On Saturday, Feb. 11, 2012, I covered the opening day of sturgeon spear season on Lake Winnebago. The winter sport, which is unique to Wisconsin, involves fishermen sitting in shanties, waiting for the prehistoric fish to swim into their ice hole. When one comes into sight, fishermen drop a 10-foot spear on top of them. While waiting to make a catch, they drink and trade fish stories.
My boots did not leave the glassy surface as I slithered along. Making tiny, itsy, bitsy steps, I slowly journeyed along the iced lake with my photographer in tow.
As the wind pushed and pulled at my body, stinging the tip of my nose, I made my way to the next shanty, re-evaluating my career choice as I carefully proceeded.
The cracks in the ice introduced themselves, warning me of their power to make my day dramatically worse.
“Watch your step, buddy, or it will be your last,” I imagined the cracks saying in a cranky, old maid voice as I inched along, attempting not to fall on my brittle ass.
My imagination continued to get the best of me.
What if I fall through the ice? Will it hurt, or will I be numb? Will I black out as I fall through into the icy depths, or would I see and feel my expiration as it unfolds? What will run through my mind, everything I accomplished or everything I did not?
Will I say goodbye or hello? Will I cry? Will I laugh? Will I struggle or gently excuse myself from humanity? Or, will it be an exuberating relief in that I now know how this wonderful show ends?
Snapping me quickly back to reality was a burly, bad ass of a man driving a golf cart – equipped with snow tires. He interrupted my delightfully morbid thoughts as he pulled up next me. I attempted to trade pleasantries with him while he gave me his best “get’ter off my land” stare and mumbled.
I later learned local fishermen call him Buttercup – Butters for short. I never confirmed the reason why they call him Buttercup or Butters. But my source said it would be wise not to call him by his nickname to his face. After meeting the man, I understand why.
Buttercup, who rents shanties to fishermen who take part in the sturgeon spear season on Lake Winnebago, seemed to have some control over the proceedings during the season. He’s somewhat in charge of the scene in these parts, the maître if you will. He is also known for the mean shindig he throws in a vacant red barn on the eastern shore of the lake. The party, which is held during the evening of the opening day of the season, features chili, live music, strippers and beer.
Instead of putting Buttercup’s ball on our itinerary, we headed an hour northwest, around the lake to Woodeye’s Bar and Grill, where we found speared sturgeon on the blue tarp-covered pool table in the middle of a crowded tavern.
“Your heart is jumping out of your chest. It was kind of a blur. Then I needed to drink a beer,” Michelle Lemmers, 36, said of the moment before and after catching the 93-pound sturgeon that was now laying cold, bleeding and dead next to empty beer bottles on the pool table.
“That’s huge. To pull something like that out of the water,” Lemmers said proudly, pointing at and slapping the bloody sturgeon as passers-by acknowledged her accomplishment.
It all crystallized at that moment for me – the power of the winter, of Buttercup, of the great sturgeon and man’s great unending quest to be one with nature.
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