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Proof of the legendary local cousin to the Loch's Nessie could net a $50,000 prize for some lucky angler.
By Kevin Harter
kharter@pioneerpress.com
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| Steve Raymond, owner of a gas station and bait shop in Lake City, Minn., believes he's seen a creature in Lake Pepin. He grabbed his camera and took a photo of the monster but says he has misplaced that evidence. (Scott Takushi, Pioneer Press) |
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As fish stories go, this one is a whopper.
It tells of a large, serpentlike creature, a legendary lunker that lives in the shadowy depths of Lake Pepin below Maiden Rock.
The latest twist in the tale is that anyone who can hook, net or capture Pepie on film could earn a $50,000 reward.
Larry Nielson, 52, of rural Lake City, owns the 125-passenger paddle wheeler Pearl of the Lake. He said he has seen Pepie and believes the creature deserves respect and recognition. That's why he has taken the lead in attempting to prove Pepie lives.
In the process, Nielson, who's also a member of the Lake City Tourism Bureau, wouldn't mind drawing a few tourists to the lake that gave birth to water skiing. That's why Nielson is behind the $50,000 reward and the Web site pepie.net.
"There have been a lot of people over the years who said they saw it, or something they couldn't explain, on the lake, but up until now, there hasn't been a central clearinghouse for that information," Nielson said. The Web site will chronicle the creature.
Collecting the reward requires only a good photograph or a bit of fin or skin. If the photo is determined to be authentic, or if a University of Minnesota biologist can confirm the DNA came from a monster, fame and fortune will follow.
Still, it would seem a long shot.
Pepie seems to have much in common with its more famous camera-shy cousins, Nessie, a Scot living in the depths of Loch Ness, and Champ, a New Englander inhabiting Lake Champlain, which separates New York and Vermont.
All are long, elusive, serpentlike creatures that have been sighted for years yet haven't surfaced long enough for anyone to get a clear photo or video, much less take a DNA sample or schedule an Oprah appearance.
A search of Wisconsin and Minnesota historical societies' archives resulted in one short entry but did not provide the source.
"A lake monster was seen swimming on Lake Pepin" on April 28, 1871, according to the Minnesota Historical Society's Book of Days Almanac.
Legend has it that the Dakota, who lived along the scenic, wide stretch of the river, beached their birch bark canoes for thicker dugout canoes when traveling on Lake Pepin.
The reason? There were large creatures lurking in the lake that had easily punctured the thinner birch canoes.
A sturgeon on steroids?
Nielson became a believer one day about four years ago, when he was on the Wisconsin side of the lake near Pepin.
"The lake was smooth as glass, and I saw a single wave about 100 feet long and about a foot and a half high, but there were no boats around to cause it. Something was making it, but what, I don't know for sure," he said. "A lot of people have seen things like that."
Kevin Stauffer, Lake City-based DNR area fisheries supervisor, said there is a wide variety of species of fish on the upper Mississippi, and 50 to 60 of them are regularly found in Lake Pepin.
"We do come up with a bizarre fish occasionally, like the Pacu, and there are some strange-looking ones, but no sea serpents or monsters so far," he said.
The Pacu, which is found in the Amazon and related to piranha, likely got dumped out of an aquarium, Stauffer said. But he did note that Lake Pepin and Loch Ness are eerily similar. Stauffer recently traveled to the Scottish lake on a vacation and said they're close in size. Loch Ness is about 23 miles long and about 1.5 miles wide, and Lake Pepin is about 22 miles long and 2 miles wide.
Each is surrounded by highlands or bluffs, but there is one big difference. Lake Pepin's average depth is 28 feet, and its deepest point is 60 to 70 feet. Loch Ness reaches depths of more than 700 feet.
Some have speculated that a sturgeon - a large, prehistoric-looking fish - is a likely lake monster suspect. They can live up to 100 years and grow to 7 feet and 200 pounds. But pollution and dams have devastated sturgeon in the recent past, and while the species is making a comeback, Lake Pepin sturgeons today are 40-pounders at best.
Convinced, or not so much
Others believe Pepie is nothing more than a combination of an overactive imagination, bad eyesight and a long, weathered log, riding the waves.
Shelly Schimbeno, of Lake City, was 14 in summer 1983.
"Yeah, I saw it," she said. "It came up right next to the ski boat. It scared me to death. The lake monster was black as night and longer than the boat," she recalled of the encounter on the lake's north side.
She said what surfaced near her was a log or a goofy-looking fish.
But true believers exist and trust their senses.
Four years ago, on a late August morning, Steve Raymond, 57, and his fishing buddy were cutting northeast across the lake to do some pan fishing near Stockholm, Wis.
"Up ahead, I thought I saw a tree, but it wasn't a tree. It was undulating. We got closer, maybe 50 to 75 yards from it, and I saw at least 20 feet of it out of the water," Raymond recalled. "It was greenish, with a cast of yellow."
Raymond grabbed a camera and took a snapshot, which he has since misplaced.
He knows there are skeptics. But he was sane, somber and sure of what he saw that day.
"I've been on the water all of my life, and I know what I'm seeing," said Raymond, who runs a Lake City bait shop.
And what bait does he think someone who wants the reward should use to catch Pepie?
"I think Pepie is probably a vegetarian," Raymond said.
Kevin Harter can be reached at 651-228-2149.
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Former Minnesota Vikings all-star visited Lake City on
Thursday, June 19th.
Tourism
is a key sector of Minnesota's economy, generating
$9.8 billion annually. It's a statewide industry,
part of the economic mix in the Twin Cities
area and in cities and towns throughout Minnesota.
