Spring Trash is Grizld's Treasure!

I grew up sucker fishing Crockery Crick. I don't expect most, if any, of you to know where it is and I'm not about to waste my time trying to explain. It's generally a muddy, tangled, knot of a crick. Rare are the stretches that anyone would label “picturesque”. Oh, you're still back there wondering why I called it a crick, and not a creek, aren't ya? Well, that's because that's what it is. There's a hard distinction between the two. The late outdoor author and scholar, Patrick F. McManus, goes into detail about the differences in his essay “How to Fish a Crick”. As he has already expounded greatly on the topic, I will summarize. A creek is calm, pristine, and well behaved. A crick is liable to get thrown in the drunk tank on a Saturday night after doing shots of house whiskey.

But I started off talking about growing up sucker fishing, so stop distracting me.

From about as early as I can recall, our family would fish the crick from mid March, well into the summer. Our primary target was sucker. Occasionally a trout would end up on the end of our hooks, but I promise, it was never intentional. Obviously these trout were at the lower end of the intellectual spectrum for their species, so we did our part and removed them from the gene pool.

Sucker are a bottom feeders. They eat worms, bug, invertebrates, and a host of other organic materials. Most folks consider them trash fish. The Michigan DNR labels them as “rough” fish; a distinction also afforded to carp, gar, and buffalo, to name a few others.

Some folks, myself included, enjoy pursuing these fish that are often deemed unfit for true sportsman. That's fine. They're more than welcome to keep flipping their jigs or double hauling their streamers in in pursuit of more reputable species. Us folks is plenty happy to sit on the bank, relax, and enjoy some really fun fishing. And I'll let you in on a little secret...Some of us miscreants even take them home to eat 'em! Gasp!

I know it's a risk to be divulging such things. It wouldn't do to have the local waterways all crowded up with other folks. But I think I can trust you to keep it under yer hat.

When they make their annual spawning run in the spring, that's the time you want to be out getting after 'em. A standard slip sinker rig, like the Carolina rig, and nightcrawlers for bait, is ideal. You want places with lots of current and deeper holes. Use a heavy enough sinker to keep your bait from drifting downstream. Then just cast it on out into that deep hole with good current, set it in the crotch of your forked stick, and sit back and wait.

What's that? You don't have a forked stick? Well why not, man? You're going sucker fishing. You gotta have a forked stick. If you're in an area that doesn't have much in the way of good forked sticks, I suppose it's okay if you use a store bought rod holder. Fisherman are forgiving folks and they won't hold it against you for too long. Forty years or so would be about right.

Anyway, you got your bait out in the water and you're sitting and waiting and relaxing and generally living the good life. You may be tempted to put some music on. Don't do that. Nobody else wants to hear it. We're out there to get away from noise and people...mostly the people, but we don't want no extra noise either.

So you're sitting there, QUITELY, watching your rod. You'll know when you've got a sucker on the other end because the rod tip will start bouncing up and down like a headbanger at a Metallica concert in 1993. If you don't get the reference, don't worry about it. You won't appreciate it even if you do look it up.

A lot of times the rod tip will start bouncing and you'll get all excited and go to set the hook only to find out it was a clump of leaves caught in the current or a creek chub, neither of which are much fun to catch. So you toss your big ol' nightcrawler back out there and sit and wait some more.

A lot of folks will tell ya that sucker ain't fit to eat. They couldn't be more wrong. Granted, they do take a bit more work than other species, but once you get the hang of things, it only adds another minute or so to the cleaning process. 

Suckers got what people call "Y" bones, and they are a hassle if not handled properly. Our trick is to filet the fish like normal, then score it every quarter inch, making sure to cut through the "Y" bones. Once scored, the filet is breaded and deep fried in hot oil, and the small pieces of bone will break down and ya won't even notice 'em. 

So there ya have it. That's what spring sucker fishing is all about. But don't go blabbing our little secret to everyone and their brother. Wouldn't do to have all the suckers caught up by everyone else. Now grab yer forked stick and get out there. We'll see ya outdoors!