Fishing With Dave

[bountyhunter]

Over my life I have been very luck to have been able to fish in many locations and with many different folks. None of these folks will be remembered like Dave. Dave was a very special (Forrest Gump Special) fisherman that gave me and the other guys that fished with us many hours of funny stories.

It all started back in the fall of 1989 during the flounder run. I had only been in the Houston area for about a year and hadn't gotten any place to hunt lined out as yet, so I decided to take my annual week off for hunting. The only thing I was not going hunting, I was going to try my luck catching flounder. My wife informed me that if I was going to take a week off to catch flounder, then she expected me to fill the freezer with filets. Luck was on my side, as I had a great week fishing and to this day it ranks up there as my best week ever fishing as I ended up with 139 flounder during 7 days. If you remember back in 89 the limited on flounder was 20 a day, so I almost had limits everyday.

Well by mid week the guys from work were calling for fishing reports and I was giving them great ones. Dave decided that he had to get in on this fishing, though he had not done a lot of saltwater fishing as he was from Kentucky, and I think from way way back in the mountains. Dave asked what he would need to meet me at Seawolf Park on Friday morning after work. He had never wade fished so I told him he would need waders (remember 89 was that really cold year here for us) as the water was cold. Not making a lot of money in those days, Dave said he couldn't afford waders. I told him about the cheapie ones that sold a K-Mart and Walmart for about $10. I haven't seen them in a while (really haven't looked) but if you remember them they were not much more than trash bags in the shape of pants. They were stocking footed and really light weight, so I told Dave to get them a size big so he could put some warm clothes under them.

Well Dave was no small guy, in fact is was somewhat on the X-large size with a belly that was almost as big as me by its self. He was not a gentle giant either, more like the bull in the china shop type of guy. Dave was also not a quiet guy either, he was very loud at everything he did. Well I didn't hear any more from him until he came wading up to me at Seawolf that Friday morning. He got there around 9 that morning so the water was full of fishermen. I had been there at first light and already had close to half me limited.

Dave waded to me and held up a flounder he had caught on the way out. This flounder couldn't have been more than six inches and I had the hardest time making him turn the little guy go. By the time he did release the fish, just about everyone within 100 yards of us (50-60 fishermen) were looking and pointing at us. Well to make matters worse it was about this time that Dave loudly announced his dislike of the waders. He flatly stated, “I don't like these here wader pants, the only shoes I could get to fit down inside them was my shower shoes! I couldn't believe my ears and couldn't help but ask, What did you say? He answered my question with the same statement, only this time it was twice as loud. You guessed it, there were a bunch of guys laughing all around us. That is when I told Dave that you were suppose to wear the shoe over the waders and not inside them. To this he said, You recon that's why they're leaking? At this point I just turned made another cast and tried not to make eye contact with any of the other fisherman in the area.


This day continued when a few more funnies, as did the next five or six years fishing with Dave, but I don’t want to eat up any more bandwidth unless you folks would like to read more.


Later
Derek

[FlatoutFishin]

I believe I heard that one Derek somewhere else...

[bountyhunter]

Monte everyone needs to hear the fishing with Dave stories.......at least once.

[Shin-Diggin]

I laughed as hard as the first time I read it.

Post the one about him going in Walmart.

[FlatoutFishin]

Monte everyone needs to hear the fishing with Dave stories.......at least once.

Keep em coming...once isn't enough!

[bountyhunter]

Well things calmed down some the next hour or so and we were catching a few flounder. Ole Dave still wanted to keep the small ones, even after I had explained that they had to be 12 inches and that was the law. A few of the guys that were fishing close to us, even chimed in with the same information and he would let the little one go. There were really six of us fishing close together and all trying to pull another flounder out of the mud hole next to the ship at Seawolf. As we fished we chatted with each other and was really having a great time.

