Fishing Rhino

I'm not sure about the "stick" looking bait. I have seen it before, and the lip on the top is definitely unique. I'm trying to recall through the mists of time, but my best guess is that it mimics an elver, or baby eel. When eels return from the sea they are only three or four inches long, and nearly clear. We lived alongside a creek, which was actually the headwaters of the East Branch of the Westport River. There was a dam downstream from our house which held back water to be used for powering a mill. It was built right down to the rocky ledge, which was exposed by the water running over the top of the dam. There was a gutter at the base of the dam which I thought was created by the erosion of the water, but may have been cut into the stone to provide a level surface for the structure of the dam. Whichever is not important. When the elvers returned, this cut would literally be full of elvers packed side by side like sardines in a can. The mystery is how these tiny fish got by the dam unless they squirmed their way through tiny cracks between the timbers which formed the dam. From there, they made their way to Lake Noquochoke, passing our home on their journey. They all swam at the surface. I used to sit above the creek on a bridge my friend and I built from trees, watching them as they passed. I suspect that is why the lip on the top, to keep the lure at the surface.

While the through the gills article has been posted before, some may have missed it. That is the single greatest thing I have learned about fishing, without question. It cannot be rerun too often. I would add one more instrument, which, in my opinion, is far superior to needle nose pliers for the through the gill removal. A pair of curved hemostats. All the edges are radiussed, except for the biting edge, and they are polished stainless steel. But, their advantage is in the curve. Try them once, and you won't want to be without them. That the jaws lock can be helpful at times. You can turn the hook, and if you need to do a bit more manipulation, you can leave the hemastats hanging giving you a free hand to work in the mouth.

I stopped putting them into any compartment that holds new hooks. I suppose it depends, at least in part, how many poles you take to go fishing. I take a minimum of five. In my larger canoe, I have a rack in front of me that can hold eleven rods, all separated and instantly available. I rarely have two poles rigged alike. So it's a rare day when I need to change a hook. I'm not a meticulous person, so I will not put a used hook in the compartment that holds the same new hooks. I did it once. Did not dry the hook completely, and a few days later I had a compartment of rusty hooks. They cleaned up OK, but that was the last time I put a used hook in with new. The couple of times I have change a hook since then, I stick it into the wood of the rod rack. It's out of the way, and there when I switch back. Can't remember the last time I did that.

Thanks Tom, I was hoping for your reply. Sounds like I'll just have to evaluate the needs of my guests, and use the appropriate solution. I took a fellow fishing with me this summer, on my favorite pond. He's the nephew of the lady who allows me access through her property. He grew up in Westport but now works as a civilian contractor at a military base in Jacksonville, Fl. The stuff he had brought to use for fishing was pretty sorry stuff, so I rigged a couple of my poles for him to use. I had experimented with a combination of two worms in contrasting colors on a circle hook. The first was threaded through the center of the head then out the side an inch or so from the head. Then, I put a smaller worm in a contrasting color wacky style on the hook. His casting was quite unorthodox, but he was reasonably accurate, distance wise. Direction was hit or miss, but on this pond that is not critical. In two or three hours, he caught close to twenty fish on that rig. All he did was cast and retrieve. He did not twitch the rod or impart any action to the baits on the hook When he got a hit, he just kept reeling. For the first hour and a half, he kicked my butt, doing nothing more than any first time fishing person would do. Throw out the bait and retrieve it at the same speed, every time. I finally passed him in count during the last hour of fishing. His comment was, "This is too easy." Thanks for your nice comment. I may be older, but I'm not set in my ways. There is always a better mousetrap. The ability to adapt to changing circumstances is key, whether it be in life, or fishing. Sometimes hard to distinguish between the two.

