To that end, Lake Winona fits the bill as a nice place to "experience" fishing, particularly if you have kids, and especially if you are a kid, maybe fishing for the first time. Winona, Minnesota is a beautiful town on the Mississippi River. With a population of 27,000 it's neither too big, nor too small, has a robust arts community but also enough commercial retail and dining to complete the picture (the experience of living). The bluffs visible from just about any vantage point rise 500 feet above town, and from the top provide an astonishing view of a long swath of Mississippi River valley. They are at the southern end of the "driftless area", which escaped the oppressive hand of the glaciers when last those massive sheets of ice paid a visit. As a result, the entire region is visually stunning, a gently simmering (sometimes roiling) landscape of hillsides and long valleys called coulees that, at certain times of year, and surely certain times of day, actually sing. In other words, these hills really are alive with the sound of music. I would encourage any restless traveler who appreciates such a thing to make way to Trempealeau, Jackson, Vernon and Pepin counties in Wisconsin, or drive Highway 61 through southeastern Minnesota, to witness this landscape - unique in the Midwest - first-hand.
Lake Winona itself is one of those manicured, highly accessible in-town oases that residents should feel lucky to have at their disposal. There are kayaks for rent, a boat landing, fishing pier, a 5.3 mile walking trail that circumnavigates the entire lake and summery things like ice cream shops, classic car shows and concerts going on almost daily. The ducks are cute, the geese are jerks (and pretty disgusting), and the bluffs that tower over the water are an impressive visual reminder of the geologic forces that shaped this area....or happily didn't. The lake is 307 acres, divided into an east and west section by a heavily trafficked city street, and has a maximum depth of 38 feet. A reclamation project started in the 1970s kept this jewel from becoming another unusable muck hole full of dead fish each spring.
Today it offers anglers both pan fish and game fish and a few surprises (a teenager caught a 48-pound catfish recently), and while the best way to manage the lake seems to keep locals talking (urban run-off, goose droppings and dredging are all continued sources of debate), there's no doubt Winona residents do consider themselves fortunate. They come out in droves to enjoy their little slice of heaven - walkers, runners, bikers, strollers, picnickers, kayakers, anglers and boaters. From sunrise to sunset, Lake Winona would seem to draw more attention than the mighty Mississippi River rolling its way south toward the Gulf of Mexico barely a mile away.
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| PICTURE PERFECT - The bluffs overlooking Winona, Minnesota help comprise the southern extent of the 'driftless area', a small lobe of land primarily in southwestern Wisconsin that escaped glaciation, and was left, when those glaciers retreated some 10,000 to 15,000 years ago, with hills that actually sing in the daylight. BELOW: Morning sunlight unfurls over the dense green that rises some 500 feet above town. |
I really love this time of year, when the days are as bright and long as they will be. It gets me thinking everything is going to be all right, even in a volatile summer such as this one. And for the first hour of this recent outing, at least, everything was all right. I was out the door by seven, and met with ideal conditions: warm, but not hot, mostly cloudy but no threat of rain, and enough encouraging peeks at the sunshine to send my spirit soaring as a brisk but unassuming wind drove the broken clouds eastward. A splendid summer morning on a splendid little lake...what better inoculation from our country's current strife can there be than fishing like this...?
It was an active morning, to boot. I must have come at just the right time, because cast after cast attracted fish, and every few resulted in a strike. It was almost frenzy-like. I was using a little bass popper across the top of the water, and having remarkable success: several bass, a ton of bluegill. Lake Winona seems to be an especially hot spot for pan fish, so that kids are almost sure to catch something. This fact makes it a great destination for first-time anglers, to get them interested and keep them interested. I've said it a million times: every time I get a strike on the line, no matter the fish or its size, it feels like the first, and that can get addictive.
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| SMALL BUT PLENTIFUL - No lunkers along the shoreline of Lake Winona (at least none that found their way onto my line), but the sunfish and bass were hungry this summer morning. |
I'm a catch and release angler, and I follow all the proper protocol: I try to handle the fish as little as possible, get it back in the water quickly, try to use care when it comes to removing hook from flesh. Usually I'm pretty good at removing hooks, but until this particular morning, it was never my flesh I had to remove one from.
I'm not a fan of treble hooks, don't really see them as necessary for how big a pain in the ass they are to remove. But the prevailing wisdom seems to be that if you want poppers with single hooks, you have to switch them out yourself and that seems like a lot of work. I admit it, I'm often too lazy to see a good idea through to fruition.
When it hit my lure, one bluegill managed to double hook itself, not just on its lower lip, but also a spot right where its chin meets its chest area. I carry pliers like a sidearm for just these sorts of situations, and set to the "operation" without anticipating a problem. I managed to get the first hook free from the animal's chin pretty easily, but the one attached to its mouth was sticking straight through the tough, cartilage-like ridge of its lower lip, and wasn't budging.
