreds of White Bass.
The Bad News is that they were all small fish, probably about 6-8 inches in length.
About noon, the three of us in our boat said, "To heck with it, we're tired of catching and releasing fish, let's quit for the day."
Wow! It's not very often that anglers get tired of catching fish, but we did that day. And, so did Rich and his grandson.
Now for the rest of the story:
When Don H stopped in front of my house, he walked back to check on the boat and trailer, while I was busy unloading all of my stuff.
That's when he discovered a major, major problem:
The front axle on the driver's side of the dual-axle trailer had blown out its wheel bearings. The bearings had struck the tire on the second axle, tearing off a huge chunk of the tire tread, which in turn tore off the light wiring on that side of the boat trailer.
Don H called a towing company and when their large flatbed truck arrived, he was presented with a new problem: The boat trailer was too wide for the flatbed, and if they could have gotten the trailer on the flatbed, then the boat would have been too high in the air.
So, the towing company option was out of the question.
Finally, by replacing the ruined tire with the tire from the axle that had lost its bearings and then tying up the tireless axle to keep it from sagging to the ground, the boat trailer was ready to move.
Then, Don H, followed by his son, Tracee, in his pickup, slowly and carefully took a combination of back streets to reach his backyard, where the two of them could begin to work on the problem.
Wow! How's that for an unusual ending for one of our usual Thursday fishing trips!
-- Bet Your Favorite Pigeon
Bet your favorite pigeon he can't tell you about Don H's insurance company and its representative.
If he grins and says, "The company is State Farm and the rep is my wife, Elaine," he could have been standing next to her, while watching them work on the trailer.
-- Don Quilici is the Outdoors editor for the Nevada Appeal.