I prefer the circle hooks for wacky rigging, with only an exception or two. One exception is when I wacky rig on a Jackall wacky jig head, or something similar. Another is drop shotting, though I have given some thought to trying a circle hook for wacky rigging a drop shot. I hesitate to do so simply because of the smaller sized hooks used in drop shotting. I'm quite likely wrong, but it looks like too small of a gap would result between the bait and the tip. So, it's more of a mental block than anything. In addition, I only head hook finesse worms which leaves the business part of the hook wide open. For baits like the flappin hog, craws, and even the Fat Ikas, I prefer to run the hook through the centerline of the body of the bait for a half to three quarters of an inch, then out the side. This puts the nose of the bait close to or slightly over the eye of the hook. Yes, amazingly it will work with a 1/0 hook on a Fat Ika. I've tried nose hooking those baits, but don't seem to get the same productivity. Sorry for the aside. The most difficult thing for me is to remember not to "set" the circle hook for the first few casts, when I haven't been wacky worming for a day or two, or more. Most hooksets are in the corner of the mouth. The other thing is, when you feel the weight of the fish, by just reeling, you do not yank the bait out of the fish's mouth. The fish can still get a better purchase on the bait. With the other hooks, the tendency is to let the fish take the bait for a brief period to make sure they've taken it far enough to hook them. That short pause results in more gullet hooked fish. Not a problem once you master the technique of turning the hook, but still not desirable. Which has a better hook up ratio? I don't notice a distinct advantage either way. Some will say the circle hook is better, others say the regular hook is better. My feeling is that it's not so much that one is better than the other. It's that one or the other is better suited to a particular anglers style of fishing. Long liners and tub trawlers switched to circle hooks thirty or so years ago, and their catch rates went up dramatically. But, and this is the big but, there is no one to set the hook in that style of fishing. My take is that if you are a bang bang, quick reflex type of fisherman, the regular hook could serve you better. If you're more of the feel, give 'em a second or two with the bait type of fisherman, the circle hook might suit you better. I don't think there is a one size fits all when it comes to hooks, and other aspects of fishing.

My biggest fish, caught on a line was a basking shark. No bait or lure was needed. At the time I was a commercial lobsterman. What happens is the line between the traps on a trawl floats off the bottom. The sharks feed on plankton and krill. They swim through the water with their mouth wide open filtering their food from the water. Some, unfortunately get the line in their mouths. Then they thrash and get tangled up in the line, and making a mess of the trawl. I've hauled them up all wrapped in line with four or five lobster traps against their bodies. "The largest specimen accurately measured was trapped in a herring net in the Bay of Fundy, Canada in 1851. Its total length was 12.27 metres (40.3 ft), and it weighed an estimated 19 tons." (from wikipedia) The largest one I have caught was over thirty feet. The worst was hauling gear about fifty miles south of Westport, MA in 30 to 35 fathoms of water. We had six of the creatures entangle in our trawls. Two of them in the same trawl. It's a bloody nightmare of a mess. The worst one took nearly three hours to clear. The easiest took about fifteen minutes. We did have a sea turtle entangled in our ground line. Fortunately for the turtle, it must have just happened. He was still alive when we brought it to the surface, and we were able to free it without harm. Now, federal regs require the use of sinking line. That's a big problem when fishing rocky bottom. Hangup after hangup. Those regs went into effect after I got out of lobstering. As for finfish. Largest largemouth. Just over ten pounds on a chatterfrog. Largest smallmouth. Just over five pounds on a Mepps plain spinner, gold blade, #2 if I remember correctly. That was over forty years ago. Largest pickerel 36" on an inline spinner with a small treble hook and an inch and a half length of teardrop shaped pickerel belly meat. That was nearly fifty years ago. Largest bluefish just over fifteen pounds on a mackerel Rebel plug, medium size. Nearly forty years ago off Nauset Beach hanging in the shade of a floating telephone pole, and rockweed, when we lived on Cape Cod. Largest striper 42 pounds on a flourescent pink Hoochie or Hootchie Troll in Cape Cod bay near Billingsgate Shoals. That about forty years ago also. They stopped making those baits. RoLo is one of our members who remembers them. They resemble a squid. They were a hot bait among the charter fleets in Cape Cod Bay. Don't know why they quit making them. Wasn't from lack of demand. Not back then anyway. This is the closest thing I have seen to the old Hootchie Trolls. http://www.cabelas.com/p-0003477.shtml The largest hootchies of the seventies were nearly a foot long, if memory serves. The head was lead, and the 7/0 hook was at the end of a bead chain that went through the lead head. There was also a shorter version of seven or eight inches, but the larger were more popular. Fastest action, also when we lived on the Cape. 1971, Cape Cod bay west of Jeremy Point, Wellfleet. Seventeen bass and seventeen bluefish in less than two hours of frantic fishing, during a "blitz". The stripers ranged from 8 to 17 pounds and the Blues averaged about 8 pounds. Also caught a couple of sea gulls that I had to unhook and release. All those on a mackerel Rebel. The water around my skiff was boiling with fish. Never seen the likes of it before or since.

