Don't get me wrong: Mike Laptew's a nice guy and everything, but sometimes he's a pain in the butt to fish with. Like the time we were pursuing striped bass with Capt. Greg Weatherby and John Collins off Sakonnet, Rhode Island, a couple years ago. For the better part of an hour, Weatherby, Collins and I had been casting big snake flies into the wash at the base of some granite ledges without so much as a bump. We were about ready to pack it in and move to another location when Laptew, ensconced in his bright-blue wetsuit, announced that he wanted to poke his head underwater. So we waited patiently as he donned his mask, slipped overboard and disappeared below the swells.

A minute later he emerged, a broad grin spread across his face. We could guess what was coming. "They're down there," he chuckled. "Some big ones, too. They're just not feeding. Oh, and if anyone wants to try for the world-record tautog on fly, put on a deep-sinking line and a crab pattern; there's hundreds of them down there."

You get the idea: If you prefer not to know when gigantic striped bass are thumbing their noses at your expensive, never-fail flies, don't fish with Laptew. However, if you're also intrigued by how stripers behave in the wild, and what the underwater world of the Northeast looks like, then wait until you're safely at home, far away from the ocean, and pop in one of his videotapes.

"There's a kick in it for me," Mike says when describing his ability to give anglers a unique perspective on what's going on under the suds. "People go to an area and they know it's good and they know it's productive, but they can't really imagine why. If they could see the bottom, they'd understand. I can give anglers a chance to see what some of the legendary striper grounds really look like. These are places that would have a park bench and a water fountain next to them if they were on dry land. They're just really interesting chunks of geography."

In the 26 years he's been filming underwater, Mike has seen plenty of interesting geography. In fact, the 47-year-old spearfisherman-turned-videographer keeps a satellite image of New England at home, and aims to hit every major promontory on the coast. Some of the more famous spots he's visited so far include Maine's Mousam and Kennebec rivers, Cape Ann, Cuttyhunk, Sakonnet Point, Newport, Pt. Judith, Watch Hill, The Race, Montauk Point, Fishers Island, Monomoy, Devil's Bridge, Squibnocket, and Menemsha. To the New England striper fisherman, these are hallowed grounds indeed, and Mike has visual proof that they hold some big fish. However, none were bigger than the bass he encountered one summer day back in 1979 at a lonely group of rocks known as The Dry Salvages off Cape Ann, Massachusetts.

Like a fisherman, Mike had scoped the place out on a chart as a good place to find fish, and was extremely excited about his prospects as he headed out to the distant outcropping on his paddleboard. Forty-five minutes later he arrived at his destination and proceeded to make his first dive on the deeper side of the rocks.

"First of all, it's amazing bottom," he says, describing the underwater structure. "You've got these huge granite boulders sitting on the bottom that are almost like giant building blocks, and they're arranged so that there's like a donut hole of deep water between them. As I made my dive, I could see that there was a fish in one of these donut holes. I thought it was going to be a five-pound codfish, but it turned out to be an enormous cunner! Immediately, the area looks, you know -- good!"

Excited by what he had seen so far, Mike paddled around to the other side of the rocks to see what he could find there. "I rolled off the board and was surprised to see that it was only about eight feet deep. Then I noticed that there was a big head below me on my right side. A moment later I saw that there was another head facing in the opposite direction of the first head. The two heads were nose to nose. The heads were so wide that I thought they were monster, monster codfish, but all of a sudden a third fish swims broadside to me and it's all silver and stripes and olive green. I realize that it's the biggest bass I've ever seen in my life, and it's one of the smaller ones. Suddenly I find myself watching a procession of these things swim between me and this rock that juts out of the water. All along the shoulder of the rock is this one school of absolutely mammoth stripers that I would say ranged from 50 to over 70 pounds."

Mike figures he was in the water with the leviathan stripers for about three minutes before he thought to get his camera. However, by the time he returned from his board, the fish had vanished. He searched the area for the next three hours, but never saw the school again.

Those are the types of magic moments that inspire Mike to dive, and it has been that way from early childhood. A native of Rhode Island, he grew up around fish and fishing. "I got involved in surf fishing when I was knee-high," he recalls. "Dad, grandpa -- everyone fished. My uncle had a summer home in Jamestown where I would swim, fish, dive. That's where it all came together for me."

