Pro Bass Fisherman Saves Tangled Bird -Video

Originally posted on Men's Journal | By Kurt Mazurek | Last updated Feb 19, 2024 8:39 PM ET

During his first official practice day on Lake Santee Cooper in South Carolina, heading into the second tournament of the Major League Fishing Pro Tour series, David Walker came to the rescue of an animal in need.

“As I navigated around a lay down log in front of my boat, I noticed a bunch of super heavy, bright yellow, monofilament, fishing line in the water, and realized I had caught it with my trolling motor,” Walker explained. “I pulled the motor up quick and the tangle wasn’t too bad. A couple snips with the scissors and I was free, but then I noticed there was something tugging on the other end of the line. That’s when I saw the bird swimming about fifty-feet from my boat. Another tug on the big, yellow line quickly confirmed that the Cormorant was stuck.”

Walker admitted that he’s maybe not the biggest Cormorant fan, like a lot of fishermen, but he knew that a helpless animal was in a tough spot and was likely going to suffer a slow, painful demise without his help. He was glad to sacrifice a bit of his practice time to do the right thing.

“I assumed that I would find a hook stuck in the bird’s mouth, but there were no hooks involved. He had just got himself so twisted in that line that he was never going to get out on his own.”

He added, “I don’t think he had been there very long, because as you can see in the video, he was still awfully feisty!”

I asked Walker how the rest of practice turned out. “Unfortunately, the Cormorant was the highlight,” he laughed. “The water is still pretty cold. I did catch one good one, but overall it was slow and tough.” He continued, “But I like pre-spawn fishing and I like tough conditions. Obviously, Santee Cooper is the kind of place where you only need a couple bites a day to end up with a giant bag.”

If nothing else, David Walker has added another entertaining story to his repertoire and has most certainly stockpiled a little good karma. Let’s see if he can cash some of that karma in during this week’s tournament.

You can follow along with the tournament results on majorleaguefishing.com. Keep up with SCORETRACKER® for real-time fish catches throughout the event. And, MLFNOW! will be LIVE from Santee Cooper starting Day 3.

This article first appeared on Men's Journal and was syndicated with permission.

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