RISAA Newsletter [Angler's Profiles: Michael Lanni]

Angler Profiles

by

Steve Medeiros

A series of articles introducing RISAA members to the rest of the club.

(from the January, 2001 newsletter)
MICHAEL LANNI

This column is usually written by Mike Lanni. His genuine desire to get to know other RISAA members, and his ability to make friends has made him the perfect person to write this monthly article. In the past three years, he has helped his readers to know dozens of fellow RISAA members. But because he was the author of the column, his own story hasn't been told.

On December 15, Mike was seriously injured in an accident at his home. His writing for this newsletter must be temporarily halted during his recuperation. Those of us who put together this newsletter, will miss his montly columns and reports, but it gives us the opportunity to tell the Mike Lanni story.

Anyone who has followed the RISAA newsletter stories for the past three years knows that Mike Lanni is a serious watchdog for the recreational fisherman. Anyone who has had the privelege of working with him on a fisheries panel or legislative meeting, knows that the REAL Mike Lanni is a pit bull when it comes to defending the recreational fisherman! While he has had an interest in fisheries issues for several years, it wasn't until he became involved with RISAA that he became active in the fisheries management system. He spends many evenings each month attending fisheries panel meetings, R.I. Marine Fisheries Council meetings, state house hearings, and RISAA committee meetings.

THE BEGINNINGS

Mike grew up in North Providence and was one of five children (he has a brother and three Lanni at the State House

sisters). His height made him a natural for basketball and he played basketball for North Providence High School before graduating in 1994. He then moved on to play for Rhode Island College and served as the basketball team captain in 1977 and 1978. He graduated from RIC with a degree in Industrial Technology.

Today, Mike works for the State of Rhode Island as principal investigator for the R.I. Contractor Licensing Bureau. He's held this job for 20 years, but is also an carpenter and cabinet maker. He has built, almost totally alone, his beautiful 3 story home on the shores of Narragansett.

Mike's interest in fishing began when he was a youth. Although his dad, Michael Sr., didn't fish, his uncle Joe Lanni had a boat and would take Mike fishing with him often. Mike would spend weekends on the boat, and he recalls how they would frequent Prudence Island, sometimes fishing, sometimes quahogging, and sometimes camping out on the island. Most of the fishing at that time was confined to winter flounder and trolling for bluefish.

While Mike wasn't the avid fisherman that he is today, he still always stayed with it, usually fishing from shore or the bridge at Narrow River or off the docks at Galilee.

In the early 80's he would frequent Casey's Bait in Warwick and became friendly with many of the regulars and would even fish, at times, with Pat Beirenday, who was the owner of Casey's in those days. It was around this time that Mike also started to get serious about fishing.

Not one to fumble around, learning by trial and error like most of us do, Mike believes that if anything is worth doing, it must be done right. The best way to do that is to learn from those who know what they're doing. That's what he did in the 80's. He would listen to the stories and tips of guys at the bait shop. He'd ask a lot of questions, and he'd "follow people around" to see where and how they fished. When Mike went out on the bay, he knew what he was doing and where he was going to catch fish.

THE FIRST BOAT

In 1985 Mike bought his first boat, a 16-foot Stingray bowrider. While it wasn't made for fishing, it gave Mike the opportunity to move around the Bay. "Even when I wasn't catching fish," he said, "I just loved being out there." Besides tautog and bluefish, Mike was now able to fish for stripers.

His favorite area was still Prudence Island. He would often fish after dark, casting eels along the shore of Prudence Island, and learned that one of the best places to find bass was between Patience and Prudence Islands. There were a lot of fish around, and Mike attributed that to the large schools of menhaden that moved into the bay drawing bass and bluefish. But then in the late 80's the menhaden disappeared, and so did the bass.

THE NEXT BOAT

In 1991, Mike purchased a 1991 ProLine which really improved his range. For the first time Mike moved out to areas of Brenton Reef and Beavertail and began targeting bass again. His boat was kept in Warwick Cove, but he would make the run outside the bay at night, usually fishing alone, following the tides. In the fall he would fish for tautog around Ohio Ledge and Hope Island.

STRIPERS BECOME #1

Shortly after this, he began trailering his boat to Point Judith and Watch Hill, targeting stripers. He learned that if he wanted large bass, he had to move with the fish. It was at this time that he caught his largest bass, 38 pounds, while chunking at Watch Hill.