How many went on last year's road trip? I'm thinking about making a cauldron of chicken or beef chow mein. Got a big kettle and a big propane burner, plus a three burner propane cooker. Or, perhaps my famous spaghetti and meatballs. I ain't volunteering yet, but I'm considering it. Is this in Long Mike's bailiwick?

I don't think so. I've been on some forums that track what you've opened. The next time you go to a thread, it will open on the next post since you visited. Some have a button to send you to the first unread post, but those don't seem to work, at least not on a couple of other forums that I frequent, infrequently.

My favorite technique, at the moment, is swimming a drop shot. You can cover more ground than fishing it with the usual method. It works very well in vegetation. I leave a tag end of about four feet at the hook. Set the sinker in the middle. If you grab vegetation, move the sinker down until you snag it only occasionally. If you aren't snagging the plants, shorten the distance between the hook and the sinker. I use 6 pound test mono, or fluoro. My thinking is that braid will impart too much of a jerk rather than a subtle twitch to the bait. If you have toothy fish like pickerel, I use a twenty pound fluoro leader, with a foot and a half or so between the knot and the hook. Longer than that and I have a tendency to reel the swivel through the eye at the rod tip. Make long casts. Allow the bait to settle, then retrieve with a wrist flick. Grip the rod loosely and flick the rod to move the bait. Use just enough force to get the rod moving, then let the momentum of the rod impart the action to the bait. A medium or medium heavy rod should work fine. I don't have the touch to feel the subtle differences between the rods, and either seems to work well for me. The flick retrieve seems to be more effective when you start with a little slack. By the time the slack is out of the line, the rod should be moving on its own. Your hand is along for the ride. If the sinker snags on the bottom, just keep flicking. Most of the time it will come free. It allows the bait to remain in one place which at times is what the fish want. I use a 1/0 wide gap octopus hook. The smaller finesse hooks don't seem to have enough "bite" when using thicker baits like the Flappin Hog, and the very thick Fat Ika. I lost a lot of smaller fish on the smaller hooks. It wasn't a problem with the larger fish for some reason. It takes about ten or twelve of those flicks to get a full sweep of the bait using the rod to move it. Go back to position one, reel in the slack, and start twitching again. Mix it up. Try varying the retrieve, you may find something that works better for you. You can also swim the drop shot while drifting. It won't cover as much ground as a spinner bait or crank bait, but it is very effective in vegetation. It also works in rocky bottom, but it really shines in grassy, weedy patches of bottom. At least that's been my experience during my first year of using the drop shot. The three best producing baits have been the four inch coppertreuse Strike King finesse worm (they last forever), the Yamamoto Flappin Hog, and the Yamamoto Fat 3 3/4" Baby Craw. The Flappin Hog has accounted for most of my better fish, but if they are short striking, the Baby Craw seems to solve that problem.

I'm afraid to ask, but who's Muddy? Lest you get the wrong impression, Muddy is a good guy, who enjoyed a lot of good natured bantering. He hasn't been around as much lately, and I miss him.

Not only do the mods appreciate all your kind words BLee, but they are also glad you haven't met Muddy yet.

I don't have any problems with others' wives. Thank goodness. I have enough problems with my own. But, after nearly 45 years, a certain numbness has set in.

How many in your group?

I have two interested in traveling with me. If both go, still have room for one or two more. Will be traveling I-78 into PA, and picking up I-81 south. Five can ride comfortably. Full size, four door pickup with a cap on the bed. Plenty of room for luggage and gear, including rods to 7.5 feet. It's a short bed, but the rods can fit diagonally. As stated, it's six months away. I'm trying to cover all the bases before then. The details can be finalized a couple of weeks out. For me, half the fun in going on any trip is the planning and anticipation.

Is anyone planning on getting to Pickwick a day or two ahead of time to get some "practice", and a bit of a feel for the lake? To date, a couple of members are interested in sharing my ride and a room, but nothing confirmed. If either can make it, my intention to get there ahead of time will depend on what they can do. If they can make it, I won't do anything that would jeapardize their ability to go. I'm looking for any advantage, fair or "unfair" I can get.

