Mainstreet Radio-Brainerd’s Leif Enger rides along for the day for group fishing launch onto Mille Lacs Lake with Joe Fellegy, a local historian, musician, writer and fishing expert. Report includes various interviews.

Awarded:

1988 Minnesota AP Award, first place in Sports Reporting category

Transcript:

(00:00:06) It's 40 degrees on the North shore of Lake Mille Lacs as joffe, elegy guides his launch out of his front yard Harbor
(00:00:12) and into white-capped
(00:00:13) waves about four feet high a few hundred yards out several red and silver fishing boats Lurch at anchor in the high wind. It's a good day to be out in a big boat. It's
(00:00:23) got aluminum skin. I guess you'd call it. It's close to a quarter inch thick and measures what about 34 feet long Levin feet wide. It's kind of small. Mark launch standards, but I only take parties of seven or eight people as a rule. So it's big enough.
(00:00:44) There are nine Anglers on board today nine Veterans of the fella G launched an avid local historian musician and writer fellow G says he's perfectly happy taking people fishing for a living. I've
(00:00:56) been doing this since I was 14 years old. This is your number 31, and we've been I've had a lot of Adventure fabulous fishing stories fabulous people all kinds of books to All Eyes coming in.
(00:01:13) This is the first action of the day up in front Bill dailies fishing rod is bent double fella G coaches from the
(00:01:19) side. I'll take your time. It looks like a pretty good one. And if he pulls hard just flopped the handle back on your real. Let me have a lighter drag. I don't think it's a while. I just think it's a regular nice fish is all. You I don't believe that's but it's a dogfish. I work
(00:01:45) a dogfish is an unfortunate catch but there's been better luck at the other end of the boat a 16 inch walleye flops on the bottom there. It's the first of some 50 walleyes that will be caught today despite the conspicuous absence of electronic fish finders and other high-tech gear. Fella G doesn't hold with such stuff Ed Liston known to everyone aboard as the old Professor puts a match to his corncob pipe and talks
(00:02:09) history 32 years. Coming up here and I guess we're just about made the opener. Every year wouldn't miss it. Somebody said to me the other day of just talking. Somebody said you must be crazy to take go up on the opener. Why do you have to go in the openers as well? It's a case of did you say tradition? It's really
(00:02:34) traditional. Tim. Rozina is here with his brother father and Uncle he was brought into the tradition
(00:02:39) early. We kind of started coming up when we were about 10 years old. We had to come up on the second Saturday every every week every year for a while so we could prove we can make the varsity and get out here on opening day. So then we've been coming up here on the opener for about 810 years something like
(00:02:56) that a day, especially opening day passes quickly on Mille Lacs besides the occasional scramble to net a fish. There are roles to be eaten bets to be placed for the biggest walleye and stories to be told stories of big fish caught Big Fish lost men overboard all we heard a
(00:03:13) big splash. That's how it was and I didn't know what happened and a lady hollered Marvin's gone. Of course, everybody was gasping and wondering what the heck happens. Anyway, the guy came up right up alongside the boat here. He had dropped one of my fishing rods overboard tried to grab it fell out. I don't think he intended to dive in
(00:03:40) at five o'clock. Fella. Geez business day will end. He'll pull up anchor and head for home when he gets there. He and a kid down the road. We'll fillet the cooler of walleyes and send the crew smiling to their homes in the City he says he has plans for the evening to stand on his Dock and cast for the walleyes that come the last hour of daylight. On the North End of Lake Mille Lacs, I'm Leif Enger.