The fishing never ends

Gary Lake is back on Rainy Lake beginning his search for a second Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship title. Mike Shulz is looking for his first.
Lake, a veteran of more than 30 years of fishing tournaments, only has fished one other tournament this season and that was on the Mississippi River.
Shulz, meanwhile, is fishing almost every weekend and has come here directly from a largemouth bass tournament in Minnesota.
But only competing in a single tournament hasn’t slowed Lake from fishing. “I’ve been doing some guiding,” he noted.
His voice is getting a little excited, and his eyes have brightened, as he tells the story. He is talking about some of his days on lakes this year.
“I took a man out who had never fished and he caught a 12-pound musky and then over a four-pound largemouth,” Lake recalled. “He was excited.”
While Lake is talking, he’s feverishly casting a jerk bait with a hair tail from the bank in front of the picnic hut opposite the Bayview Motel. Shulz is nearby, on the opposite corner, throwing a popper in front of a storm sewer drain.
Lake kept talking. “I took another guy out and he caught the biggest fish of his life,” he said.
There is a certain pride in his voice as he talks of this year’s fishing experiences.
The contest between the two best friends is in full swing on the riverbank. Both are working their baits criss-crossing the water.
“I thought that I would miss the tournament fishing but I don’t,” Lake conceded. “I went to a couple of weigh-ins.
“On Mondays, I call Teddy Capra [who he is fishing with at the FFCBC] and some others to find out what happened, and stay in touch,” he added.
As well as fishing the FFCBC next week, Lake also will head on up to Kenora to fish the KBI later this summer.
In the evenings, Lake and Shulz have a bragging rights riverbank tournament going on. On Monday night, Lake was able to coax a “smallie” into taking that same jerk bait at the surface.
The fish kept coming up and looking at the bait, then chose to pick a may fly beside it. Several times it performed this routine.
“Finally,” Lake said, “I just let it sit there motionless right next to the shore. The fish came up, looked at it, barely moved, and then I just lightly twitched the bait and it hit.”
On Tuesday night, Shulz got the riverbank first with his popper. The popper brought the smallmouth bass from under the storm sewer culvert, leaving the two tied with each catching a fish.
Both fished that same shore for another half-hour. The bank had gone dead.
Local residents, out riding their bikes or walking, hollered down to the fishermen offering encouragement. Both seemed to enjoy that.
The riverbank tournament will go on for the next week until the FFCBC starts next Thursday morning.