Just Angling for February 1, 2001

By Donald Millus

Wallace Lee Quits Fishing Until Spring

Last year for Superbowl Sunday I went crappie fishing in a freshwater pond. This year I had to dig some clams before the weekend got underway. It was sunny and clear, light jacket weather on land but still chilly on the water. I was surprised that there were no cars or trucks and boat trailers in the Murrells Inlet public ramp parking lot even at one in the afternoon. The reason was that no one was fishing.

I soon found out why. No fish were biting, despite the thin new moon that had just appeared in the western sky the previous evening. At Low Country Tackle a salt-water, fresh-water fishing and every kind of hunting emporium located on Highway 544 just north of the swing bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway there was no good news about fishing. "Wallace Lee has put away his fishing tackle until the waters warm up," someone said, with a tinge of awe in his voice.

For those of you unfamiliar with the exploits of Wallace Lee, suffice it to say that I am not the only one who considers him one of the most experienced fishermen in Murrells Inlet. He certainly is the most experienced fishing guide in the Inlet, with a captain's license and a good track record.

But if Wallace Lee can't catch fish is there any hope for us lesser mortals? My attitude is that if I'm going to go out and wait for the tide to drop so I can dig a pail of clams, I'd feel naked if I didn't have a couple of spinning rods with me tipped with suitable grubs or plugs. I even took one with a tiny crappie lure, a pink twister tail by Cotee with a chartreuse head weighing an eighth of an ounce or so. Besides eating my lunch and watching the pelicans, I would take a few casts.

I reported recently that the Inlet was remarkably free of that clingy "snotgrass" that afflicts anglers' lures and baits at this time of year. Well the honeymoon is over. The grass is back. I had nary a strike as the tide settled toward the ocean. But I would get some clams.

The Atlantic Hardshell clam is a beautiful piece of creation, cleaning the water and growing bigger in its growing shell. In Murrells Inlet the clam is particularly salty and a perfect candidate for being eaten alive on the half shell, steamed in a pot with just a few inches of seasoned water in the bottom to produce clam broth and steamer clams, or combined with bread crumbs and cheddar cheese and other seasonings to become clams casino.

We freeze the larger ones and they open very easily to be diced in he blender for stuffed clams or turned into clam chowder, hold the milk please. On Superbowl Eve, wife Patricia and I had a few dozen of the cherrystone variety served on the half shell with freshly ground horseradish. No cold beer is mediocre when served with such a delicacy. On Monday evening the first course of my spaghetti dinner was a couple dozen steamers shared with one of my neighbors.

Aside from the pleasant exercise of digging clams, I enjoy the visits of long-thin-billed kiwi-like birds taking advantage of my excavations to harvest some juicy worm dinners for themselves. Best of all, as I walked along he shellbank where I was harvesting, I spotted a school of small minnows in the shallows. The water was not too cold for them and, doubtless, the flounder that are hidden in the mud will find such little fish a target of opportunity in the weeks to come.