Gary Reeder
I had an uncle that got me into fishing, sorta
Friday, April 03, 2020, 13:37

I was maybe 12 or 13, just got home from Italy (my Dad was military so we moved a lot). My uncle stopped by the house and asked me if i wanted to do some fishing. I said sure and went with him. When we got to the creek where i had seen a lot of big small mouth bass he got his tackle box out. I asked where was his rod & reel. He said, don't need it. We walked down to the creek and he opened his tackle box up and took a small box and an empty baby food jar out. He told me to walk down to the creek and pick up a few small rocks that will fit in the baby food jar. Having no idea what he was talking about I filled about the bottom third of small rocks and gave the jar to him. He filled the rest of the jar full of white powder. I asked him what it was and he said Calcium Carbide. He walked down to the creek bank, got a handful of water and put it in the baby food jar and tightened the lid. He walked over to the edge of the bank where it was deepest and told me to watch for fish. He then pitched the jar into the creek. I got down on my knees and started watching for bass to come out from under the cutbank. About that time the whole world exploded and a water spout came up about 4 feet in the air soaking me. That jar of Calcium carbide had exploded and if I remember right I may have shit myself. Then the bass came floating up, wiggling around in circles. He grabbed a stringer and started picking the bigger ones out of the water. After he had filled the stringer with about 10 or 12 lbs of small mouth bass, I noticed the others were coming to and swimming away.
As we walked back to his truck he mentioned that "by the way, don't do that, it's illegal".