A Prop-Stopper If I Ever Saw One

I was checking out the latest issue of Jay Kumar's BassBlaster when I came across the photo at right, showing the wire turtle trap that bass pro Russ Lane picked up while fishing his first tournament of the new year. Just goes to show you that everybody has to take his/her turn in the barrel. Lane summed up his feelings in one word, "Disgusting!"

This incident made me start wondering what other kinds of messes involving props have occurred over the years.

I feel pretty certain the vast majority of us have found fishing line wrapped around our props from time to time. There truly is never a morning that I don't sweat finding some line in the water as I ease up the channel toward the West Neck Store for a tournament. It already has happened to me multiple times since 1977.

Would imagine a few folks also have gotten hooked up in crab pots from time to time, as well.

After a bit more research on the Internet, I found one other incident that...at best...only could be termed gruesome.

Seems an angler was backing his boat off the trailer one morning when he realized something wasn't right. He subsequently shut everything down and pulled the trailer up the ramp a ways to see what was wrong.

Imagine his surprise when he found a deer carcass wrapped around the propeller. Someone evidently had cleaned the deer and then tossed the remains in the water at the ramp.

Local game wardens noted that they "find stuff like that at boat ramps all the time." For the unlucky angler in this case, however, it was the first (and hopefully the last) time he'll ever have to deal with something like that.