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Boundary Waters Quetico Forum :: Fishing Forum :: Who started you?
 
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OffTheBeatenPath
01/18/2018 01:27AM
 
My pops started my brother, sister, and myself down that road. A simple bobber set up with some red worms or beemoth would kill it for a little kid anywhere around indiana.
Car camping during the summer and wearing our flip flops to a pond down the road was our slice of heaven. The real moment that made me a lifetime fisherman came when my father had to go in the water after a big one had pulled his pole in. It didn't matter to any of us that it was a big nasty carp. I wish I could remember that in the moment whenever we get on each other's nerves now. I am the fisherMAN I am because of him. (And trips to the North woods)
 
QueticoMike
01/18/2018 07:34AM
 
Love hearing these stories! Thanks everyone for sharing!
 
Captn Tony
12/10/2017 11:24AM
 
I was just aleays interested in fishing and being outside. My Grampa got me interested in hunting. I had a boy scout guide book probably from the 40s that got me interested in being in the wilderness.
My friend Captn Carp got me interested in the boundary waters. I had never heard of it until I met him.
 
TheMadPaddler
12/18/2017 09:05AM
 
Dad started me and I’ve been hooked ever since. Based in Indiana trying the easy access pits to half mile hauls we have gone through a ton of fish in our ol green canoe.
 
GeoFisher
12/18/2017 11:35PM
 
QueticoMike: "Just curious...... who was the person that got you interested in fishing? My grandpa was the person who installed the love of fishing in my soul."


My grandfather, so my parents tell me.


I was an army brat, and moved all over the world. MY first few years on this planet, I guess my grandfather watched me. And he loved to fish.


As the story goes, he took me fishing 2-3 times a week from the day I could walk until about 4 years old. At 4, My fam moved to Germany for tour 3, I believe.


We stayed away for the next 8 years.


when my Dad retired from the Army, we moved back, to Indiana.


My grandfather died of lung cancer that year, so I didn't get very many opportunities to fish with him, and REMEMBER it..........


I wish I had.


Later,


Geo
 
Jeriatric
12/03/2017 02:11AM
 
My father was the person who introduced my brother and me to fishing but he was a meat fisherman and took the process too seriously. A friend of my father's was the older person who had the ability make the experience something to really look forward to. Otherwise, fishing with certain friends our own age was a joyful thing.
 
Bumstead
12/03/2017 06:48AM
 
quote dbpmw3: "Grandpa. On the banks of the channels on Lake Wawasee in northern In. He’d sit for hours with a 16’ telescoping cane pole and a box of red wigglers. Remember it like it was yesterday."


Much of my love the sport stems from fishing with my grandpa and dad, and a fair amount of that was also on Wawasee. Box of wigglers and bobber rig on a channel bank can occupy a young boy for hours. That lake and a few farm ponds solidified my love for the sport. Also, two group trips to Canada with dads and sons at ages 15 and 17 are incredible memories. I hope to pass on similar memories to my sons.
 
missmolly
12/03/2017 07:48AM
 
Nice thread, Mike! My father kickstarted my love by arraying just-bought fishing lures, rods, and reels on our kitchen table. The colors! The shapes! I was smitten.


However, I shouldn't have fallen so hard, for it was colorful crap, as I learned every time I hooked a fine fish, which my brother and I enticed by tying our fishing poles to our bicycles and fishing farm ponds. I still remember the ones I lost.
 
lundojam
12/03/2017 08:32AM
 
Dad. Strictly big sucker minnows under big bobbers. We got serious after the first hard frost, that was the rule. Snowmobile suits on the pontoon boat, salted nut rolls. Lots of nice pike.
 
mastertangler
12/02/2017 07:35AM
 
My Dad and Grandpa.
 
mutz
12/02/2017 08:25AM
 
Grew up on a lake so started fishing when I was old enough to hold onto a cane pole. Had my first bad experience with a fish hook when I was about five or six, my older brother was casting a big pikey plug on the dock I was behind him, he thought he snagged the tree on shore tried to jerk it free and set four (yes I said four) of the nine hooks (three trebles) securely into my stomach. I don't remember much of it but mom and dad said it was very painful and quite a sight when I walked into the ER with a six inch plug hanging from my stomach. You would think I would be a proponent of barbless.
 
