Swamp Girl

I'm twitchy as a tweaker who hasn't scored for a score of days, so I'm sure glad you shared this anecdote.

Mid- nineties? Not here. We reach that temperature about one day every five years and thank goodness because Mainers are heat sissies.

I use KVD wakebaits. I have two in my tiny tackle box, which shows how much I value them. I find they work when the noisier Whopper Plopper won't and vice versa.

I just took the pup outside and it's gray, wet, cool, and windy here. However, we do have one day forecast where it's supposed to reach 80 degrees.

@WRB:

Those are all great places to have lived and visited, @Koz. Thanks for sharing. Yikes!

We'll be hitting mid-fifties some nights this week and it's been steadily cooler, which is why some trees are changing color. Where did you live in Maine?

When I go out, I probe the column, fishing shallow, mid-depth, and deep. I also fish laydowns, shorelines, and weeds. I do this each time because I don't know where they'll be. They move from hour to hour and day to day. When I hook a fish, I note the look of the place and look for similar places. Stay nimble and launch with multiple rods having lures to fish different depths.

I would whimper with such weather. I'm not surprised that 52 will be a new record low.

I hear ya. I have successfully fished flukes in the past, but not recently. I keep intending to use them again. Thanks for the reminder.

Gosh, I hope so! Hmmm. I couldn't coax a hit from a deep bass and caught all my bass in a foot of water this morning. You can see in my fish pics that I was tight to shorelines. Changes in latitude, changes in bass attitude.

There are two kinds of stability: primary and secondary. My Old Town canoe has great primary stability. It feels sooooooo stable and it is...until it isn't. Push it far enough and it will entirely tip, dumping all my gear. My Bell canoe has terrible primary stability. I sit in it and feel like I'm going to constantly tip for the first five minutes. However, if I do tip, I go over, but the canoe doesn't. The canoe remains upright, saving my fishing gear. There are canoes that have pretty good primary and secondary stability and I'd suggest one of those because if your canoe goes all the way over, you lose your gear and that's expensive.

I forgot to share that I caught nearly every bass retrieving my Whopper Plopper parallel to the shore, about 12" from it. I'd set up my casts by positioning my canoe a couple feet from the shore. I also cast a spinnerbait and underspin, casting at shorelines, pockets, lily pads, grass, and in open water and didn't get a single hit. I did catch one bass on a T-rigged blue Crush City Bronco Bug and hooked another on that lure and triggered three hits with my frog.

I've paddled thousands of miles in canoes and kayaks. That said, I know that canoes aren't popular as other platforms, but I suggest a canoe. They're big, carry a lot of gear, weigh less than kayaks, and can portaged and wheeled. A pontoon boat is another good option. I don't know if you've ever noticed, but I catch a few bass from my canoe. My pond's dock has a fishing kayak. I can take it whenever I want. I go with the canoe.

Me too!

I'm glad we're edging into fall. My three hardest months are March (too cold), November (too cold), and August. They're spawning in May and June, so they belly up to my smorgasbord of lures. They're recovering from the spawn in July, so they're hungry. And in September and October, they're back for seconds and thirds again because winter's coming, but there's less incentive to chow down in August.

Yeah, summer's a long time comin' and short time stayin'.

Brave son.

The nighttime lows are reaching the upper fifties and the daytime highs are in the upper sixties to lower seventies. Trees are starting to change. Days are noticeably shorter. Yeah, it's fall. However, it's still fishing like August and I struggle in August, averaging morning or evening catches from the teens to the twenties. I checked my trip reports for August of 2023. Same thing. I launched in the dark. It was also foggy and calm. I caught the vast majority of my 2024 bass with an underspin, but they're not hitting them anymore. They are, strangely, hitting my loon-colored Whopper Plopper. I caught 18 total and lost one that was bigger than any of the bass below. Here we go. See, it's fall. See the red leaves of the maples on the right? Next are my first three bass. You can see the sky lightening and the fog drops reflecting the flash of my camera: This wasn't my biggest, but I like the composition: Here are my biggest bass: You just knew a pretty pic was coming! And here's an ugly pic, my battered Whopper Plopper: This one was long and strong, but skinny! This short one must have eaten the long one's lunch. Here's a wiggler waving bye-bye! Th-th-th-that's all, folks! Thanks for going fishing with me on a misty morning in Maine.

@IcatchDinks: It's good to see you fishing again. @PhishLI: That's a good lookin' poop bass!

@T-Billy is a heckuva angler.

I'm with @geo g too.

It's fall in Maine. It's dipping into the high fifties at night and trees are changing, so thanks for the video, Glenn. Timely!

Me too. I'd be plucking weeds all day instead of unhooking bass. Same here, but I do think they'd work in my weedy waters since it would be sinker in the weeds and not the lure. I enjoyed everyone of them. Other BR anglers report breaking rods. I've never broken one. How did you break them?

Some bass are that way, huh? My hardest fighting bass of 2024 was only 17.5" long and on the thin side. Meanwhile, my seven-plus pounder felt like a gob of weeds. I am so happy you went there with your pops and son and even happier that you caught so many thick fish.