Swamp Girl

No diss at all. The water I fish is unpressured, but it's still challenging. It's just a different challenge than big, open, pressured water. I often fish in thickets of wild rice, with more weeds on the surface and just below the surface. When a bass hits, she has weeds everywhere to break free. To even reach these places, I have to carry my canoe through the woods, over fallen trees, and down banks in the dark. The photos of fish only come if I pay my dues. Launching in the foggy dark is also a challenge, as I've watched horror movies and I've an active imagination. Plus, in the foggy dark, there's a lot of life on the water, as critters feel secure in such conditions and approach me, so I have to remind myself that Mother Nature sends them and not Stephen King. Sometimes I have to drive down old, muddy logging roads to reach a pond, which requires a different set of skills. I sometimes paddle up to a wall of wild rice. I'll paddle along it looking for a narrow break. Then I enter a maze. I'm amazed I don't get lost in those mazes, but I'm always able to find my way home. I was only uncertain a couple times and I had a rush of panic, but then I settled myself and got busy solving the maze. I should take more pictures of these places, as I only take pictures of the pretty, open water, but that's not where I'm catching most of the bass. Kayaks and canoes are made for such places. It would be a shame to waste your kayak's potential.

I think if you buy that kayak, you'll start fishing bass. Just follow Robert Frost's advice and launch at the lake less fished. That will make all the difference. @Dwight Hottle, do you have any numbers on that bass? Weight or length?

^THIS!^ I have so much respect for you bank fishermen. I started fishing from the bank because kids can't afford boats. When I could fish from boats, I caught so much more. I think bank fishermen should be allowed to add two inches to each of their fish to compensate for the bank handicap. Hey, tell that fish to quit eating my bass! I just checked Tennessee's population, Bob. You've nearly 7,000,000 people. Maine has 1,372,000 people and half of us are too old to fish as we're the oldest state. So, your fish are seeing a lot more lures.

Does anyone know why there are so few fish caught?

Every summer that I fish, I catch smallies and largies that run from 19" to 21.5". I don't weigh them and I don't catch any bigger, so one of those 19-21.5-inchers was the heaviest, but I don't which two. What I'm saying is that I might have caught my biggest bass 30 years ago and I might have caught my biggest smallmouth or largemouth in 2022.

Alex, those three-bass-on-a-cast and 50-fish days have spoiled you. I know, I know. I telling you the same thing you told me at the end of the fall when I'd go out and only catch ten fish, but it's true. You caught some beautiful fish today. Look at those two largies. They're built like offensive lineman! And your spot is built like a wide receiver. You're catching a football team that could rumble with the Eagles or Chiefs!

It's stupendous. Clearly it feeds on whole muskmelons.

That bass in your thumbnail photo is crazy fat!

I did Google Goggins. What a man! Goggins reminds me of this, which I'll pay to have tattooed on Alex's arm: "Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting 'Holy mackerel…what a ride!"

Following up on Gimruis's post, side scanning sonar in the ocean has left the fish no place to hide. Here in Maine, we once fished for cod. They're gone and after decades of hoping they'd return, they're not rebooting. It's the same with shrimp as they've closed Maine to shrimp fishing because there are so few to be caught. Same with commercially fishing for halibut. We are not a foresightful species. We have a long history of killing off the things we love. Our skies used to blacken with passenger pigeons, but yesterday's technology and gluttony ended them.

@AlabamaSpothunter I like her joy when she fishes. She's like you, Alex, celebrating the bass. I don't think ^this^ is fanciful. I think a drone boat with cameras, FFS, radar, Garmin, and a mechanical caster could find and catch fish one day and the "fisher," like a drone "pilot" in a trailer in Nevada, could fish from a couch.

I agree, Alex, that all of us use technology. My rods and reels are high tech. My canoe is Kevlar. My paddle is carbon. Then I think about MLB and the home run derby of Mark McGwire, Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, and Sammy Sosa. None are in the Hall of Fame and likely never will be. They all have invisible asterisks beside their numbers. For most people, 755 (Aaron) > 762 (Bonds) and not a little greater, but a lot greater because Bonds and the others swung with high tech chemistry. Same with Lance Armstrong, who was dethroned. Now, fishing is nowhere near shunning high tech catches, but Gimruis's story about the Professional Muskie Tournament Trail tournament suggests that I'm not the only one wondering if there should be a cutoff or if there's a coming cutoff. I just know that I spend too much time staring at screens at home and I don't want to be staring at yet another screen when I'm fishing, even though I enjoy Alex's still shots of bass chewing on bait balls. Heck, George Perry caught a 22 lb. 4 oz. bass while meat fishing. He probably had a short steel rod and a primitive casting reel. Imagine that moment. Contrast that with a YouTuber I enjoy, Kristine Fischer, who joyfully fishes from a kayak, but it bristles with technology. Of course, everything comes with a cost. You all know that I like to fish water that has no place to launch a trailered boat. I don't think Kristine could even launch her kayak at most of the water I fish. So, I should be thankful for the tech that keeps my ponds lonesome.

Tech advances like engines and Spot Lock replace paddle and anchor and FFS replaces finding fish by experience, deduction, and trial and error. How about replacing the skill of accurate casting? The military has long used fire-and-forget technology, so I'm wondering if there were a lure ferry, either a drone or a bitsy boat, that was synced to your FFS and would drop your lure on top of an FFS-located bass or a foot or two away, as you chose, would you use it, thus replacing accurate casting? If not, why not? In short, I'm wondering if there's a point at which there's too much tech.

Don't you dare! Putting a governor on joy is for fools.

Howdy, Mr. Biscuit!

Alex, you are most excellent at living.

I also love "Love of Life." Thanks for sharing what you love, Bob. I just bought "The Old Man and the Boy."

@Bluebasser86 Whoa! You earn every fish you catch times ten. And you make the rest of us look like sissy-foo-foos. I feel like I should sacrifice a chicken to you, oh God of Iced Lines. However, I think you'll like this better than a chicken:

@Bluebasser86, I don't often get jealous of other fishers' lakes because I love the water I fish, but your lake turns me bright green. Thanks for the video, but the weather in the video confuses me. Were you fishing in a howling fog? If so, I have never experienced that. I've been T-boned by squall lines and lived through a tornado that sunk every boat but mine, but I've never seen howling fog, if that's what you experienced.

So. Much. Talent. I had no idea. None.

S-s-s-SEVEN PONDS??? You live in Heaven!

Congrat, Bird!

@AlabamaSpothunter Oh, I love "To Build a Fire" too. Papa Hemingway said that American literature began with "Huck Finn." In "Call of the Wild," remember when the man whispers into Buck's ear right before the heavy sled pull, "As you love me."? That's a perfect quartet of words. Papa had his demons, for sure, but he lived pedal to the metal, from volunteering as an ambulance driver in Italy before we even entered the war to being in a plane that crashed in Africa and then the rescue plane crashed too to hunting Nazi subs with his fishing boat. I too am amazed by the fat bass that @Bluebasser86 catches. They look like little Dots, but Dot fed on fatty trout. What's the forage in your lake, Bluebasser86?

It's cool that a crickety, ol' Yankee gal and a young Alabama hog hunter made the same leap to Papa Hemingway!