ASHLAND, Wis. -- The White River flows past like purple velvet, a cool, smooth ribbon of life in the Bibon Swamp. Dwindling twilight gathers on its placid surface. This, one of nature's incomparable flat screens, reflects the story of the late June evening: a crescent moon above, thick alder stands on one shore and, on the grassy opposite bank, a beached canoe and a trio of two-legged fishers in waiting.

MILFORD, Kan. -- Trolling on Milford Lake, Chad Richardson watched as a fishing pole rattled in a rod holder.  And he immediately knew what he had.  "That's a quitter," he said, referring to a drum and its propensity to hit hard, then give up.

MILFORD LAKE, Kan. -- Some parents measure time spent with their teenagers in minutes. Virginian Jeff Turner is getting 50 straight days with his 17-year-old son, Taylor. Friday, the Turners were in Kansas as part of their goal to fish in all 50 states within a 50-day period. "We kind of got started on the idea about June 15 of last summer," Jeff Turner said. "We'd talked a lot about doing a big summer adventure sometime. It just kind of evolved from there."

TAYLORS FALLS, Minn. -- Larry Dahlberg is busy in his workshop. But he's not making bookends or a kid's dollhouse. Instead, like a mad scientist who dreams only of catching fish -- monster fish -- Dahlberg is making his own lures. Really big lures. Surrounded by dyes and fillers, sculpting tools, mold putty and measuring cups, Dahlberg, of Taylors Falls, Minn., and the host of "The Hunt for Big Fish" on the Versus Network, is not new to such fiddling.