Memorializing the Mistakes of Anglers

You know those State Farm TV commercials where the guy says, "We know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two?" Well, Gary Nye (right), a physician assistant in the emergency room at Adirondack Medical Center in Saranac Lake, NY, makes a similar claim after having removed more than 100 lures from anglers' body parts over the last 20 plus years.

He has removed treble hooks from thumbs, arms, legs, noses, eyelids, lips, sides of necks, backs of heads (yip, I've been there, done that one and have the T-shirt)--in short, nearly every body part. "I've even taken lures off several patients' penises and scrotums," said Nye, adding, "those incidents usually occurred when the individuals were fishing and wearing small bathing suits, or skimpy, loose-fitting shorts with nothing on underneath. Alcohol usually had something to do with it," he noted.

And just like the State Farm TV commercials memorialize events with a trophy, the medical center staff memorializes the incidents by asking the anglers involved to let them keep the lures for posting on a bulletin board (left) for all to see. They began that practice back in 1990.

"Today," as noted by award-winning newspaper journalist and outdoors writer David Figura, "the more than 100 lures are displayed on two, side-by-side bulletin boards in the main lobby. One board shows lures taken from anglers from 1990 to 2000, and the other, 2000 to 20??. On top of the display boards is a sign that reads, 'The Ones That Didn't Get Away.'"

The display boards also include a hunting arrow with a razor-sharp broadhead, but Nye, nor other staff members, could remember the story behind it.

The lure display was the idea of Dr. Michael Pond, the former medical director, who is a fisherman as well. "Sometime in the late 1990s or 2000s," he said, "someone stole four or five antique lures from the case," which he went on to note were "absolutely gorgeous and expensive lures." As a safeguard against further thievery, the two display boards now are encased in glass and under lock and key.

According to Figura, "Nye has removed lures embedded in patients ranging in age from 2 to 90. In 95 percent of the cases, he claims to get the hook out without snipping the barb and pushing the hook all the way through. Instead, he usually begins by putting tape over the lure's other hooks to prevent further problems, then injects an anesthetic into the wound. The anesthetic serves two purposes. It deadens the pain, and it also results in fluid around the wound and the barb. He said he then grasps the hook with a needle-holding device, and with a little twist and flip of the wrist, the hook comes right out.

"Nye said not all the lures could readily be removed by emergency-room staff. There were a few cases where a hook went into the globe of an individual's eye. In those cases, the patients were immediately referred to an eye surgeon."

Every patient is asked if they want to donate their lure afterward, but not all do. Some anglers say it's their "lucky lure," and they don't want to part with it.