Lost gear horror stories

Years ago a friend of mine got lazy and wouldn’t tighten his small outboard to the transon of his small pontoon boat. While fishing, it “hopped off” the transom when he hit a submerged stump. After marking the location with a couple of bobbers on a weighted line, they paddled to shore and called a another friend who had scuba gear to come and retrieve it. They waited for him to arrive at the local resort. Prior to getting there, another fisherman came in for a beer and was heard telling the bartender that the fishing was so-so, but he was lucky to have found a couple of bobbers out floating in the lake. And now, my friend “isn’t so lazy anymore!”

I had a pair of pliers I had fished with for years and one day I forgot that they were setting on my lap and stood up. Of course they land right in a hole and sink like a rock!

I went back the next day with a magnet and got lucky to get them back, only to loose them a couple years later off the back deck of a bass boat!

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Years ago a friend of mine got lazy and wouldn’t tighten his small outboard to the transon of his small pontoon boat. While fishing, it “hopped off” the transom when he hit a submerged stump. After marking the location with a couple of bobbers on a weighted line, they paddled to shore and called a another friend who had scuba gear to come and retrieve it. They waited for him to arrive at the local resort. Prior to getting there, another fisherman came in for a beer and was heard telling the bartender that the fishing was so-so, but he was lucky to have found a couple of bobbers out floating in the lake. And now, my friend “isn’t so lazy anymore!”

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I am sure your buddy was more than happy to point out who owned theses bobbers. Bye Bye Mr. Outboard!

Was ice fishing years ago with my buddy Bubba on a Sunday evening in northern WI about 2 hours from home. Bubba was the kind of guy with the ‘key chain’ that had every key on it that he had since the day he was born. He also wore an old flannel shirt. He was bending over cleaning the slush out of his hole and he looks at me and asks “What was that?” as he looked down his hole. He thought/hoped I threw something at him. Turned out his keys fell out of the shirt pocket and went to the bottom in about 12 feet of water. I watched him try and snag the keys for the next 2 hours with every treble hook and lead weight he had. I got to drive him home to get the extra set of keys and back up to pick up his car. Then I got to hear him complain about all the keys and locks he got to replace.

This past summer I was fishing a bragging rights tourney with my brother and we were catching and releasing a lot of small saugs. and after using my new Rapala needle nose pliers to unhook one, instead of tossing the fish….. Everything went into slow motion watching them fly through the air.

This happened many years ago when I thought I need a ten inch diameter hole. I drilled three of them side by side and set up a Snow Boat shelter over them. Things were going along great and I was catching fish. My brother-in-law was also fishing the same small pond but was in his tent about a 100 yards away. I walked over to his tent to see if he was doing any good and tell him about the fish I was catching.

By the time I got back to my tent, the wind had tipped the entire tent over on it’s side. Yep, tipped it towards the three 10 inch holes. Most everything that hit the ice went on down thru the holes to the bottom of the pond. I could see a lot of it looking down thru the clear water.

I marked the spot and came back the next weekend. I came back armed with my scuba gear. I was able to recover my rods, a couple jig boxes crammed with jigs and some other assorted equipment.

Now I drill smaller holes and anchor my tent.

Lost a cell phone to the bottom of Lake Mendota a while back. Had it on a belt clip and it must have fallen off. Hated the phone so it didn’t bother me too much. My wife at the time was going to call me if she wanted to come out in the boat for a while. I thought about heading back in to find a pay phone, but didn’t really want her to come out and ruin my fishing so just fished. Heard about that when I got home as she called me a hundred times.

Lost a full plano box of shad raps on Lake Wisconsin once. Left it on the back deck by mistake and it didn’t survive the trip to the next spot. If somebody found it before it sank, they would have added a good 40 shad raps to their collection. Hurt the wallet to replace all I lost.