It was about then that I had a hit, and gave the flounder a little time with my finger mullet. When I set the hook the line broke. A little upset I had not been checking my line for nicks, I reeled up to find only my hook was gone. I quickly tied on a new hook and had a fresh finger mullet on and a new cast in just a matter of minutes. As I was making the cast I stated, “I’m going to catch that flounder that has my hook in his mouth” just to get a laugh. Well as my bait came to the same point as I had the hit before, low and behold I got another hit. I again gave him some time and then set the hook. This time the fight was on and it wasn’t long before I was netting another feisty 3lb flounder. When I started to take my hook out I noticed that here was also another hook in the other corner of his mouth. Of course I had to show everyone there, and they all bowed to their new fishing god, well I might be making up the bowing part, but they were all impressed to say the least.

This flounder though seemed to be the last one in the hole because close to an hour passed without another hit. This is when Dave started to say things like, bet them fish is deeper water or we need to be casting further. What didn’t help matters was just after another of his loudly stated “We ain’t a casting far enough” a guy out close to the channel hooks up and lands a nice flounder. This brought an “I told you so” from Dave. As the rest of the guys and I continued to fish the mud hole, Dave had other plans. What I didn’t know was how he was planning his execution of fishing in deeper water, but I was soon to find out.

While I was fishing I had not notice that Dave had tied on a 2 oz sinker until it was way too late. He reared back and with all his might let fly a cast towards the channel. I watched in awe as that big piece of lead headed out toward many unsuspecting fishermen, but for some reason neither I nor my fellow fisherman could yell out a warning of “In Coming”. Lucky was everyone as the big weight landed with a huge splash. It did cause guys in the generally area to look to see what caused such a splash on a calm morning. But none of them really knew and just were looking at each other. I told Dave that he was going to hurt someone by throwing such a large weight amongst so many people, but he just looked at me and kept fishing. For some weird reason neither I nor the other guys around were fishing any longer, we were just standing there looking at Dave. Not sure if it was awe or shock from what happened but all the other fishermen there with us had the blank looks on their faces, and I guess I had the same look on mine.

At this point Dave sets the hook hard, and at the same time a guy some 50 yards beyond us seems to reach back and grab his butt. It was a sight to say the least and we were trying to get Dave to quit reeling and jerking on his rod. To this Dave loudly said, “I ain’t hooked no guy it’s a fish cause he is a taken drag”. This caused me to look at the guy grabbing his butt, and yep he was moving away, and pulling at his stringer. That is when I saw him pull his stringer loose and let it go. That is when I knew Dave had hooked his stringer and not the fisherman himself. Guess the fisherman thought a shark or something had gotten a hold of his fish and he didn’t want to have no dealings with a shark.

Dave continued to fight “his fish” and finally brought up the stringer with his hook in it. He didn’t stop there, he pulled up the stringer which had 10-12 good flounder on it and proudly announced “Told you guys the Founder were out deeper and you can catch them more than one at a time”. Well it almost took myself and the other guys around to get physical to get Dave to give the guy back his stringer and fish. Dave just kept saying “I caught them fair and square!”

Needless to say I had to leave at this point, and that was the only day that week I didn’t catch my limited of flounder.

More to come later………

[Unclehandy]

[bountyhunter]

To say the least, you could call Dave “Wader Challenged” as he had all kinds of problems with his waders over the years. As you know from the first part of this story, he didn’t know that stocking foot waders required the shoes to be worn on the outside, but here is more of his “Wader Challenged” fishing trips.

It was the early summer of 1990 when Dave decided to meet another fishing partner (Jeff) and I at Seabrook Flats one morning to catch some flounder. We all met there at about sun up and started getting ready to hit the water. Dave began to put on his pair of cheapie waders (new set as the first ones before had way too many holes in the feet to fix as you might recall). You may ask why he was putting on waders in the summer, well that is another funny that happen a few weeks before.

I normally just wore jeans when I waded during the summer in those days. Well this summer morning Dave met me down at the Texas City Dike to do some wading in the MosquitoIsland area. I was getting ready to get in the water as he pulls up and rolls out of his truck. He was wearing these short shorts and t-shirt and thank god the t-shirt was long. If he had tucked that t-shirt into his shorts I might be blind today. This man had no business wearing shorts, as his white legs were reflecting enough of the morning sun to start a fire. He grabbed his rod and gear from the bed of his truck and headed to meet me in the water.

We entered the water and were about waist deep when all of a sudden Dave (in his louder than normal voice) started screaming “They’re biting me, they’re biting me.” This caused me to turn and look at him just in time to see him start walking on water, well walking on water as well as a 300lb plus man can. He headed toward the shore faster than I have ever seen, I mean this was world class sprinter speed. Once he was on dry land and safe, he stopped for a moment to catch his breath (well that really took more than a moment) then announced that something had been attacking his legs. If you have ever been in the water in shorts you will know that piggy perch sometimes will pull at the hairs on your legs and that is what I figured had happened to him. However no matter how I explained this to him he was not getting back in the water.

This brings us back to Seabrook Flats, and Dave finishing putting on his waders. Well as I mentioned earlier, Dave had a rather large belly on him and even the XXL waders he had would not fit up over this belly. That didn’t make any difference to him as they were there just to keep the evil fish from attacking his legs. So off to the water we went and were soon fishing. We started out not having much luck and had spread out looking to see if we could find some fish. We had been at it for almost an hour when I got my first hit (first among the three of us also) and was soon landing a small but keeper flounder. On the very next cast to the same general location I again have a hit that produced a little bit bigger flounder. Both Dave and Jeff headed in my direction, the only problem was I was chest deep in the water, and even though Dave was taller than me, the water would still be above the top of his waders. I warned him of this fact but he never slowed, and stated “You is only sayin’ that to keep me away from the fish.” Which wasn’t true, but I had learned not to argue with Dave as he had his own way of thinking.

The three of us fished this area for most of the next hour and picked up 5 or 6 more keeper flounder between us, as well as a few undersized ones as well. Yes you guessed it, Dave wanted to keep them little ones again, and I had to flat tell him if he wanted to fish with me any longer then he was never to keep an undersized fish. So he turned them go, but grumbled under his breath each time he did.

It was about then that we heard the first clap of thunder and looked up the coast to the northeast and saw that there was a pretty good storm bearing down on us. I was never one to risk fishing in such conditions and announced it was time to head in, to which Jeff agreed. Dave however stated “Go ahead you wussies that is just more fish for me.” We tried to talk some sense into him, but as I said before he had his own way of thinking. Jeff and I headed in and as we were walking up to our trucks the skies were getting really dark. Though I wore jeans while fishing, I always wore a bathing suit under the jeans so I could get out of some of the wet clothes before the drive home. Jeff had learned to do the same so we are taking off our wet things when all of a sudden the whole sky lights up and there was an immediate and loud clap of thunder. We both looked at each other and said “Dave”.

As I had my wet jeans off, I turned and ran back to the water. What I saw when I got to the water’s edge was almost indescribable. There was Dave in water just over his ankles. His cheapie waders were so full of water they had ballooned out where each of the legs were bigger than the diameter of my truck tires. He was just standing there and couldn’t move. About this time Jeff joined me at water’s edge where he stopped and was also speechless. This is when Dave saw us and started yelling “Help me, help me, one of you guys come out here and pop me.”

More coming later.

[bountyhunter]

Over the summer Dave started to save his money to buy a pair of neoprene waders for the fall flounder run. As I had said we weren’t making a lot of money in those days and it was the middle of October and Dave still didn’t have enough money. It was about that time that Malburger’s put and off brand name pair of stocking foot neoprene waders on sale for around $39 and Dave jumped on them. The only problem was these waders didn’t come in anything bigger than XXL and we know that XXL really wasn’t big enough for Dave, but he bought a pair anyway. The week following his wader purchase a pretty good cold front came through about mid week so four of us (Dave included) planned to hit SanLuisPass to see if this front would start the flounder moving.

