First GameWarden experience

[LindellProStaf]

This is a little off topic but I like to tell the story so sorry... When I was about 12 years old my mom used drop me and my brother and a couple of friends at "The Pits" for the afternoon. It was the sand pits south of town that had lots of bluegills and sunfish in them. Well we had some worms and were catching lots of fish. We knew what the limit was and were proud that we knew the regs. Well we ran out of worms cuz the fish were biting so good. We had them on a rope stringer. Well Mom wasn't coming back for another hour or so and we didn't have a limit yet and were out of bait. I started gutting our bluegills and we were using their guts to catch more fish. Worked great. We were pretty proud of ourselves. A game warden stopped and was really nice and wondered how our fishing was. We proudly showed him our catch and showed him how smart we were by using the guts of the fish that we were going to eat to catch more fish. He said, you guys can't do that. I said as I my bobber went down again, well yes we can, see it works great! He said no I mean it is illegal. I said well that does not make any sense. We are keeping the meat and are just using the guts so why does that matter. He said well that is the law. As we proudly kept baiting up and catching more bluegills in front of him and showing him how smart we were for thinking of this idea he just smiled and said Ok you kids have a nice day and remember what your limit is and got in his car and drove away. It was a great first experience with a Game Warden for us.

[LindellProStaf]

I just put this on the using Carp as bait thread and thought maybe someone else had some Game Warden stories to tell so started a new thread.

[JayDeHay]

My game warden experience was similar in regards to the "That's illegal" comment, but the story is very different.

When my dad took me on the HOFNOD (Hooked On Fishing Not On Drugs) outing, we had the pleasure of being placed in the same boat as our local DNR agent, let's call him 'Joe'. We knew him fairly well, he was quite friendly and always had a smile.

It wasn't until about halfway through the trip that I learned the reason he and my dad were so close. It seams that about 40 years ago, 'Joe' was a relatively green agent on patrol when he came across some youngsters on a remote bridge in the toolies doing a little fishing... with rifles. My dad happened to be one of them.

'Joe' still likes to give my dad a little prodding about that from time to time, but is happy that my dad hasn't repeated his youthful transgression. My dad likes to prod 'Joe' about being his first big bust and making his career lol.

Best part: My sister had the pleasure of repeating the trip for them the next year. In retrospect, it wouldn't surprise me if 'Joe' had intentionally picked my dad, just to keep an eye on him lol