The young Mike Laptew was initially attracted to spear fishing, and has fond memories of chasing eels with a homemade hand gig in the local salt ponds. "There was just something about stalking those anacondas," he reflects with a laugh. When he was 22, Mike became involved in competitive breath-hold spearfishing, and won the North Atlantic competition in 1979. During this time, he had also begun shooting underwater video, although his focus was still on spearfishing. Gradually, his interest shifted, and in 1987 he hung up his spear gun to concentrate solely on filming. "I discovered that I was more attracted to shooting images than shooting fish" he says.

The Striper Network

Always friendly and enthusiastic, the gregarious Laptew meets numerous guides, captains, and anglers in his travels, and has forged friendships with some of the best striper fishermen in the region. "I like to call it a subculture," he says of the special bond between the striper hounds he meets along the shores of New England. "You can't go to places like the south shore of the Vineyard or the Outer Cape without coming across a van or truck with a rocket launcher on the front and someone behind the wheel who's at least thinking about fishing. We're all wondering, 'Where are the fish today? What are they eating? Where are they going?'"

Without air tanks, the average dive lasts about a minute. However, if Mike sees something worthwhile, he'll often extend his bottom time to around two minutes. While that might not seem like an especially long time, try holding your breath for two minutes.

After arriving at his pre-selected area, Mike often makes a series of reconnaissance dives to scope out the surroundings. Being unburdened by SCUBA equipment, he can glide along the surface, "hop-scotching" from one spot to the next and making intermittent dives to the bottom until he runs into something interesting. This method is especially useful when investigating rocky ledges, which the fish use as underwater highways or, as Mike calls them, "underwater game trails." Swimming with the current not only lets Mike cover more territory and conserve energy, it puts him in a prime position to intercept fish on the move, since they usually swim into the current. He likens his approach to a hawk flying along a steep ridge, soaring above the landscape and occasionally swooping down for a closer look at something that catches its eye.

When Mike spots a school of bass, he switches into stealth mode. "I'll try to be as unobtrusive as possible," he says. "If there are boulders around, I try to get myself next to one to break my outline and be nestled in an ambush position. But I also have to consider the direction of the sun from a photographic standpoint." Laptew points out that stripers rarely linger in one place very long unless they're feeding or hugging the bottom in a strong current, such as in a rip situation. Most of the time they're simply moving from Point A to Point B, like those big fish he encountered off Cape Ann.

Mike's observations in the wild has led him to the conclusion that the action of a fly or lure is of primary importance, which is a large part of what makes the Clouser Minnow so effective. His underwater footage of Clousers being retrieved through the water reveals just how lifelike they appear, and why using a loop knot is so important to achieve a maximum "jigging" or "wounded baitfish" action.

Mike has also discussed the importance of fly action with Lefty Kreh, and even has footage (which appears in "Stripers in Paradise") of the famous Lefty's Deceiver being retrieved underwater by the master himself. "Lefty builds his Deceivers with a big shoulder that creates an eddying effect," Mike reveals. "This causes the feathers to move from side to side with very little action being imparted by the angler." After viewing the underwater performance of many types of flies, Mike recommends using highly flexible materials, such as marabou, that undulate in the current. In some situations, such as when fishing a beach surf or rocky coastline, it's often most effective to simply let the fly sit, allowing the current or waves to provide the action. This imitates a confused baitfish struggling in the wash.

Another important consideration is retrieve speed. For example, Mike points out that small baitfish shouldn't be retrieved in foot-long strips, because that's not how they swim. Instead, short, jerky strips that produce a darting action are best. On the other hand, some species such as herring, eels, and crabs demand a steady, hand-over-hand retrieve.  Mike says that it's a good idea to pause every once in a while and let the fly sink, which often triggers a strike. Crab flies, especially, should be retrieved with a hand-over-hand motion and then  allowed to wobble to the bottom, especially if a fish is seen following the fly. Then there's Mike's extensive footage of squid, which has shown him that the best way to imitate this important prey species is to let the fly free-fall after the cast, followed by foot-long bursts interspersed with long pauses. Again, the videos reveals exactly how real squid swim in the wild.