Take a Bluegill Break from Summer Bass

By 10 a.m., I was ready to go home. My dad and I had been bass fishing for several hours, and I only had a few missed strikes on a spinnerbait to show for it. It’s easy for a 9-year-old to get bored and frustrated with such slow fishing.

- Aubrey Smith

Just when I thought all hope of having fun was lost, my dad nosed the boat into a shady, sandy, shallow inlet, dropped anchor and started rigging our smaller rods and spinning reels with bobbers.

The next 90 minutes were mine.

About the time my first cast landed, the bobber disappeared. I set the hook, cranked the reel, and boated a 7-inch bluegill in short order. In 15 minutes, I had 10 fish in the boat. By the 30-minute mark, my dad had given up exploring the underwater structure and weeds for largemouth on the other side of the boat and was hauling in bluegills along with me. By lunchtime, we had a mess of fish in our coolers. I’d had fun catching enough fish to keep me happy for the rest of the day.

That night, we cleaned several dozen bluegills and two bass. The bass filets would be good, but I preferred the bluegills anyway. We cut off their heads just behind the pectoral fin and gills, pulled the entrails out, scaled them with large kitchen spoons, breaded them in flour and Cajun seasoning and deep fried them whole. We set an empty plate in the center of the table to spit bones into, thanked God for the day, the meal and dug in. When I laid down for bed that night, I had a hard time falling asleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw a bobber go under.

I’ll never forget that day, though it was many years ago.