SaganagaJoe
12/02/2017 05:17PM
 
quote Frankie_Paull: "My dad, grandpa and uncle. My uncle and I actually wrote a book together about the whole thing. Here is the front cover. "


Bob Cary is your uncle? Lucky you.



 
QueticoMike
12/02/2017 05:10PM
 
quote Frankie_Paull: "My dad, grandpa and uncle. My uncle and I actually wrote a book together about the whole thing. Here is the front cover. "


Oh wow, your uncle was Bob Cary! I only met him once, right before I went on my first solo trip into Quetico. It was right before 9/11/2001 happened so it was 9/9/2001. He was at PP doing an interview of some Canadian Rangers bringing a gift of a special wooden paddle that presented to the USFS rangers, something like that.......If you go to trip reports it is called Remember 9/15 ( because that is when I found out about 9/11). I sure miss his write ups in the Ely Echo and hearing him on the radio.
 
SaganagaJoe
12/02/2017 05:18PM
 
Grandpa started me out in frankly in all things outdoors, between the BWCA and time at the cabin, from a young age. I am so blessed to have spent so much time with him in the woods. Such precious memories, and still counting!


Grandpa in the 70s up in the BWCA, in his 30s



Grandpa in 2014, now in his 70s.



 
dbpmw3
12/02/2017 07:01PM
 
Grandpa. On the banks of the channels on Lake Wawasee in northern In. He’d sit for hours with a 16’ telescoping cane pole and a box of red wigglers. Remember it like it was yesterday.
 
QueticoMike
12/02/2017 07:09AM
 
Just curious...... who was the person that got you interested in fishing? My grandpa was the person who installed the love of fishing in my soul.
 
Savage Voyageur
12/02/2017 07:51AM
 
My Dad got me interested in fishing when our family bought a Lake cabin. The cabin came with all the fishing gear needed. A 16 foot wooden boat with a 5 horse Johnson motor with the gas tank on top. If you wanted reverse you just rotated the motor. Long wooden oars when the motor ran out of gas. Fishing rods were made out of steel complete with black cloth line. Lures in an old tackle box were all the classics too. Steel bait cans full of drain holes that fit inside a bigger bucket. Cotton nets to land the fish. Steel snap stringers full of fish. When we got back to shore we would pull the boat into the boathouse and clean the fish on sawhorses. My Dad and most of the gear is gone now but I would give a lot for just one more trip.
 
saltdog
12/02/2017 08:03AM
 
My grandfather got me "hooked" open fishing for bluegills and crappies. My dad started my love for the Boundary Waters on my first trip in 1963.
 
walllee
12/02/2017 08:11AM
 
Grandpa, Dad, my two uncles.
 
QueticoMike
12/02/2017 09:31AM
 
quote mutz: "Grew up on a lake so started fishing when I was old enough to hold onto a cane pole. Had my first bad experience with a fish hook when I was about five or six, my older brother was casting a big pikey plug on the dock I was behind him, he thought he snagged the tree on shore tried to jerk it free and set four (yes I said four) of the nine hooks (three trebles) securely into my stomach. I don't remember much of it but mom and dad said it was very painful and quite a sight when I walked into the ER with a six inch plug hanging from my stomach. You would think I would be a proponent of barbless."


That made my stomach hurt just hearing that story......
 
Frankie_Paull
12/02/2017 09:37AM
 
My dad, grandpa and uncle. My uncle and I actually wrote a book together about the whole thing. Here is the front cover.
 
cburton103
01/14/2018 02:43PM
 
My grandpa is who I inherited my love of fishing from. He had a modest cabin on a lake in West Texas. Some of my fondest memories are from the few fall breaks in elementary school when they flew me up to Lubbock to spend a week fishing the later end of when the white bass would school up and force shad to the surface to be devoured. Lots of fun. If you found the school you could cast anything into it and catch one every cast pretty much.


