Swamp Girl

Do you remember when you got seven feet in three days? November of 2014, I think. I was driving from Buffalo to Rochester when that storm hit. The wall cloud was black and terrifying. That was the only time in my life I've seen such a thing. My gas gauge was reading empty, but I didn't stop until Syracuse because they were shutting the freeway down behind me and those drivers caught on it were trapped by the blizzard. Ha. That's goofy, huh? Oh well, they meant well.

Yes, I did. I cheer for all BIG10 teams, but some a little more than others. Michigan beat Alabama too, which is heckuva finish to their season, beating both the national champs and the winningest program of all time. However, what Ohio State did has never been done before. According to the end of season rankings, this season the Buckeyes beat the teams ranked 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, and 8. The two games they lost, they lost by a total of four points. They won four games to win the National Championship, which makes the old way of winning one game seem easy-peasy.

I've been inviting guys to launch from my dock, use my canoes, and keep some fish, asking them to keep the smaller bass. I don't eat like to eat bass.

Impressive.

I am oh-so fond of my southern basshead brothers, but after years of the SEC thumping the Big Ten, finally winning two natties in a row has me grinning.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrr! Here's a pic of Gim. That's me in the background photobombing him:

With Photo Shop, it sure looks like I do, huh?

You're a heckuva angler, Pat.

Tom, you ascended Mount Olympus a long, long time ago, Once you're there, you're forever golden. I actually have some footage of you arriving. Yeah, I was the Mount Olympus videographer for a few years.

Ha! You are so close to my reality. I caught hundreds of bass in 2024 with poppers. I love fun, noisy lures like poppers. Thankfully bass like 'em too! In 2024, I caught my first bass on spinnerbaits and walking-the-dog lures. Now I'm gaga for both those lures. My avatar bass was a walking-the-dog bass and that morning, I had to paddle a creepy canyon in total darkness with white, fallen trees looming out of the foggy gloom and then paddle a couple miles of a little river winding through mud flats. It was coldish too and oh-so-muddy. I worked for that bass, but at least I caught it with a fun, noisy lure!

Sure! Caveat: You're pretty new to Bass Resource, so just be forewarned that I'm pretty much the village idiot here. I'm an affable idiot, for sure, but I'm the girl who can only remember the names of about five of my lures and has no idea which rod is right for flipping or jigging and who power fishes with spinning gear, so my fangirldom comes a little smudged. I think this might be the favorite thread I've started because while there are outliers with stunning big bass percentages, many of us are in the 3-5% range and many of us up north consider four pounds to the cutoff and down south, consider five pounds to be the cutoff. I wouldn't have guessed that there'd be so much consensus because you can put five bassheads in a room and have seven opinions. So true. You'd need that number, even if only an estimate, to determine a percentage.

Now I'm your fangirl.

Kya likes the snow, but I love Kya! What a fun pup! Cool car, Rockhopper!

Fingers crossed for you, Crow! As you might know, my pond is full of three to three-and-a-half-pounders. My fingers are also crossed that they grow into four-pounders. That's still great fishing from my perspective, Tom.

Yeah, but I'm a busy boater and you're a Kraken hunter. Me: You:

Totally agree. The relative rarity of my four-pounders marks them as big bass...for my latitude because right now, I could drive my car across all the waters I'll fish come spring and spring is a long time coming. So, thanks, Jimmy, for acknowledging that a four-pounder is a bigger deal in Maine than Texas. Ours aren't as big, but they sure are pretty. I didn't understand why @AlabamaSpothunter commented about the health of Maine bass at first, but after looking at hundreds of photos of southern bass and comparing them to my bass, I came to see what he saw. For whatever reason, Maine bass are thriving. Here are three different-sized bass, but all so plump and healthy: Out of reactions already, but when I read @A-Jay's 40%, I literally said:

@king fisher, I learned a lot from you post. Thank you.

Crow, if 15 to 20% of your bass are plus-four-pounders, how many are plus-five-pounders? That's a heckuva pond you fish! I fish fertile water, but have never fished any water with that percentage of big northern bass, not in Maine, the Midwest, or Ontario.

Yep. From time to time, I spot aluminum cans on the bottoms of the water I fish. I often try to capture them with my net, but doing so is a bit dangerous, as I have to lean over the side. Still, I've captured a few and am as proud of those crummy, old cans as my four-pound bass.

By whatever metric YOU use for big bass, what percentage of your total catches are big bass? Please share your big bass cut-off. I understand that for some of you like @Fried Lemons, your big bass percentage will be higher by dint of throwing big lures, reducing your smaller bass catches. Others, like @Zcoker, will have a higher cut-off by dint of their latitude and their strain of bass. If you want, share your methodology. My big bass cut-off is 4 pounds. They're northern strain largemouth and as about as far north as one can go in the lower 48 states. On average, 3% to 5% of my total catches are big bass. I have had a few better sessions, of course, and many sessions with zero big bass, but multiple 3.5-pounders, which are close, but don't count. My methodology is easy, because in my trip reports, I record my total catch for each session, as well as bass over four pounds. So, I just run the numbers.

@Rockhopper: You have a cool truck though. And @TOXIC has a wicked cool deck. And this latest snow isn't @Jar11591's first, as I can infer from his windshield wipers.

Over the course of my life, I have filled many garbage bags with litter and I often think about the hygiene of litterbugs and wonder how many literal bugs they have crawling on their bodies. A person too lazy to properly dispose of trash is too lazy to properly clean their body.

This was taken from my front door about two minutes ago (Maine). Not a lot, but pretty: