John Kinkead writes...

On 4/13/11 I was driving home from my Midnight Job at Cabelas in Dundee, MI. I had knew a couple of my buddy's had fished the night before. I decided to give my buddy Alex a call and get the fishing report. He had told me they caught 10 fish in 2 hrs with an 8lb average. This was a credible as a fishing report gets. I talked to him and said I was thinking of going out and had nobody to fish with on such short notice on a weekday. He convinced me to go out alone that the fish were there and biting aggressively. That was all it took I was on my way to get my boat and 18 ft crestliner sportsman with a 40 horse tiller drive Johnson equipped with a Minnkota bow mount trolling motor. I launched right around 7:00 out of Elizabeth Park in Trenton, MI. After a short boat ride I was into my first drift. After 2 hours and 3 drifts of watching boats all around me net a few fish here and there I was still empty handed. With a 42 degree surface temp and sunny clear skies with a light wind, I knew the fish were here and was determined to catch a walleye that morning. It was about 10 minutes into my first drift about 9:30am as I moved into about 10 ft of water when my line was pulled down. Immediately set the hook with my personalized St. Croix Avid Spinning rod which is a 6'6" MH. The weight on the other end of the line was heavy as if I were pulling a log off the bottom. As the fish came to the surface I looked over the side of the boat to see the largest walleye that I had ever seen on the end of my line! When the fish came to the surface we met eye to eye. She then took of to the side of the boat all I could do was hold my rod tip straight to the water hoping my 8lb flame green berkly fireline and 10lb vanish leader would hold to this fish pull. As I prepared the net hanging off the side of the boat I brought her to the side a 2nd time was then that I saw my 1/2 orange and black 2 tone gumball jig tipped with a 4" gulp smelt colored minnow in her mouth. Then she ran again and again I was holding my rod tip straight to the water letting the drag spool off of my Shimano Sonora spinning reel. She ran about 15 ft off the side of the boat, as she stopped I lifted the rod and slowly brought her back toward the boat. When she came back to the boat she was coming along the surface right to me. I held the net in front of her, pulled her head into the net and kept pulling until tail was almost in and then scooped. She was in the net! I was shaking and having uncontrollable heart palpitations. I tried to lift the net into the boat with 1 arm but could not make it. I then set my rod down pulled her into the boat. I initially I did not know how big it was I knew it was gonna be at least a 12lber. until I had went to a fellow anglers boat and asked to use a scale. Then we were in amazement the fish was tipping between 15 and 16 lbs. Wow I thought to myself. It was then when I knew I had to have this river monster officially weighed. A guy whom I knew on the water told me that Bottom Line bait and tackle had a certified master angler scale and I took it there after I pulled the boat out of the water. After putting in the scale at bottom line it weighed out to 15.9lbs which converts to 15lb 12oz. After filling out the master angler application and freezing the beast for the taxidermist. I went online to the mi.gov/dnre website to look at the master angler entries. To my knowledge and research this had been the biggest walleye being reported being caught in the Detroit River since 1994 which is as far back as the websites records show. There are so many anglers that travel here from out of state every year and just so many people that fish this tremendous fishery each year for this to be the heaviest walleye caught in 15year is absolutely a fish and accomplishment of a lifetime.

Rich Arch, fishing manager at Gander Mountain Port Huron caught this 22 inch 4.5 lb smallmouth on fish stalker mother of pearl at Cedar lake.