“Hey! You kids have permission to fish there?”

During my early season bass scouting I stumbled across some misguided youth that had fallen off the path of right and wrong. These two youngsters had in fact strode so far as to cross two fences leaving their tracks in the snow to fish a pond on private property. They were tucked into the northeast corner out of sight from the large farmhouse located closer to the road on the east side of the lake. I watched them fish like spooked pheasants for a few minutes before yelling, “Hey! You kids have permission to fish there?”

(Above: It doesn’t take a forensic expert to diagnose the crime scene here. But for just for fun I went ahead and did my own CSI markup.)

Kid One just kinda looked at me and then his friend to the right. I had to ask the question twice before he called over to his buddy “Rick”.

“My friend said we could fish here.” Kid Two replied.

“What is your friend’s name?” I continued to drill these kids really just for the fun of it.

Long pause. No answer.

“Ok, I’m gonna give Mr. Baker a call here and see what he thinks.” I said pulling out my cell phone and walking to the public access ponds just a few hundred feet down the trail. The kids waited for me to get further down the trail before hopping back over the fences and retreating to where Mom was parked off the side of the road.

This was not something I wanted to get Operation Game Thief or even the local authorities involved in. One good scare should do the trick and maybe next time they will do the right thing and ask permission. At the very least they will think twice before jumping this private lake again. The landowner (whose name is not “Baker”) has donated the land and ponds to the west of here for public use. Fishing the two ponds he still keeps private is a bit of an insult to all of us who enjoy the newly added ponds. To return the favor we should all help keep an eye on the private ponds for trespassers as well as keep the newly added public ponds free of trash.

My name is Matt and I’m a fishaholic.