Chris Lee had a plan, but there was a ticking time bomb of sorts that was putting added pressure on him and thousands of other sturgeon spearers this season.
While the rest of us were enjoying record warm temperatures, those spearers on Lake Winnebago and the upriver lakes were sweating for a different reason: The ice their cherished sport depended on was quickly deteriorating.
While most spearers want a big fish, especially one in the elite 100-pound class or better, some spearers never even see a fish appear in their 4-by-8-foot holes for years, even decades. With the rapidly melting ice, Lee planned to jab the first legal fish he saw and go home dry and happy.
The Winneconne spearer had drawn a coveted upriver lakes tag — one of only 500 issued this season — which typically takes up to eight years to get. This allows the spearer to set up his shanty on Lakes Butte des Morts, Winneconne or Poygan. Lee has only speared on Poygan, patiently waiting year after year to chase sturgeon there, where the odds of success top 60%, rather than spear every year on Winnebago, where the odds are about 10%.
He’s managed to take five fish in his spearing career, including a whopping 78-pounder that was 68 inches long.
Lee’s father, Randy Lee, lives just a few doors away from his son and knows most of the spearers in his Winneconne neighborhood. Friends and relatives share shanties and gear, helping each other with drilling pre-season holes for scouting, cutting in shanties and all the other chores that go with the sport.
Opening Saturday (Feb. 11) found the younger Lee sitting in a shanty his dad borrowed from a friend and set up. Both Lees had confidence in the ice, which measured 9 to 12 inches on Poygan that morning. Chris drove us onto the ice with his Jeep Compass, while his dad drove a big Nissan Titan pickup truck full of gear.
Spearing sturgeon is similar to deer hunting, but without the woods full of critters to break the monotony of waiting. Staring into the hole from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. daily can be agony, but when a bluegill, shad or other fish appears, it’s like the first volley of fireworks on the Fourth of July. We spotted a few shad during the first hour or so, but nothing else.
At 8:20 a.m., we were both startled when one of the two spears we had hanging from the shanty ceiling fell straight down into the water. Spears have heavy steel heads and are too heavy to hold for hours, so most spearers use an eyehook screwed into the handle to suspend the spear over the hole from a hook in the ceiling. This borrowed shanty had odd L-shaped hooks with duct tape to keep the eyehook from slipping off. The tape had let go, allowing the eyehook to slide off the L-hook.
Because we were fishing over just 5 1/2 feet of water (the shallow water of the upriver lakes makes it easier to see and spear fish, compared to Winnebago), the handle was sticking out of the water, so it was easy to retrieve. Both the handle and spear head are attached to separate ropes as well.
We chuckled about the literal slip-up, re-rigged the spear and went back to staring at the hole.
At 8:55, the spear again slipped off the L-shaped hook. We had trouble getting the spear head attached to the handle via a toothpick that slides through a tiny hole in both. We called Randy on his cell phone to lend a hand.
I broke out some crackers and cheese as we settled in again. Chris bobbed his two lures — a copper cake pan and three fidget spinners suspended from cords — a few times to attract a sturgeon.
Just before 9:30 a.m., Chris said in a soft voice, “There’s a fish.” I assumed by his almost monotonous tone that he’d seen a shad or maybe a gar. Then he launched the spear and said, “Got him. He’s pinned to the bottom. Now let’s get everything out of the shanty.”
Eight years of waiting for a tag and hours of cutting a giant hole in the ice with a chainsaw and all the other prep work were over in seconds. I’d witnessed only my second sturgeon speared in more than a decade.
Chris marked his tag with a knife as required, then we headed for Critter’s Wolf River Sports in Winneconne, one of several Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources weigh stations where successful spearers are required to bring their fish. Staff weigh and measure each fish, and determine whether it’s a male or female and a juvenile or adult, with each fish moving the needle closer to season’s end.
Lake Winnebago and the upriver lakes have separate quotas for males, juvenile females and adult females, as well as a cumulative quota. If any individual quota gets within 90%, spearing on that watershed ends after the next day. If any quota is reached, the season there ends immediately.
The Lake Winnebago quotas this year were 280 juvenile females, 714 adult females and 985 males. The upriver lakes quotas were 70, 79 and 246, respectively.
Chris’ svelte 45.1-inch male weighed 18.4 pounds and was destined for the smoker, the fryer or both.
There were larger sturgeon at the check stations (one Winnebago spearer jabbed a 177-pounder a few days later), but none speared as swiftly and efficiently.
“This is the earliest I’ve ever speared one,” Chris said. “I was at the check station before the spearing time ended.”
His lucky fidget-spinner lure went to his uncle Ray Lee’s shanty, where Ray’s son-in-law used it to jab another sturgeon.
Ross Bielema is a freelance writer from New London and owner of Wolf River Concealed Carry LLC. Readers can contact him at Ross@wolfriverccw.com.
Warm weather has sturgeon spearers sweating
