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Monticello

Thursday, January 29th, 2015 | Author:

Jackson and I went to Lake Monticello this morning about 9 o’clock to see if we could get in on some early action since it has been warm for a few days. We had a plan to repeat our March trip of last year when we caught a good many and 3 over 5 pounds. The water temperature was 48 when we started. We went into the end of one of the lake’s fingers that the wind was blowing into. The idea was to go into the very end where the warm water from the top was being blown into the end and creating a warm spot in the shallows. The water in the end was 51 degrees just as we suspected. It didn’t take too long before we got the skunk off with a 2 1/2. The wind was howling so we had to tie up to a snag to be able to fish at all. We left there and went to another finger of the lake that had a little protection from the wind. Fishing was fine but catching was slow. When we went to the end of that finger the water warmed again, this time up to 55. We caught one in almost the same spot we caught a 7 1/2 last year, in a little more than a foot of water. After running out of fishing room, the first place was the spot we visited for the second time. The wind had slowed down and we were able to fish there unaffected by the wind.  It got a pretty good going over but only one came to the boat although we had one good boil and one on that broke the spinner bait at the neck after jumping to let us see it. A 1/4 ounce Booyah spinner bait did all the catching. The FOD was 3 – 5. Last year the water temperatures were 52 to 61. We were about a month or so too early. but after any prolonged warm spell I’ll be back.

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Old Fishing Pictures

Wednesday, January 28th, 2015 | Author:

Hal emailed some old photos, and I do mean old, of when we went to the Keys each year. When not too much fishing is going on here it’s fun to look at some photos taken when you were in college.The first one is of me holding a nice bonefish caught wading on the South side of Grassy Key behind the chicken farm. We would wade pulling a minnow bucket with shrimp for bait and casting to visible fish. Bonefish, permit (Hal caught one), tarpon (we saw some but caught none wading), barracuda, and an occasional shark were the creatures we saw there.

bonefish

Who is that young guy?  We would also cast from the bank at night around the bridges with a Pfluger mustang or a Creen Chub Pikie Minnow. We caught a few Tarpon and this nice snook.

snook

We also got to go out trolling once or twice and caught  a bull dolphin.

dolphin

Here is Hal back at home with a 4 1/4 that was the large fish champion for a few years. It gave the 4 1/4 pound bass blewhole its name.

hal early

I do not know where this group of fish came from but it is impressive. Edit: They came from our trip to the 87 pound treeline.

Hal good string

This one is of a young Hal with some bass.

young hal

The last one is of a young Harley with an early season bass (note the lack of a tan) taken on Lake Ferguson at Walcott’s Dock.

early bass

My, how time flies when you’re having fun.

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Tough at the Private Hole

Thursday, January 22nd, 2015 | Author:

Hal and I fished at the private hole Monday and Tuesday thinking it would be good because the highs were forecast to be in the 60’s. We took my regular boat so we could use the side finder and look for any new logs or etc. The last time the side finder was used there was before the 2011 flood so there was plenty opportunity for some new things to be discovered.  There were some new things but one of the most revealing things was the number of dense schools of fish down about 15 feet. Judging by the shape of the fish and the way they were together, I think they were crappie. A good sized one even came up and ate my DT-6 in a place where the schools were most prevalent. We had trouble catching bass. I caught one off of a tree top with a DT-6 and Hal caught one off of a deep log with a drop shot then nothing happened for a while. We got a few nips out in the open water but I have to believe they were from the crappie. The last bass was caught directly under the boat in 19 feet of water on a shaky head. There was no “thump” with the bite, only “something there” and set the hook. All this was on Monday – Tuesday not a bite we could be sure of. Hal got something he was 83.5% sure was a bite on a blue jig. The fish must not have gotten the memo that the rating for fishing was high both days. The next time I go there, after one time around and not much to show for it, I’m going to rig up a small crank bait with a sinker 3 feet in front of it and troll around the hole with the idea of catching some good cold water crappie for supper. Hal and I have a long history of fishing in the private hole so, even though the fish were not in a cooperative mood, we were able to relive some of the fun times we have had there. It also has been a few months since we have fished together and enjoyed each other’s company.

This post was delayed by technical problems that had me unable to post for a couple of days. A thank you to Harley IV for getting it straightened out. He was told there might be some data loss and I hope it was not too much.

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Just Too Good

Thursday, January 08th, 2015 | Author:

This afternoon as I was returning from checking on the house at the River this sunset presented itself. It is close to what my daddy used to call a mackerel sky. The ones that he used to designate that way were never as colorful as this one mostly because they occurred during daylight hours and did not have the benefit of the redness that you see at sundown. In his mackerel sky the clouds were not quite this thick. Natures beauty is spectacular. This sunset just made me feel good, so I had to take a photo and share it with those who might not have seen it.

Be sure to click on it to enlarge . Seeing something this beautiful affirms my belief that there is a God in heaven for only God could create something this wonderful.

This is a fishing site, but every now and then I see something not dealing with fishing that is worth posting. There has not been a lot of fishing going on lately but that will change.

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Mortality of Tournament Released Bass

Wednesday, January 07th, 2015 | Author:

This is an article from the Louisiana Sportsman’s magazine that was sent to me by John. I think it is good information.

Whether one loves it or hates it, a certain amount of catch-and-release fishing is here to stay. While fishermen have released some fish for a long time, the practice became high profile with the commercialization of black bass fishing through the founding of the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society by Ray Scott in 1967.

 

Scott obviously knew that the concept of turning a gang of expert bass fishermen loose to kill fish for money would not sit well with either local anglers or conservationists. So he stressed that his bass tournament participants released all their catch.

This ethic, if that is the proper term, caught on rapidly in the competitive bass-fishing world.

