12-06-2005, 02:57 PM
I moved to Utah from Kansas in 1974. Did most of my fishing on our own land which had a nice creek running through it and a couple livestock ponds. The ponds weren't worth much - just a few bullheads. But the creek had a nice variety - crappie, largemouth bass, channel cats and sunfish. ANYWAY, I never had to have a license and could fish year round with as many poles as I wanted (often cane poles) and didn't have to be within eye-shot.
ANYWAY, there used to be a fishing season in Utah that began the Saturday before Memorial Day and went until ... That's the part I don't remember; I don't think you could ice fish in Utah then.
Any of you old codgers, i.e. kentofnsl, tubedude, oldcoot, oldscrat, and others ---can you fill in the blanks for me and add your own remembrances to this?
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ANYWAY, there used to be a fishing season in Utah that began the Saturday before Memorial Day and went until ... That's the part I don't remember; I don't think you could ice fish in Utah then.
Any of you old codgers, i.e. kentofnsl, tubedude, oldcoot, oldscrat, and others ---can you fill in the blanks for me and add your own remembrances to this?
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] Yes, I can fondly remember those days. I can remember standing on the shoreline of Scofield, and a few other bodies of water, on opening morning and we would have our rods all baited and ready to cast. Someone would yell out that it was 4:00 AM, and it was just like the opening of the pheasant hunt, it was more like 15 minutes to 4:00 AM, and everyone would make their first cast of the season. It was amazing how many people went fishing on that first Saturday. We quit fishing a few weeks before the season ended for the year, so I don't have any memories about fishing at the end of the season. I'm not sure if Utah Lake was open all year in those days, but I believe that it was. I also recall them finally allowing a few other bodies of water to be open, for example one could ice fish Deer Creek but must immediately release any trout that one happened to catch. I believe it was sometime in the early eighties when they opened the entire state to ice fishing. I remember talking to a guy I worked with who tried ice fishing on Strawberry on January 1st (the day that it opened) and cutting a hole in the ice with an axe. As I recall, he got plenty wet and cold but didn't catch any fish.