Uncle Bill Didn't Know Power Plants Caused the Decline in Fishing

Fishing trips could go all the way to the horizon.

Dearly departed, Uncle Bill was the best boatman I’ve ever known.  He could take the waves and motor across Lake Erie with such grace.  It was a sad day when he decided to hang up the old fishing cap, and retire the boat for good.  He’d seen the best of the fishing days, and knew Lake Erie from end to end.

He knew the shallow spots, and hidden obstacles beneath the surface.  More than that, he knew the islands’ best fishing spots.  An hour long boat ride may take the fishing excursion to the most northern points where 45 feet of water was as deep as a line could go. A double header cast down into the depths and reeled back almost always yielded two good sized perch. 

I’d bait my minnies, all the while feeling sorry for them, and never catch a thing.  In the meantime, the men folk filled up a twenty four by thirty six inch pallet of gleaming golden perch enough for a winter’s worth of good eating.

 Uncle Bill knew the best perch fishing spots, and when and where to caste.  In the fall we’d walleye fish.  That’s when I caught my one and only walleye.  It was with much pride that I got to brag about “skunking” the men folk.

It was a very sad day when returning to the campground and seeing the empty spot where his camper used to be.  After that, not much time went by and he passed on.

He never knew the reason for the decline in fishing successes.  He blamed the netters on the Canadian side of Lake Erie.  I wish I could tell him that it’s going to get better now. 

The coal fired power plants were responsible for the death of many perch and walleye.  It was a long debate on the part of First Energy.  Cleaning up the waterways meant job loss, but the exorbitant cost to improve the water intake systems made closing down a more viable alternative.

Our fishing tours always began on the bay side

In Uncle Bill’s day, Lake Erie boasted an estimated eight million fish.  More recently, that number dropped to around twenty million according to the Port Clinton Herald Newspaper.

If I could talk to Uncle Bill, I’d get to tell him how the water cooling systems at the various power plants killed bait fish, and sucked in walleye.  Now, eight of the plants will be shut down.  I could tell him how ecologists and charter captains are looking forward to an immediate difference.

We could look forward to being in walleye heaven, the kind of heaven that Uncle Bill would have liked best.