Cheap, Local Fishing

 

Custer disliked being surrounded by all those Indians. He disliked it as much as I do like being surrounded by more lakes to fish than I will ever get around to. See that preposition right there at the end of that last sentence? Watch out, they’ll kill ‘ya.

Cheap as I am, I am never so cheap as I am right before Christmas. Partly, it’s based on my kind disposition: I don’t like disturbing the moths in my wallet. The other reason would be the high cost of Christmas items at the Dollar General Store these days. My wife is pretty picky to have come from such a long line of hash slingers and dishwashers. It took $6.78 to get out of there with a present for her this year. It’s pretty, though, and not even all plastic like last year’s, which she liked so well it made her cry. It’s true, I guess, that it’s the thought that counts.

What it did do, however, this year’s gift, I mean, was cause me to pare back my fishing budget here at the end of the year. I’m staying close, and off the highway as much as I can. I “tune” in as much as I can to any latest info. regarding nearby hotspots that I may have overlooked. I discovered an old one when Justin Shavney called me the other day.

Justin called wanting my recipe for oven-made deer jerky a’ la window screen. Before my teeth started developing large gaps between them, I made tons of the stuff and saved hundreds of dollars, some of which I spent on loved ones at the Dollar General Store. After the recipe information was exchanged, I asked Justin what he had been up to.

“Been trout fishin’ over on Pretty Water Lake a little,” he said.

“Wait a minute. Is that that little lake located about half-way between Sand Springs and Sapulpa on 86th Street west of Highway 97?”

“That’d be it, alright.”

“How you been doin’ ?”

“Well most of ‘em are kinda’ small, ‘bout 10 or 12 inches long, but I’ve caught a couple up around five pounds.”

“You’re kiddin’.”

“Not a bit.”

There are few things more fun to catch than a rainbow trout of any size, 10 inches, or five pounds. They fight even after your hands are around them and jump. My goodness. I had forgotten all about Sapulpa City Parks and Recreation Department’s Lake Pretty Water. Right under my cheap nose. I know they’ve been stocking trout in it every winter for about 10 years, now. You can buy either daily or full season permits at either Sapulpa or Sand Springs Wal-Mart stores. You could buy one for your wife for Christmas right now, if you still haven’t been able to come up with anything more special.

The lake is stocked about every two weeks between October and March. Run-of-the-mill rainbow baits such as whole kernel corn, Velveeta cheese, Berkley Power Bait, mini-marshmallows as well as small spoons, in-line spinners, and artificial flies work well depending upon the daily “attitude” of the fish. Yes, Virginia, fish do have attitudes.

The lake is suited for the handicapped as there is a nice concrete walkway paralleling the lake’s north side next to the road and parking lots, and there are several very well constructed fishing docks adapted to wheel chair use with access from the sidewalk. You won’t find a better fishing spot so well suited and situated to the abilities and capabilities of anglers of all types and persuasions. Sapulpa’s Park and Recreation Department has really done an impressive job of making Pretty Water user-friendly. And there’s not that big a crowd weekdays, even in the evenings after work.

I bought my yearly permit the other day with all the cash I had left over after buying Pam’s Christmas gift, and pulled up alongside the lake just at sundown, a good time to fish anywhere. While rigging up at the back of my pickup, another fellow pulled up and parked next to me and walked over to pass the time of day. He recently moved into our country from Arizona where he had caught many trout over the years.

He showed me, when asked, what he was going to use (an orange Mepps spinner) then pulled out his flip phone and showed me a picture of a seven pounder he had caught right there in front of the parking lot a few days earlier. Such an experience might keep a fellow from moving back to Arizona, what with all the cactus and rattlesnakes, don’tcha’ think? We wished one another luck and moved along.

I tied on a Super-Duper, an angle-bent piece of metal that I had luck with fishing trout in the California Sierras as a kid. The strange looking lure can be deadly, darting back and forth through the water like a rabid Tasmanian Devil coming off a hunger strike. I didn’t catch anything, until about the tenth cast. Then I hooked a nice trout that looked to go about eleven inches, give or take. Then, about twenty casts later and right before all-out dark, I caught several more of about the same size. Nothing big, but more fun, really, than I had paid for.

I took a picture, and would like to have released them, but one of the lake rules is that all fish caught must be kept, so easily are they hooked deep and killed when returned to the water. The Pretty Water Lake limit, by the way, is five.

I felt so good on the way home to Baker’s Branch, only 30 minutes away if I didn’t hit a deer, that I did some reconsidering. Pam probably deserved more than what I had gotten her for Christmas. Maybe dinner out, you think? We both like Sonic. Hooo, boy! Chili cheese coneys. I bet it’d make her cry.

Copyright © 2010 Conrad M. Vollertsen