We fished out of an old V-hull John boat that my grandpa and my dad had been fishing out of for over 30 years together. Lots of good times in that old boat.
 
Atb
01/14/2018 06:09PM
 
My dad got me started too. He was romantic about it more that skilled, but it was enough to get me hooked. I often think about what I have learned since, what I could teach him, and how blessed I am to have all the gear we did not have.


I hope I’m now paying it forward with my little one.
 
QueticoMike
12/09/2017 04:34PM
 
quote missmolly: "Thank you, lindylair. I loved reading that."


I enjoy reading about everyone's humble beginnings.
 
CanoeViking
12/09/2017 09:43PM
 
My Dad, he wasn’t around much but when he was we often went fishing for sand bass, we would catch them by the hundreds and two at a time on awesome days.


When I left home to start my own I didn’t fish anymore until my brother came up to visit me here in MN and said I had to go to the BWCA and I had to fish. So I’d did, and after a whole afternoon of catching dozens of Smallies the love reborn.
 
lindylair
12/08/2017 08:25PM
 
As a kid our family vacation was a week at a cabin in a resort in northern MN. Sometimes we had a resrevation, sometimes we just headed up to an area and checked em out. I remember looking over some places and of course us kids loved them all. Disappointed when mom and dad said no. But we always found a nice place except once. Went to Park Rapids and checked some places out but they didn't like any so we spent the night in a motel. That hurt. But the next day we found the resort that topped them all, gorgeous setting, great facilities, beautiful lake and great fishing. I have been going back since then, around 1968.


Mu dad got me interested in fishing but he didn't really know anything about it. We would row a boat out, usually not too far from the cabin and throw our cane poles over the side of the boat. Didn't help that it was a different lake every year that we knew nothing about. We caught a few fish, usually sunnies. But when we found our place near Park Rapids things changed. Our equipment was slowly getting better as we could afford to rent a motor. And danged if we didn't catch some huge crappies, lots of really nice largemouth bass, and even a couple muskies. The water in this lake was and is still crystal clear and I will never forget the morning when dad and i were fishing off a point and saw some largemouth that were absolutely huge...and in the excitement of the moment my dad dropped his rod and reel in the lake.


To this day it is among my favorite places on earth and when I take that last turn into the driveway and see the lake the memories of those days come flooding back. the family vacation kind of fell off but my dad and I returned to that resort every Memorial weekend for 8 or 9 years. Some of the best memories of my life. Spotting a muskie 40 yards off the boat and throwing a lure past him...watching him turn and follow, seeing him open his mouth and grab the lure...and wham... I had my first muskie at about age 13. Bass fishing was incredible and the loons and wildlife and serenity was first class.


In the years since I have gone back many many times and with better equipment and knowledge I have been able to do even better. I was just there in September of this year and caught a nice muskie, maybe 43 inches or so. But the bass and crappie fishing is what keeps me coming back. But the clarity of the water is amazing and we saw so many muskies including one that had to be 50 inches, definitely gets your heart pounding.


Dad and i had so much fun up there and my first sight of the lake always reminds me of that. Wish I could bring him back up there again now that I know what I am doing but alas, he is long gone. But it was definitely dad who turned me on to fishing, even though he didn't know much about it and we couldn't afford more than rowboats and cane poles at first.


That was good enough. Thanks dad. Some of the finest memories of my life.















Typical catches
 
cowdoc
01/07/2018 09:38PM
 
My dad was not a fisherman. It was my own curiosity in HS and college that got me started. Then I met my wife to be and her dad was a river rat that fished, hunted and trapped along the Mississippi River. I learned a ton from him over the years about the outdoors and chasing many different critters. He died in 2007 too young and I miss hunting and fishing with him.
 
mgraber
01/05/2018 11:45PM
 
My dad and grandfather. Most of my family and friends were serious fishermen.
 