The four of us meet at the Kettle in Dickinson that morning for breakfast as they had a really great buffet in those days. This is when we found out that you don’t go to a buffet with Dave as this man is not only big but in can really put away some food. In fact we were there almost 2 hours so Dave could get his fill, and his first plate had more food on it than I ate the whole morning. It got so bad that the waitress were all pointing and laughing at Dave at first, but after his sixth plate they had stopped laughing, and had pointed him out to the manger. It was at this point that the rest of us almost had to drag him out of there. Besides we were now late as there was no way we could get to SLP by first light.

We all loaded into my truck (I had the only supercab) off we went. I had noticed that Dave still had his waders in the box and ask him, “Dave did you try on your waders?” His answer was, “Nope ain’t even opened the box little buddy”. I must explain that he almost always referred to me as “Little Buddy” not that I really enjoyed being called that, but my complaints were promptly ignored. So I had to live with being called that for many years. That he hadn’t tried on his waders let me know that were again in for a real treat once get got down to the Pass.

I pulled the truck up as close to the water as I dared and we all bailed out and started putting on our waders. When Dave opened his box, there was this little yellow card on top of the waders. He picked it up and read it, then said “What the he!! does this mean?” So I reached for the card to read it, thinking it was some kind of directions for the care of the waders, but what I read made me go to my knees laughing as did the other two guys with us once they read the card. The card had on it in big bold letters “If your fat @ss won’t fit in these, don’t go in the water cause you will be harpooned!” I had never in my life see anything that funny and Dave asking “What’s so funny?’” over and over again and that kept the three of us rolling. I mean I laughed so hard it hurt to take a breath. The only thing I could figure was someone at the company that made the waders, was putting those cards in the box as a joke. Not sure if they put them in all the XXL size boxes or what but man one in Dave’s box was sure special.

To make matters worse, these waders came in two colors, brown and cream. The cream was really very close to skin tone, and yes you guessed it, Dave had picked the cream color waders. Dave started pulling and tugging on the waders to get them on, and believe you me those things were at least one size too small. It took him the better part of 30 minutes to finally get them pulled over his belly and once he was done they were so tight it was almost looked like he was standing there naked. To say the least in was not a pretty sight, unless you enjoy seeing 300lb plus men naked. He did have a cherry to put on top though, as he had bought white gum boots to wear with his waders and as he headed to the water, it looked like a naked fat man in white boots.

It was really cold this morning and the worst part was the wind shifted on us and started coming from the northwest. After an hour of nothing we decided to pack up and head to Seawolf to try our luck. Also, Steve, one of the other guys had forgotten to bring gloves and we were going to stop by Walmart on 61st Street to get him a pair. When we got to the truck, we decide not to even take the time to get out of our waders, besides they were warm. So we all loaded up and were back on the road headed toward Seawolf.

I was throwing the coals to the fire and it wasn’t too long before we were pulling into the Walmart parking lot. Once I got the truck parked, Steve announced that he really didn’t want to go to all the trouble of taking off his waders and wasn’t going to wear them inside the store. To this announcement Dave said, “Give me the money and I’ll go in and get your gloves” This statement caused my mouth to drop, as it did for Steve and Jeff. None of us could believe that he would really go in the store looking like a naked fat man in white boots, but Steve handed him some money and out of the truck he climbed.

As Dave started lumbering toward the store, all the people in the parking lot stopped what they were doing to look at this unbelievable sight. Everyone of them had their mouths gaped open in disbelief as what appeared to be a naked fat man in white boots was heading in the store. The three of us in the truck were in tears from laughing by the time Dave disappeared in through the front doors. I’m not sure how long he was in the store, but the thought of all the people inside seeing him like that had us still laughing as he reappeared. People were now pointing and laughing at him, and this just caused our own laughing to worsen.

Dave got to the truck and opened to the door and looked at us all laughing then said, “What is so funny!”

[Unclehandy]

Wow, you can type man! Great stories!

[Milkjug]

You could write a book on this guy

[bountyhunter]

I've been told I need to write a book about him. Maybe one day after I finish the book I'm currently working on.

[coachlaw]

I have never seen or heard the Dave stories before. I can't even finish my lunch I'm laughing so hard!

[WestEndAngler]

"come over and pop me"

[007]

Tells us more......Tell us more!!