The Adventures of Team Bug Tussle

1st Place
Marquette Bay Trout and Salmon Classic
September, 1996

From left:
Steve Valdek, Pilot
Earl Hawn, Crewchief
Gary Gibbs, Captain
Steve Morris, Crewman

Below, Pilot Steve Valdek stepped aft to battle one of several large, early-morning lakers which helped capture one of the most coveted fishing titles in Marquette Harbor.

At right, Steve's nine pound lunker showed lamprey scars upon inspection by Chief Earl and the Captain.

Around 9am, with hot weather and calm winds, the fish disappeared and the crew became restless after an hour with no action. And real thirsty. With 5 fish totalling almost 40lbs in the cooler, by noon the crew was was talking of cribbage games amidst their strewn beer cans and snack wrappers. But they were overheard by the captain, who realized that the current catch could place well with a few more fish over 5lbs and firmly orderd lure, depth, and position changes which produced the final catch which took 1st place by a mere 4/10ths of a pound over the Lee Birds team, who were followd in 3rd place by the Cooler Crew

At left, one of our scant 8 fish total comes to the surface to contribute to the winning 46.5lb total after a day of unusually slow fishing for this time of year. We also won largest fish honors with a 13lb trout which was the first fish of the day at 6:25am after less than 10 minutes trolling.

All fish were caught with flutter spoons, with 12lb mono line clipped to downriggers running from 60 to over 100' deep. A couple of fish in the 20lb range were hooked by other entrants, but were not landed. More and larger fish are usually found in Marquette at this time of year, our 2nd place total last year was 62.5lbs with one fish 18lbs and others over 12.

Weight totals are scored from the largest 6 fish per team.

Weights through 10th place totals this year: 


46.5 Team Bug Tussle   ---------->
46.1 Lee Birds
44.5 Cooler Crew
37.2 Waterskunks Forever
36.5 Rum Aways
35.9 Carolina
35.5 Hellsinki Herring Chokers
35.2 Bottoms Up
35.0 Bottom Bouncer
??   Shirley's Kitchen
In the Salmon category, 1st Place was taken for the 2nd year running by the Peterson Glass Crew with a catch of 9.7lbs. The fall spawning salmon have not shown up in Marquette during fair weather for a couple of years. As an imported and planted species, their natural reproduction has not produced many large fish in the extremely cold waters of Lake Superior around Marquette, and were never in favor among many of the area laketrout enthusiasts.

Below, Crewman Morris readies for a strike, Pilot Valdek waits for a course change, and the Captain sets the hook.

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