AtwaterGA
12/16/2017 06:40AM
 
My Grandmother. She loved to fish and she and Papa lived on a farm that joins the Alapaha River in South Georgia. I would often stay with them on the weekends as my father kept cows on the farm and we would go to the farm almost daily. Granny kept a worm bed with red wiggler's and was always ready to take me fishing. I still have her tackle box that has her black cotton line, corks, hooks and sinkers. We fished at a place called the "Sucker hole". She kept it baited with sunk sacks with corn meal in them. We caught bream, suckers, catfish and an occasional bass. The bass were called trout back then.
 
AtwaterGA
12/16/2017 12:00PM
 
In most parts of the South and certainly in rural Georgia people referred to largemouth bass as trout. My parents were born in 1914 and all of their lives they still called them trout. I was born in 1945 and everyone I knew call them trout until around 40 years ago. Crappie were called speckled perch. Many people still call them speckled perch.
 
QueticoMike
12/16/2017 10:11AM
 
AtwaterGA: "My Grandmother. She loved to fish and she and Papa lived on a farm that joins the Alapaha River in South Georgia. I would often stay with them on the weekends as my father kept cows on the farm and we would go to the farm almost daily. Granny kept a worm bed with red wiggler's and was always ready to take me fishing. I still have her tackle box that has her black cotton line, corks, hooks and sinkers. We fished at a place called the "Sucker hole". She kept it baited with sunk sacks with corn meal in them. We caught bream, suckers, catfish and an occasional bass. The bass were called trout back then. "


What kind of bass were called trout?
 
zika
12/16/2017 10:40AM
 
One of the many lucky ones to share fish camps w Bob and Lil. Your post about this book is golden. Thank you.
 
missmolly
12/08/2017 09:19PM
 
Thank you, lindylair. I loved reading that.
 
bfurlow
12/08/2017 11:20PM
 
quote QueticoMike: "Just curious...... who was the person that got you interested in fishing? My grandpa was the person who installed the love of fishing in my soul."
Same here. Grandpa had a cabin on a lake in northern Wisconsin. He could barely walk but would always walk with me out on the dock or take me out in his boat in the evenings.
 
rpike
12/06/2017 10:46AM
 
My dad. My first fish was from a canoe. A smallmouth from the Granite River when I was 5 or 6; I don't remember many of the thousands of fish I've caught since then, but I remember that one like it was yesterday. Mom and I scattered his ashes near there.
 
QueticoMike
12/06/2017 08:03AM
 
quote Basspro69: "quote QueticoMike: "quote Basspro69: "My Mom when I was 3"




You don't here that too often....."
Yeah my Dad wasn't around so I give my Mom a mother and fathers day card !"



Thank God for Mothers! ........also I meant "hear" not "here".........didn't notice that until I saw your response.
 
QueticoMike
12/06/2017 08:05AM
 
quote DeanL: "I grew up and still live in a farm family so everything revolves around that. I give all the credit to my dad, and my moms parents (my grandparents) for getting me started.



My dad grew up in a family that fished some and had some friends that were very good fisherman. I can remember some trips to Mille Lacs with his friends where we drifted 3 way rigs on the mud and caught some huge walleyes. There were also some winter trips up there where we caught a ton of walleyes. The trip I cherish the most was the first time we went to Red Lake crappie fishing. This was before the whole crappie thing was popular. He rented a house from a local guide and we proceeded to catch the 30 biggest crappies in my life! Over the years we made several trips to Red and the fishing was great for a few years it eventually got slower and slower over the years. That first trip however is one I'll never forget.