Mike's favorite stretch of striper territory became the shores, coves and points from Anawam Cliffs to the Point Judith light. He almost always fished at night casting eels into the dark shore.

In 1995 Mike joined the West Bay Anglers and again learned how to improve his fishing from people like Bill Beaudry and Frank Tameo. Mike won the title of Angler of the Year from West Bay in 1995 and 1996.
Mike also formed another friendship, that continues today in RISAA, as Paul Karcz became a faithful fishing companion. Both Mike and Paul are fanatics when it comes to fishing for tautog and they often fished together. Mike recalled how they both fished on December 15 for tautog and came home from Coddington Cove in Mike's boat during a snow storm!
RISAA

Then in 1998, Dave Fewster approached Mike Lanni, and asked him to get involved in a new group that was starting called the Rhode Island Saltwater Anglers Association. Dave told Mike about how this group planned to get involved in fisheries management and conservation, as well as promoting the educational side of fishing. This sounded perfect to Mike and he immediately signed on becoming the first Legislative Chairman of RISAA. It wasn’t long before he was elected as 1st Vice President of RISAA.

Just like with his fishing, Mike dove into this new positon with a vengeance, leaning all he could about the people, process and laws of how the fisheries management system worked. He attended meetings of the R.I. Fisheries Council. He was appointed to the Menhaden Advisory Panel and the Winter Flounder Advisory Panel.
He was a principal negotiator that brought about the agreement in Rhode Island establishing new rules for menhaden seining that crated protected areas for menhaden in Narragansett Bay.

When Mike learned how the Brayton Point Power Plant was damaging Mount Hope and Narragansett Bay, he began an investigation and started a campaign that brought the issue to the forefront, and caused lots of government agencies to take a fresh look at the problem.

FISHING IS STILL #1

Don’t think that Mike is all politics. Not by a long shot. This past fall, he fished several nights a week. He thinks nothing of going OUT at 2:00 AM, fishing for several hours, and making it to work by 8:00 AM!

In the fall, his favorite method is to chunk with menhaden or herring outside the center wall of Point Judith. Always looking for moving water, he’ll fish whatever time of night that the tides will cause his chum line to bring stripers to his boat. This year, he landed 150 keeper bass between September 1 and October 15 by fishing this method.

His favorite tools for this type of fishing is a Penn baitcasting reel on a 6-1/2 foot sturdy graphite boat rod. When casting eels along the shore, Mike uses a Penn 650 spinning reel and a fiberglass rod. He prefers the fiberglass over graphite because the glass has “more parabolic action” that is perfect for slinging eels.

All of Mike’s rods are custom built. He has 40 rods at home, all built for him by CMS in Dartmouth, MA. Does he sound like a hard-core fisherman? There’s more.

In his garage you’ll find a freezer, just for bait, that is always stocked with 4 or 5 flats of mackerel and herring. His garage also boats a live well, that is stocked with eels, ready to do service on the spur of the moment - the way Mike usually fishes. Many times we’d be walking out of a fisheries meeting at 9:30 PM and Mike would say, “Come on, let’s go fishing for a couple of hours!”

His trophy record is impressive. He won the Winter Flounder division in RISAA last year with a 4.4 pounder that put him in the RISAA "Angling Hall of Fame." His best striper SO FAR is 38 pounds and many albacore and bonito over 10 pounds. This year he landed a tautog of 10-3/4 pounds.

FAMILY FIRST

As much as Mike loves fishing, he has one other pleasure that comes first - his 12 year old son, Tommy. As much as Mike’s tried, he can’t get Tommy to become passionate about fishing. He’s the typical kid who’d rather play computer games all afternoon, but Mike says, “he’s a great kid and I wouldn’t trade him for anything!”

Tommy does like fishing when Mike stays in Salt Pond though, and enjoys the fast action of catching shad and schoolie bass. But Tommy may be coming along. Mike beams as he tells how Tommy caught his first keeper this year (18 pounds) while out fishing at night with Mike.

NOT DOWN AND OUT

So, you know now something about Mike Lanni.

You can rest assured that, while he may be temporarily incompacitated, he’ll use that “rest” time to follow the fisheries management system, plan for what he’ll do as soon as he gets back, and probably spend a lot of time dreaming about that 50 pound bass he’ll land next fall.

View other ANGLER PROFILES