This story was originally published Feb. 18, 2024.
Caydan and Braydan Closson of Bass Harbor have a love of the water.
It’s no real surprise since their grandfather Lester Closson was a lobsterman and then joined the U.S. Coast Guard in the 1970s, and their father Daniel Closson has made his living catching lobster since he was 15.
Plus the whole family, including the boys’ mother Ashley Closson, are avid recreational fishers.
It’s a perfect example of how Mainers proudly pass on the state’s outdoor experience as a legacy to the next generation.
It should also not be surprising that Caydan, then 16 months old, caught his first fish — a pickerel — while ice fishing with his father and brother, just a couple weeks after his very first ice fishing outing.
In Daniel Closson’s video of the adventure, you can hear Braydan, then 8 years old, expressing excitement about his baby brother’s first fish. Although Caydan probably won’t remember his first fish, Closson helped his youngest son, encouraging him all the way.
“I was impressed that Caydan was hand-hauling the line so well,” Closson, 33, said Thursday.
Braydan was about the same age when he caught his first fish and he’s been fishing ever since. He was baiting hooks and setting his own ice fishing traps at 3 years old, his father said. And he’s been hand-hauling lobster traps since that age too.
Braydan’s favorite fish is landlocked salmon. After all, salmon is the English translation of his Irish name.
The family fished East Grand Lake about three weeks before Caydan landed his first fish, and no one except Braydan caught any fish. Of course, it was a salmon, 19 ½ inches.
“I am very fortunate I have a nice family and that we like to do the same thing — go fishing,” Daniel Closson said.
The Clossons fish year-round. Ashley Closson often takes their sons rod and reel fishing off the dock on Long Pond or along the shoreline at the pumping station in Southwest Harbor.
She and Daniel Closson have been ice fishing together since they met at the University of Maine at Machias. But he inherited his love of the sport from his father Lester Closson, who taught him to fish at 5 years old.
And Lester Closson takes his grandson Braydan fishing a lot too, Daniel Closson said. Soon, they will include Caydan.
It’s a legacy that is still going strong.
