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Saturday, April 2, 2005
Fishing with pipe dreams
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AUBURN — Opening day of fishing season? Must be time to visit the hardware store. At least that's what it looked like Friday, when fishing season kicked off with fishermen lining the northern shore of frozen Lake Auburn - with their trusty PVC pipe on hand. The 2,260-acre lake is usually iced over when the open-water season begins each year on April 1, so fishermen have found a way around the lack of open water: They use PVC pipe to push their bait out under the ice, the same way electricians snake electrical wire through walls. And, according to the state, it's legal - even understandable, some say. "As long as they're not littering with the pipe and letting go of it, there is no prohibition on stuffing the bait under the ice," said Greg Sanborn, deputy chief of the Maine Warden Service. "They can't position themselves on the ice or chisel a hole on the ice." Southern Maine fisheries biologist Francis Brautigam said the technique is ethically sound. "I don't think there is anything wrong with it. I think anglers, right now, they're not allowed to fish off the ice. If that law was not in place, people would be using chain saws to cut troughs," Brautigam said. "What they've done is to develop another approach. It came to light last year." Lake Auburn has a rare and attractive urban shoreline that offers fishermen ample access. However, this year especially, the PVC-pipe technique was helpful after a long winter left an ice cover that reached virtually shore-to-shore. The lake was one massive ice sheet except where inlets cleared 10 to 20 feet of open water, such as at The Basin, at the lake's headwaters. On Friday, as dozens of early-morning fishermen lined Lake Shore Drive at Lake Auburn, PVC pipe could be seen lying along the road in a few spots. Lawrence Rideout used it successfully. After driving from Westbrook and claiming a spot near a culvert at 4 p.m. Thursday, Rideout camped out with his brother, Joe, who came from Oxford. The two brothers backed their vehicles trunk-to-trunk, strung a tarp between them, put out a few kerosene heaters and waited in deck chairs across the street from the lake until the start of the season - intent on getting the choice spot on the lake. "It's fishermen etiquette," Lawrence Rideout said. "If that guy showed at 4:30, he could have had it. But, since he showed at 7:30 p.m., he had to go down there." By 9 a.m. Friday, after reeling in two salmon and a togue, Rideout was showing off the catch. "I accidentally on purpose pull these up when people drive by," Rideout said as a large pickup truck crawled past him - and he hoisted his catch out of a bucket of water. "They slow, and look," he noted, with a triumphant grin. The PVC pipe was the key, said Rideout, who has a large bass tattoo and a license plate that reads: "FSHRMAN." He was happy to share the pipe with a friend, Stephanie Berry, whom the Rideouts invited to their prime spot. "I call second spot," Berry said, hoping to get a shot at the favorite fishing hole. Even 9-year-old Dylan Cook of Auburn, who fished at The Basin, down the road, wanted to use PVC piping. He asked his mother to buy some at Home Depot, but she refused. Having none, he came to Lake Auburn with his Maine lifetime fishing license and lucky lure. He fished off the bridge at the lake's north end Friday morning. The first day of the inland fishing season brought, as usual, rain and fishermen skipping work. Dylan joined them, missing school, as he normally does on opening day. "When I'm older, I'll be camping out here like the others," Cook said. A fisherman since age 2 who fishes every day through the summer, Cook said he's already hooked. "I still have the lure I started with in my tackle box," he said. Staff Writer Deirdre Fleming can be contacted at 791-6452 or at:
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