My grandparents watched me a lot while I was a young kid. I would beg to go fishing any chance I could. If grandpa was busy tending to the farm or the cows grandma would take me to a pier a local lake and we would just have fun catching fish. There were a few times we brought a couple that were big enough to cook fish for grandpa for supper. If grandpa had time to take me we would always head to a lake and troll for pike, summer or winter they were grandpa's favorite fish. He would idle the boat as slow as it would go which was still pretty fast but the pike didn't seem to care. His favorite was to troll with long fiberglass cane poles. I thought it was cool because the spoons would only run a foot or so under the surface so you could always see them and if you were lucky enough see a strike. Those big poles got to be a lot for a young guy to hang on to but they sure were effective.



Great thread Mike, the memories just came flooding back the last 10 minutes while I typed this. I sure hope my boys that have been on trips since they were 3 look back and cherish the fishing we have done in the BW. "



Yep, I was just thinking back about my Grandpa and was curious who got everyone else going in the love for such a great outdoor sport\activity.
 
AmarilloJim
12/05/2017 11:08AM
 
My dad used to take me and my brothers down to the creek he used to fish as a boy. Cane poles, bobbers and we would dig the worms before we went. Then to Grandma's for lunch.
 
DeanL
12/04/2017 08:43PM
 
I grew up and still live in a farm family so everything revolves around that. I give all the credit to my dad, and my moms parents (my grandparents) for getting me started.


My dad grew up in a family that fished some and had some friends that were very good fisherman. I can remember some trips to Mille Lacs with his friends where we drifted 3 way rigs on the mud and caught some huge walleyes. There were also some winter trips up there where we caught a ton of walleyes. The trip I cherish the most was the first time we went to Red Lake crappie fishing. This was before the whole crappie thing was popular. He rented a house from a local guide and we proceeded to catch the 30 biggest crappies in my life! Over the years we made several trips to Red and the fishing was great for a few years it eventually got slower and slower over the years. That first trip however is one I'll never forget.


My grandparents watched me a lot while I was a young kid. I would beg to go fishing any chance I could. If grandpa was busy tending to the farm or the cows grandma would take me to a pier a local lake and we would just have fun catching fish. There were a few times we brought a couple that were big enough to cook fish for grandpa for supper. If grandpa had time to take me we would always head to a lake and troll for pike, summer or winter they were grandpa's favorite fish. He would idle the boat as slow as it would go which was still pretty fast but the pike didn't seem to care. His favorite was to troll with long fiberglass cane poles. I thought it was cool because the spoons would only run a foot or so under the surface so you could always see them and if you were lucky enough see a strike. Those big poles got to be a lot for a young guy to hang on to but they sure were effective.


Great thread Mike, the memories just came flooding back the last 10 minutes while I typed this. I sure hope my boys that have been on trips since they were 3 look back and cherish the fishing we have done in the BW.
 
Basspro69
12/04/2017 10:33PM
 
quote QueticoMike: "quote Basspro69: "My Mom when I was 3"



You don't here that too often....."
Yeah my Dad wasn't around so I give my Mom a mother and fathers day card !
 
QueticoMike
12/04/2017 10:49AM
 
quote Basspro69: "My Mom when I was 3"


You don't here that too often.....
 
egknuti
12/04/2017 12:06PM
 
My father. Funny though, non of my siblings share the same passion as me.
 
yogi59weedr
12/04/2017 12:29PM
 
My dad got me hooked on fishing.
My high school buddy got me interested in wAlleye fishing. We would fish the Mississippi river around Davenport and Hampton and Clinton and Belleview Iowa. Then we moved up and started fishing lynksville and Desoto bay and Genoa dam in Wisconsin...



My buddy is also the guy who turned me on to the BE. But we have never gone together....
 
