Sports

Fishing circuit comes to Lake Metigoshe

By Tyler Ohmann

01/07/2014

Imagine walking a mile in -20 degrees Fahrenheit, 20-plus miles per hour winds whipping, snow being blown all around and carrying a pail with more than 10 pounds of fish.

That’s what it took for Nick Schertz and Pete Venturi to win the North American Ice Fishing Circuit’s (NAIFC) opening qualifier tournament at Lake Metigoshe this past Sunday.

The arduous walk came because the pair’s ATV did not start likely due to the arctic temperatures.

“My quad didn’t start on the way back, and is still sitting out there,” Schertz said. “We quit at noon and walked in to make sure we’d get in, in time.”

The pair caught 16 bluegills that totaled 10.84 pounds to win the tournament and become “North Dakota Bluegill Champions.”

The winner was determined by the team of fishermen who caught and kept alive the best 16 bluegills, and the tally for the winner was close—really close.

That’s because Schertz and Venturi actually tied with second place finishers David Fike and Troy Jones of North Dakota.

However, per tournament rules the team with the largest fish wins the tiebreaker, and thanks to a .77 pound blue gill.

“We got just barely enough to get it done,” Schertz said. “It was a great day, and I’m so glad we came out here, and we picked this tournament because when we saw Metigoshe we knew this was a beautiful area to come and fish, and we love catching big bluegills.”

Justin and Nicky Potter of Westhope, N.D. took third place with 10.76 pounds. Other local competitors included Wyatt Johnson and Nicholas Monson of Bottineau, Riley Monson and Scott Monson of Bottineau, Steve Schepp and Shan Tonneson of Bottineau.

The biggest fish was caught by Roger Stearns and Todd Williamson from Manitoba. They reeled in a monster 1.05 pound bluegill.

Johnson and Nicholas Monson created a bit of controversy that invoked another of the tournaments rules. The team turned in too many fish.

As per the rules, “If a team is over their total number of fish, they will be penalized in the following manner: The big fish they register at weigh-ins will be the fish that is culled from their total bag number.”

Therefore, the Johnson-Monson team had to cull their top fish of .91 pounds, which dropped their total to 9.38 pounds. If they had correctly turned in 16 fish, they may have finished near the top three. Instead they finished with a respectable eighth place and qualified for the series finale at Lake Mille Lacs in Minnesota.

“We switched it up, but we were pretty much catching them on anything we dropped down the hole,” Nick Monson said.

The winners were happy with their strategy, which included finding a spot nobody else was at.

“The biggest thing to get this win today was we had fished around on a lot of the spots that we knew were holding some bluegills,” Schertz said. “And two days before the tournament we found a pod of fish that we had a really good feeling that nobody else was on.”

“We got our two biggest fish there in practice and we said let’s just leave it, and hope nobody sees us there, and we wont go back til tournament day and start there,” Schertz continued. “We started there and really got on them, and they were good fish, so that was the biggest thing, that we had a spot to ourselves and they were quality fish at the right depth.”

“It was a deep water bite, and that was our starting spot, and we ended up never having to leave,” Schertz added.

While Schertz and Venturi stayed in one spot, there were others that drilled many holes and went to different spots to try and find their fish. That was so for Jason Kamrath and Peter Hupf, also of Wisconsin.

“Being over the top of them, you had to drill and if you didn’t mark them they weren’t there obviously,” Kamrath said.

They also did some waiting too.

“There were a couple times we just waited them out, and caught some traveling,” Kamrath said. “You give them an extra five to seven minutes, and if you ain’t catching then move.”

Kamrath said he drilled a ton of holes, and whenever he or Hupf started catching fish they would drill more holes near each other.

“(I) Probably drilled 20 myself, but only a few of them were good in the travel routes that they were moving,” Kamrath said. “About 18 feet, and it was kind of in the dead water coming out of the flow, and dead water usually holds gills, and it was definitely stacked.”

“We gambled that they’d be there and they were,” Kamrath continued. “I had seven come up at a time, and would catch all seven.”

“I must have caught 40 or 50 today,” he added.

Wintry Weather

Of course another obstacle presented itself to many of the teams—the weather. Mother nature reared her ugly head and brought perhaps the coldest day of the year to the tournament.

It was brutal conditions,” said ice fishing legend Dave Genz, who emceed the event. “It made it a lot more difficult out there.”
Schertz definitely noticed the effects, as he fished without a heater, and ran into several problems.

“The weather just made everything hard today,” Schertz said. “The auger was hard to get started, the recoil was frozen and it was challenging to get everything going.”

One team, who walked to their spot, had auger problems and had to walk back and get a different auger. Then take that back and get to fishing.

Many fishermen complained of cold hands and feet, but 32 of them braved the elements to try and earn the North Dakota Bluegill Champion title.

Other NAIFC events

Besides Sunday’s tournament the NAIFC also put on events on Friday and Saturday. On Friday they held a seminar for adult fishermen that included talks on several areas of fishing, and a round table discussion with pros and NAIFC staff.

Perhaps the most important part of the weekend came on Saturday, when NAIFC Jack Baker and his daughter Greta did several demonstrations to a packed room of children.

Approximately two dozen children and their parents attended the seminar that taught kids and parents alike how to have a memorable fishing trip, as well as techniques on where and how to find and catch fish.

“The NAIFC’s aspect is that we are 2/3 education and 1/3 competition,” Baker said. “It is very important.”

Education is an even bigger part than the competition for the NAIFC.

“The NAIFC is based on education and furthering the sport,” Baker said. “We’ve had great turnout, and that’s the thing that you never know.”

“As nice as it was and as nasty as it got in one 12-hour period, you just never know how it will play out,” Baker added.

Many area individuals helped sponsor and volunteer the event. All the festivities including the seminars and the weigh-in were hosted by Twin Oaks.

As long as Schertz and Venturi’s truck starts, they’ll be a little warmer on their ride home.