Sports

A fishing experience this 6-year-old won’t forget

By Julie Harris, Bangor Daily News Staff

Tyler Marmonti was just tagging along with his 12-year-old brother Mason Marmonti and his friends to go fishing. 

Adrien Lavoie, who owns the boat, said that he loves taking his children and their friends to the family camp on Moosehead Lake. He wants to give them the experiences that his parents gave him there. So he took his son, friends and one little brother fishing.

Mason, his brother, Tyler, 6, his friends John Lavoie, 12, and John Ferguson, 12, his father E.J. Marmonti and John’s father Adrien Lavoie all went fishing in Adrien’s 25-foot-long boat in Lily Bay on Moosehead Lake. 

Photo courtesy of Adrien Lavoie
ALL WITH SALMON — Each of the boys kept a salmon to cook on the campfire. The boys are, from left, John Lavoie, Mason Marmonti, John Ferguson, all 12 years old, and Tyler Marmonti, 6. All of them are from Hollis, New Hampshire, and were fishing on Moosehead Lake.

Tyler put his line in the water and not even 5 minutes later, he was hauling in a 19-inch landlocked salmon.

It was his first salmon ever.

“He was so excited and the boys were all hollering and clapping and cheering him on,” Adrien said in a recent interview..

He helped Tyler get the fish into the boat. Tyler’s first fish ended up being the biggest catch of the day.

All of the boys caught fish that day. Each kept one legal salmon and they all cooked them over the campfire that night for their suppers, Adrien said.

Photo courtesy of Adrien Lavoie
PROUD CATCH — Tyler Marmonti, 6, of Hollis, New Hampshire, proudly holds up his 19-inch landlocked salmon he caught on Moosehead Lake.

I thought it was awesome,” Tyler’s dad said Tuesday. “(Tyler) was very excited. We had a great time.”

He said Tyler is in Cub Scouts now and will move into Boy Scouts when he’s old enough. This won’t be his last fish, Marmonti said.

Adrien, who is a vegetable farmer in Hollis, New Hampshire, said his family has a more than 40-year history on Moosehead Lake. He helped his father build their cabin in 1982, and his dad always made time for him, just like Adrien makes time for his own three kids and their friends to enjoy the lake, he said.

On that day, he was watching the weather and wasn’t sure they would get out that day. The remnants of a hurricane were supposed to hit that night, but he saw a window of time when he could take the boys fishing.

“I love fishing, but having a bunch of kids on the boat — I love that even more,” he said.

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