Sometimes the tough part is figuring out where to go fishing

It's a clich© among anglers: So many fish, so little time.

Western Nebraska has plenty of fish. But with its short ration of ideal weather and its sprawling landscapes, figuring out where to go can be a challenge.

Some of the better lakes are farther away. You have to hit some water early in the season, before it gets clogged with weeds. Often you have to do intricate mental calculations regarding the odds of other fishermen getting there first, or whether you'll be trolling in the path of holiday ski boats or jet-skiers. Experience helps.

Lake Minatare can resolve many of those calculations in a hurry when it's behaving properly. I got a tip last week regarding a spot where some walleye and perch have been congregating, so I drove out after work to check it out. A brief evening storm didn't leave me much time until nightfall, so I spent no more than a few minutes here and there trying to get over some fish. When I finally got a pattern going, I landed an 11.5-inch perch, a small one and one undersized walleye. But it was already getting dark.

That left me with a dilemma: Go back there on the weekend or go someplace else. If I chose a weekend morning and they weren't biting, it would pretty much blow the rest of the day. I decided, after a lot of hemming and hawing, to go someplace else and save the perch for some night after work.

I had a good feeling about my second option - so good, in fact, that I did something I've never done before: I tossed my camera tripod into the boat in case I needed a photo. If it hadn't taken so long for me to make up my mind I would have invited somebody else to go along. But even my most rabid fishing buddies roll their eyes at the idea of leaving town at 3 a.m. And that's what I ended up doing, driving almost two hours to arrive at the lake shortly before sunup.

That sounds crazy, I'm sure, but the way I see it there are two mornings this time of year. The first begins with the first glow of sunrise, the sweet chorus of redwings and doves, the melded chatter of hundreds of starlings bunched in the reeds and the soft fluffs of fog floating over a glassy lake. The other begins three hours later and 30 degrees hotter, bringing along the late-rising boaters and the opening gusts of the day's prairie winds. Most of the action happens early.

The first thing I did after launching the boat was pull on a sweatshirt. It was 46 degrees and there was barely enough daylight to tie on a lure. I wasn't 100 feet from the dock when I caught my first fish, a 23-inch walleye, on a contraption called a Chatterbait. I was fishing for bass. I caught a few of those too over the next few hours, including an 18-incher.

The fun really started when the pike woke up. The first one that hit would have been my biggest ever if it hadn't nipped through 50-pound Spiderwire like sewing thread. It didn't bite until it was next to the boat, and I got a good look at a broad back and at least three feet of mean-and-nasty as it popped my line. For a moment I didn't know whether to weep or vomit. After it was too late, I tied on a steel leader.

As I worked my way along the shoreline I came across a school of perch that chased my bass bait, and I paused awhile to jig up a few. I began to feel a little less stupid when it occurred to me that I had turned down an opportunity to catch walleye and perch to chase bass and pike and had caught all four before 9 a.m. With the walleye on the stringer already, I let the little fellers go.

After stopping for a slather of sunscreen and a drink of water I circled back to where I'd lost the big one, crossing a broad flat in the middle of the lake that'll turn into a thick mat of weeds in a few short weeks. I picked up a few more pike while working across it - dark, vividly marked fish up to two feet long, heavier than the hammer handles you catch an hour away at Box Butte Reservoir.

When I got back to the scene of the disaster I got slammed by another big boy that turned out to be 31.5 inches, exceeding my previous best by a half-inch and at least a pound. I set up the tripod and screwed on my pocket camera, took a couple of quick shots, said thanks and let him go.

By then a few other boats were milling around and the wind had picked up. I thought about leaving, because I'd already been out there for five hours. Instead, I spent another 90 minutes messing around but caught only one more fish. As far as I was concerned, the day was over.

I left the lake and stopped in at a store to pick up a sack of ice. I stuffed the walleye inside and headed for Scottsbluff. It was barely after noon. I'd boated about 20 fish, including a handful over three pounds and the biggest northern I had ever caught.

As I was driving back it occurred to me that in two trips to Canada I haven't landed a pike that size. And somewhere out there on that quiet little lake in the Sandhills of Nebraska is an even bigger dude that made off with my Chatterbait.

Editor Steve Frederick writes a fishing column during the summer months. He can be reached at 632-9055 or steve.frederick@starherald.com. His columns can be found on www.starherald.com under the Opinion link. More Ontario photos can be seen in his on-line photo gallery.