Gmorgan
12/04/2017 12:31PM
 
My Grandfather got me interested the first time he took me up to Rice lake in Ontario when I was about 7, but a childhood friend that I grew up with really got me hooked. I grew up in a little village outside Cincinnati on the Little Miami river. Everyday after school that we did not have baseball was spent fishing the river in the spring. Those were good days and we caught a lot of fish.
 
nakor
12/04/2017 06:50PM
 
My Grandparents. They started taking me to nw Wisconsin in the late 60's. It was a yearly tradition. 1st two weeks of June. Always the same place. Boogarts, then Bobcat resort on Ham Lake in Burnett Co. I often think back to those trips while sitting around the fire in the bwca. I only wish they were here so I could share my bw trips with them. My Grandma would have wanted to hear every detail. My Grandpa would probably just shake his head and say i was crazy and most likely will get eaten by wolves or a bear.....
 
mastertangler
12/04/2017 05:55AM
 
quote QueticoMike: "I remember I used to call my Grandparent's house every Saturday morning when I would wake up. Grandma would answer the phone, I would say is Grandpa up, it's time to go fishing. She would say honey, he's still asleep. Then I would say can you go get him up, I'm ready to go fishing right now :) He used to take me to the local lakes and some private ponds. We mostly fished for bluegills back then and would catch some occasional largemouth. Eventually he took me to the river and I got a taste for catching smallmouth bass and I loved how hard they fought. You could say I was hooked on smallmouth fishing in the river after that. In his last years the table was turned and I was the one taking him fishing. Used to load up the wheel chair and take him to a pond. I would wheel him down to the pond and he would sit there and fish until I was done fishing. I still remember the huge red and white bobber he was using because he could barely see still. In the end his mind was starting to go and I had a hard to watching this happen. I showed him a picture of this big smallmouth I caught. He said how did you ever become some a great fisherman and then he laughed, he knew why, he knew it was because of him."


Touching story Mike. I too had a strong relationship with my Grandpa.
 
bwcasolo
12/04/2017 05:56AM
 
Dad.
 
QueticoMike
12/03/2017 04:50PM
 
I remember I used to call my Grandparent's house every Saturday morning when I would wake up. Grandma would answer the phone, I would say is Grandpa up, it's time to go fishing. She would say honey, he's still asleep. Then I would say can you go get him up, I'm ready to go fishing right now :) He used to take me to the local lakes and some private ponds. We mostly fished for bluegills back then and would catch some occasional largemouth. Eventually he took me to the river and I got a taste for catching smallmouth bass and I loved how hard they fought. You could say I was hooked on smallmouth fishing in the river after that. In his last years the table was turned and I was the one taking him fishing. Used to load up the wheel chair and take him to a pond. I would wheel him down to the pond and he would sit there and fish until I was done fishing. I still remember the huge red and white bobber he was using because he could barely see still. In the end his mind was starting to go and I had a hard time watching this happen. I showed him a picture of this big smallmouth I caught. He said how did you ever become such a great fisherman and then he laughed, he knew why, he knew it was because of him.
 
Basspro69
12/03/2017 07:27PM
 
My Mom when I was 3
 
Laketrout58
12/03/2017 07:38PM
 
I wish I could say my dad took me fishing,but that wasn't the case. He was too busy working to raise 9 kids and doing things like playing with us wasn't a priority. I am not looking for sympathy,just saying. It was my own curiosity about the out of doors that interested me. I took my kids fishing when they were little. I played with them whenever I could. I loved it and when they grew up they both thanked me for spending a lot of time with them when I could have been on trips with my buddies. I go to the bwca every year now with my son and another friend. Next year I hope to introduce my eleven year old grandson to the bdub. I hope he likes it because we got him a lifetime fishing license for his baptism! Life is good! Have a good night everyone! Marc
 
inspector13
12/19/2017 08:39AM
 

My grandparents moved to a cabin on a lake in Swiss township Wisconsin when I was four. It was time to fish off the dock between lunch and when Bozo the clown came on TV. Grandpa taught me how to use the row boat by age five. At the beginning of every summer my dad would stop on the way up there at Holiday to get us kids new cane poles. That was back in the mid 60’s when every Holiday filling station carried some sporting goods. The other grandparents had a farm on the Cannon River, near some small Trout streams. Older cousins helped us younger ones there.