To make matters worse, this particular fish was a feisty SOB, as the little ones often are. It kept launching into a spastic wriggle every few seconds, in an attempt to free itself from what it couldn't help but see as my death grasp.
I've dealt with this countless times in the past, but this time, one of those contortions was a little too perfectly timed. I lost hold of the fish while trying to remove the hook, and as it slipped through my fingers, the hook in the rear of the lure, which I'd just removed from its chin, caught the index finger of my right hand, which would have been fine, except the fish kept on thrashing, and wound up driving it deep into my finger...that is, nearly through my finger. So deep that its point stuck out the opposite side, just short of the barb.
In an instant, the serene summer morning with lots of action turned sour. The fish was still attached to the front hook, and now every move it made seemed to lodge the rear hook a little deeper.
I managed to stay calm by taking deep breaths. In no way am I saying I deserve a medal for this: almost twenty-five years ago, a North Dakota farm kid had both of his arms accidentally ripped from his body by a piece of machinery. He was able to stay calm long enough (deep breaths...?) to dial emergency by holding a pencil in his mouth, then somehow had the presence of mind to lay in the bathtub so he wouldn't bleed out all over his mother's new carpet. He eventually had both arms re-attached.
CLICK HERE: True story.
Admittedly, I just had a fish hook through the finger. But hey, that shit hurts...and the same barb that ensures the fish can't easily throw the lure, also ensures that the angler can't easily throw the lure.
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| GOT ME BACK - This little bluegill was a feisty SOB, and managed to send that rear treble hook right through my finger soon after I removed it from his chest. |
The fish's ordeal was over. It could go back to feeding, and avoiding the larger fish I saw patrolling the shallows earlier (probably end up wishing he only had me to deal with). But I was left standing on the shoreline with a hook completely pushed through my finger, and not sure what the proper course of action should be.
I'll never forget the physical sensation. I could feel the hook inside my body, an invader, but weirdly felt no pain at first...only my skin tightening around it, and worse, stretching out from the bone whenever I moved my hand, like lifting a sheet off a bed.
The obvious remedy was to push the hook forward until the barb was completely exposed, then cut it off, or try to press it down, then work the hook smoothly (hopefully!) back through my finger. But I knew two things. 1) I didn't have a tool for cutting the hook; I'd brought out only a small complement of gear, and snub nose pliers. 2) I had in the past, as an experiment, tried to mash down barbs to make the hook easier to remove from the fish, and had found doing so nearly impossible, so I was reluctant to push the hook forward far enough to expose the barb, knowing there might very well be no point, and that it likely could make things worse.
At the same time, I didn't want to go to the emergency room, didn't want the expense or the hassle. Had I felt pain right away, I might have re-considered and just let a professional take care of it. But feeling just a gentle (if totally unsettling) tug on the carpet of skin covering my finger bone, got me thinking I could do this myself. I made the decision to try to remove the hook on my own, by carefully pulling it back through my finger, barb and all, along the same path it had taken in the invasion.
The first few centimeters (first attempt) brought excruciating pain, and had I not also felt some kind of movement, that is, an encouraging sign that I was making progress and not just needlessly torturing myself, I'd have given up and driven to the ER.
The second attempt offered no pain, but also no progress, and I realized I was half-assing it, reluctant to commit. If I was going to do this, I would have to step it up.
The third go-around was much more assertive, brought more pain (ears tearing, my breath hissing through clenched teeth), but more progress. In those stressful moments, I pictured the hook ripping my finger to shreds, and was prepared to abort the operation quickly, although I had no clue at what point I'd make that decision.
But by some miracle, the hook came out. WITH pain (to be sure), but surprisingly cleanly. No ripping, or tearing. I somehow managed to draw it backwards along its original trajectory. Its exit from my finger was followed by a torrent of blood, which was a probably a good thing, a good way to cleanse the injury.
I made my way home, sanitized and dressed the wound, and had to hope it didn't get infected and I hadn't contracted some flesh-eating bacteria from the lake water. Rare occurrence or not, these days we always hear when it happens, which reveals that it happens more frequently than we realize (or want to admit), and I find it an especially sorrowful tragedy: people losing limbs or lives merely for getting outside and enjoying themselves.
That first day, my finger throbbed painfully, but never swelled up, never started turning black. A few days passed, and it seemed to heal quickly. For all the blood that gushed out behind the hook, and the level of pain I experienced, there was hardly even a noticeable wound. Thank goodness.
All's well that ends well. Although I'm kicking myself that I didn't take a picture of it. Maybe next time...because I have to think there will be a next time.
But there will also be a bolt cutter on hand. ;-)