So strong is the belief in catch-and-release fishing amongst competitive anglers that some look on with absolute horror at those fishermen who keep their catch for consumption.

“Bass are too valuable to eat,” they cry.

Consumptive fishermen — those who haven’t abandoned bass fishing — return the emotions in spades. Fish were put here to eat, they retort, and if they obey legal limits they shouldn’t be sneered at for keeping their catch.

Some also began to resent the competition from tournament anglers in what they viewed as terribly overpowered boats. They cite the seemingly inevitably poor fishing on a water body following a major tournament.

At crux was the question of how many released bass survive after being wrestled from the water and held in livewells for hours. Tournament anglers claim almost all their fish survived and point fingers at consumptive fishermen, saying survival of the bass put in ice chests is zero.

Consumptive fishermen argue that most released tournament fish die, some days after release. Their main argument is against the waste of the fish.

A supporting argument is that released fish seldom, if ever, travel back to the territory from which they were taken, dramatically impacting fishing success.

In the neighboring state of Texas, biologists have conducted several studies on the impacts of tournament fishing on largemouth bass.

In Lake Umphrey, a small private lake in East Texas, they set up four teams of two anglers, with the teams making two trips each.

Each team used a different bait type: treble hook lures, Carolina rigged-plastic worms, live carp under a cork and live carp on the bottom.

Each team fished until it had 30 bass longer than 14 inches.

The hooking location was recorded for all fish before they were tagged and placed in the boats’ aerated livewells. If a fish was bleeding, it was noted.

For deep-hooked fish, the anglers were given the option of cutting the line and leaving the hook in place.

No fish were held in boat livewells longer than 15 minutes before being transferred to a 20-foot-deep, floating nylon mesh cage. There, the fish were held for 72 hours before release.

At the end of 72 hours, 22 percent of the bass had died. The death rate was little different for fish caught on live bait compared to those caught on artificials.

On the first trip, mortality was 13 percent for live bait-caught fish, compared to 23 percent for artificials. On the second trip it was 28 percent and 23 percent.

Mortality rates were associated with where the fish were hooked, though.

It was 48 percent for those hooked in the throat, 17 percent for those hooked in the gills, and 20 percent for mouth-hooked fish.

The percentage of throat-hooked fish was highest with plastic worms.

Bleeding was also important. Of the 240 fish captured, 19 were observed to be bleeding — and nine (47 percent) of those died.

Bleeding was observed more for fish hooked in the throat (48 percent) and the gills (50 percent) than for those hooked in the mouth (1 percent).

Anglers cut off and left hooks in 16 of 21 throat-hooked bass. Eight (50 percent) of these fish died, as did two of the five (40 percent) throat-hooked fish from which hooks had been removed.

Interestingly, for all fish, the larger the fish, the lower the mortality rate was.

Texas biologists have also looked at dispersal — where do largemouth bass go after being released at the end of the tournament day. A total of 12 studies were done over a 23-year period in lakes and rivers.

In some studies, the fish were tagged with plastic tags before release. In others, the fish were fitted with radio transmitters and electronically tracked.

Only 14 percent of the bass in the studies returned to their capture area. On average, 51 percent stayed within one mile of where they were released.

The length of time after release did not affect their rate of return to the capture site. In general, if they didn’t return to their capture site quickly, they didn’t return at all.

The longest distance a bass dispersed after release was 5.6 miles.

Bass tended to disperse more in rivers than lakes. Once released, an average of 22 percent of the fish were recaptured by other fishermen during the periods of the studies, which averaged nine months.

One biologist concluded that one reason so few fish dispersed to their capture sites was due to the effects of tournament capture and handling. The 23-percent death rate for released bass suggests, he said, that released fish are not in the best condition.

Recapture of released tournament fish must also be considered. About 5 percent of bass caught die during the tournament, with another 23 percent dying after release — for a total mortality of 28 percent.

After release, 22 percent of these fish are caught again. If they are caught in another tournament, they will suffer another 28 percent mortality. Of course, if they are caught by anglers who keep their catch, mortality will be total.

As a result, the biologists have recommended against releasing black bass at sites that have easy access and high fishing pressure. B.A.S.S. tournaments do use release boats to release fish away from tournament sites, not always the rule at local tournaments.

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An Email From Hal

Wednesday, January 07th, 2015 | Author:

Nothing wrong with your fishing abilities.  We all had an off year.  It took me 102 trips to get 895 (not counting 39 dock bass).  So our fish per trip average was close.  Rc and I went today and caught 24, all on drop shot.  We filleted them for Rc to take home.  We decided that the average size was about an inch bigger and they were in fair shape.  However,  90 percent had eggs.  Bad news when 13 ” bass have eggs.  I am afraid the genetics are hopeless.  Out of 512 bass from bvl, only 3 were 4# or better.  Think I will have drink and toast to 2015.

This about sums it up. His last sentence was a great idea.

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Year End

Thursday, January 01st, 2015 | Author:

Fishermen are sometimes characterized as guys that, ahem, “stretch” the truth. Today I almost wished I was one of those, not wanting to know the truth about how bad this last year has been on the fishing front. Hal emailed me his totals and that shamed me into going out and adding up mine. His were off for him, but were still good, with a total of 934 and a good many larger fish. He is normally closer to 2000. I caught only 252 on 30 trips for an average of 8.4 bass per trip. My largest fish was 7 1/2 pounds. I did not look back but I remember averaging over twice that many per trip not too many years ago. The river lakes and Wolf Lake going bad is the prime reason why, I think, however it may be my fishing abilities going South. The question arose to me “What is a guy catching this few fish doing writing a blog about fishing”? Being an optimist I am going to continue with high expectations for the next year. Improvements in the river lakes are being heard about every day now which has got to help my outcome next year.

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