Until the age of ten I split my summers between our farm that the St. Joe river ran through and cottages near the shore of Lake Michigan where my Dad worked building highways. I'd catch small mouth bass (one a near record) and rock bass in the river and blue gills in the lakes. Many a day was spent on the Lake Michigan beaches. After many years of living overseas during our marriage, learning scuba diving in the Red Sea and watching great whites and whales in South Africa, my wife and I bought a home a half mile from the Lake Michigan shore. I watched in alarm the vagaries the lake's health but it wasn't until reading this book that I understood it.