Nice fishing. Extend the season for as long as you can. Makes the winter layoff shorter. We're still catching them here too. Not the numbers but enough to keep it interesting. Water temps still hanging near the mid fifties. The fight has gone out of the fish, except for the pickerel. The last time out, I caught a couple of decent small mouths and at first could not tell if it was a fish on the hook or if I had snagged a mass of weeds. Had to stop retrieving to feel the weight on the end of the line was a living creature. The bass of a pound or so just rise to the surface and skim along on it. They may make a few half hearted attempts to gain their freedom, but mostly are led to the boat like a dog on a leash. Still it's better than sittin home wishin. Getting to be time for me to lay out all my gear, sort through and organize it. Need to inventory everything, particularly line, and hooks, to prep for next season, and the road trip. Really looking forward to that, and meeting what I hope will be a lot of you folks.

Yep, you do have to pay attention. I always bring the flyer with me when I go for a sale item. Never had a problem getting the item at the sale price. It is a crummy way of doing business, but, when you need something, and it's the only place to get it, whatcha gonna do? They don't get any more of my mail order business. Other sites offer better prices and in some cases free shipping, as well as quicker service.

The annual forum road trip to be held at Pickwick Lake in Tennessee. May 2 - 7, 2010 I won't be towing a boat. See link below. http://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_forums/YaBB.pl?virboard=gen_bass;num=1246638259

Unless things change, I'll be going on the "road trip" in May. If anyone is interested in riding down, and sharing expenses for the trip, send me a pm. There are two who are currently interested, but cannot make a firm comittment until the first of next year. I'm willing to share the room I have booked. The room is 85.88 per night. Don't know if it includes taxes. Sharing the cost of the room should be about 50 dollars each, for the purpose of calculating your budget for the cost of the trip. At current prices, the total gasoline cost should be about 200 dollars. Tolls. The only tolls will be the NJ Turnpike for a couple of exits, and one toll entering PA on I-78. If the fellow in VA goes, that will change. Tolls for the entire NJ Pike, Delaware Memorial Bridge, Delaware and MD tolls plus the tunnel toll at Baltimore would be higher. Tolls for the GW Bridge and the NY Thruway are northbound only tolls. Total tolls would be thirty to forty dollars if we travel I-95 to DC. If the fellow from VA doesn't go, and we travel I-81 to Tennessee, the tolls will be considerably less, twenty dollars or so. Driver and riders will split the cost only for the portion of the trip you actually share the ride. If the fellow from VA goes, the truck will be filled just before he is picked up, and filled again just before he is dropped off on the return. He will share in the expenses of gasoline used from the time he is picked up until he is dropped off. At current prices, 200 dollars should take care of the round trip from MA. Maximum expense for only two of us would be 100 dollars each. Maximum outlay for a local area member would be half the room, about fifty per night for five nights, possibly six if we check in the day before the fishing starts, a hundred dollars for gasoline, and the 50 dollar registration fee to Bass Resource or the person in charge. Your cost would be 450 - 500 for travel and lodging, provided you can share a room. It's up to you to figure what you'll need to budget for meals and spending money My full size, four door pickup can carry four comfortably for a long drive. There is room in the bed, which has a locking cap, for luggage and gear. Rods up to seven feet can be stowed diagonally. Rods should be bundled in a blanket or some type of sheath so they aren't clattering together with other rods. That's enough info for now. The invite is open. The particulars will vary depending on who joins me, and where they will be picked up. Here are the only rules for sharing the ride. No smoking, and no drinking. I don't want to be stuck with all the driving. Sharing the ride means sharing the driving. One note. I'm not a nickle and dime type of person who uses a calculator to break down an individual's share of the expenses. If I end up paying a few bucks more than the next guy, I don't worry about it. As long as it's close, it's good enough. A few bucks one way or the other will neither break nor enrich me.

I thought it was a variation on the standing line, "It tastes like chicken" to the question, "What does it taste like?"

Since the topic of the moment is the names of states, does anyone know how Ida ho got its name?

