First fish of spring

The first gift of Christmas, a big deal to the kid in “The Polar Express,” pales in my estimation beside the first fish of spring.

Mine came Tuesday evening with the forearm-tingling thwack that signals a walleye's inhalation of a slow wobbling crankbait.

I would not have even been on the river Tuesday had I not gotten a heads up from a friend who said he and a buddy had just caught four nice smallmouth bass on Rapala minnow-imitating crankbaits at the mouth of a river tributary.

That late-afternoon phone call prompted me to wonder: How can I, Orlan Love, experience that same thrill?

With a large inventory of floating Rapalas and access to a few mouths of Wapsipinicon River tributaries, I resolved to duplicate their feat.

Getting to the mouth of the creek I selected, which required crossing it to reach my preferred casting spots, proved difficult.

While the creek itself looked like trout water, it was lined on both sides by high, steep banks, which I could have easily scaled had they not been uniformly coated in slippery mud.

When I could find no alternative, I skied down the first bank, splashed across the creek and took a run at the second bank. I made it about three-quarters of the way to the top before I lost traction, fell on my face and slid back into the creek.

With the worst-case scenario already behind me, I crawled up the bank on my hands and knees and walked to the river, where I deslimed my hands, chest waders and reel and started casting.

Having not been paying close attention to river conditions during the preceding week, I was pleasantly surprised to find the Wapsie, which had been near flood stage in late March, had cleared dramatically and fallen to fishable levels.

Though the water was still cold enough to inhibit fish activity, the creek flowing into it contributed slightly warmer water that could attract baitfish and concentrate game fish.

After fruitless casts to all the likely spots, my modest expectations gave way to the realization that I had likely mudded myself for nothing.

Then, as my floating Rapala flickered in the downstream current, the hoped-for signature thwack salvaged the day.

I knew it was a walleye, and when I reared back on the rod and could barely move it, I knew it was a good one.

Aided by a brisk current, the fish made several jolting downstream bursts before succumbing to the pressure of my arched rod and sliding ashore, where I captured it for tonight's Lenten meal.