You call that SMALL?????? I call 3 acres small. 8-) I guess it's all relative. The largest pond in our immediate area is South Watupps. It's 1700 plus. That's small compared to Quabbin Reservoir in west central Massachusetts. Quabbin is small compared to large impoundments in the South which are small incomparison to the Great Lakes. For my purposes, small is a pond that can be fished in a canoe, kayak, or small jon boat, and fished thoroughly, hitting all the hot spots by rowing, paddling or using a trolling motor. Small ponds can also be fished almost every day unless the winds are really whistling. Three acres qualifies as tiny. Anything an acre or less is teeny tiny. I chuckled at your incredulity. I assure you there is no slight intended by that remark. Just made me think how we don't all share the same perspectives. A quick story. I used to be a commercial lobsteman. I heard someone ask a friend of mine how far he went out from land to set traps. He said, "I'm never more than a hundred eighty feet from land, even if it's straight down." From "shore" that would equate to thirty miles or so.

Here's the report. It was a nice sunny day, but quite windy. It was a small pond. 158 acres. Maximum depth a bit over thirty feet. Clarity, could see the bottom to depths of 10 feet. My buddy got there a half hour before me, launched the canoe, and caught a pound and a half largemouth while working the area near the launching ramp. LOL about the launching ramp. This pond on Cape Cod is accessed via a rutted, puddled, dirt road through dense woodland with parking spaces, and places to pull off when vehicles travelling in opposite directions meet. It's roughly a three quarter mile trek through the woods. Lumpy and bumpy, but the brush is cut back so it doesn't scratch the finish on your vehicle. The "ramp" is a small sandy beach, but perfect for launching car toppers. It's not advisable to bring anything in on a trailer, though it could be done. Ten hp limit. It's an extremely scenic, and fishy looking pond which abuts a golf course along one area of the shore. Moderately developed with homes, but most are built away from the shore and hardly noticable. Water temps mid fifties. Once my gear was loaded, we fished the area near the ramp with no luck other than a couple of taps. Left the small cove and entered the main body. The water was flecked with white foam from the wind. We tried a small sheltered cove but no luck. We then drifted the windblown shore. My buddy caught a huge crappie, bigger than a dinner plate as we drifted past a point. We made another pass by the same point and I caught a smallmouth of maybe a pound and a half, and he caught a largemouth about the same size. We then fished other areas with similar depths and characteristic but nothing other than a couple of tentative taps. After being buffeted around by the wing, we went back to the cove where we launched, and let the wind drift us along the middle of the passage. In a ten minute drift, we caught five largemouth, all the same size, a pound and a half. Made two more drifts. Nothing. After the respite from the wind we went back to the point on the opposite side where we had caught fish earlier. Nothing there either. This is the area that abutted the golf course. A small cut which passed beneath a foot bridge on the golf course led to what we thought would be a tiny pond. It is passable in a small boat and has a depth of a foot or so. We went exploring and figured it would be a small pond, maybe a hundred feet or so across. It ended up being a pond of four to five acres, thirteen feet deep in the center. As we neared approached the pond through the cut, there were several swirls in the shallow water which turned out to be dink largemouth bass hanging in the shallows. A bit further in, I saw a couple of largemougth over a pound pass by us headed toward the opening between the ponds. It looked like bass heaven and must at times based on what we saw upon entering. Perfect for drop shotting. Vegetation in most places less than a foot tall. Ideal for feeling the sinker tending bottom while the bait works in the open water above it. It only yielded one largemouth of a pound and a half. All in all, we were satisfied. First time seeing the pond, and having to fight the wind, it was still a nice day to be on the pond. In spite of being windy, it was sunny, warm, and we caught fish. We'll definitely go back.

RW, I am looking forward to your reports. They will be very helpful. My main reason for going is not to catch fish, but to meet some, hopefully many, of the members here in person. That being said, my secondary reason is to fish new waters with the expectation of catching fish, and maybe a lunker or three in the process. Actually the above is my third reason. Learning new things is my secondary reason which is a close second to my primary reason. I have every reason to believe that reasons one and two are a given. The third is never taken for granted. There are always those days or trips that do not produce as desired. As the song goes, (no, not Good Night Irene) "two out of three ain't bad" I'm expecting it will be three out of three by May 7, 2010, probably prior to that.

Since I made the decision to meet the gang at the road trip, I've started through the thread to catch up. So forgive me if I've missed this, or have not gotten to it. What would be very helpful to me, and others not familiar with the waters we'll be fishing is what baits are recommended for the time and areas we'll be fishing. Nothing like being prepared. Nothing as frustrating as going fishing and not having what they are biting on. No guarantees I know. Just some practical advice on what is used by the locals.