Swamp Girl

Hi, Kenny! I'm a canoe angler too.

Tom, I think of you as one of the world's best bass anglers, so you gave her quite a gift in sharing your expertise.

Thanks! Men do have a strength advantage and my relative weakness does come into play here and there. I remember my wrist buckling this fall when a big girl ran for cover. It folded like a piece of paper. However, 99% of the time, the playing field is equal.

In New England, a body of water is considered a pond up to about 1,000 acres, but the number varies. The pond where I own land is literally called a pond and it's 170 acres.

@Goby: I once read that a forest loses about 30% of its diversity with each clear cutting. A forest's soil also loses vast amounts of its organic matter as trees are cut and hauled away. It is estimated that it takes a forest about 500 years to recover from clear cutting. I did not know about the Smith River turning green because its forest is intact. So cool.

Oh, no. Sooner or later, Father Time takes a whack at us. We just have to whack back and it sounds like you're already doing that, starting with being proactive and requesting that they look inside you, but continuing by tapping all your resources to keep your head up, which is key. Please keep us posted. We're all thinking the best thoughts for you. Cool that you saw that eagle. They're something special, aren't they? I had one circle behind me this year, coasting to the water where it took a bass in its talons and then it ascended to a tree where it fed the bass to its young. To the best of your ability in the coming days, get outside. There's healing to be had under the sky and you'll need Mother Nature's tender touch after the fluorescent lights of hospitals.

I studied the brain in graduate school and I think hunches tap memories beyond our immediate memories. I've spent days beyond counting on water and I believe that all those memories are in my head, but not accessible to my conscious mind. My subconscious mind, however, can tap them and what helps this process is being as alert and alive as possible, so that my subconscious can find similar moments in my angling life...and use that data to decide where and how to fish. It's not just what we see and hear, but how the air feels and smells and the wind and air pressure, all the factors that nudge bass to feed here or there.

First off, Pat, thanks for all the guidance. Secondly, I know nowhere near what you know and I know this to be true from reading your posts and watching your videos. I have good hunches. My fishing partner, the Kid, brought a buddy to the pond this past summer. I've shown every sweet spot to the kid and given him all my most productive lures, but since he had a buddy, he paired with him and I fished solo...and I was surprised to see the kid wasn't keeping pace with me as he does when we're in the same boat. I was hunching in my boat and he was fishing from memories of where we'd caught bass. Both evenings, he and his buddy lagged. So, hunching is fishing the moment, taking a good look around you and making a good guess about where they might be just then.

How do you find the Amazon lures on sale?

I just ordered $80 worth of Keitechs from Tackle Warehouse. That'll get me through the spring.

I just wish I had your fur hat. There's Marvel-grade superpower in that.

Gosh, you are persuasive. You're the one who convinced me. I do wish I could stand, but I'm not willing to give up the sneaky-creeping advantages of my canoes and kayaks. I have caught bass in some of the gnarliest places, places with more wood and weeds than water. There's so little water that the fight happens mostly in the air. Anyway, thanks, King! I know what baitcasting reel I'm going to use. It's one suggested by Kent @road warrior that I bought from Japan, a Shimano. I think I'll put it on a MH rod first and when I develop some confidence, I'll switch it to a H rod that Tim @T-Billy sent me and go big bass hunting in the bogs. I hooked some bass in there that I could not land. Maybe the new rig will finally let me hold some of those beasts.

Bass are cuckoo for walking baits! I like when they wake to the bait from 25' away.

Congrats, Clayton. 89 bass is quite a day! Our water is hard and my world is white, so I'm glad you're still fishing, albeit barely.

I caught the most bass from April through the end of October on an underspin with a Mayor, Keitech, or Zako. I caught the most 4-pound-plus bass on Mike Siebert spinnerbaits. I also caught bass on T-Rigged crawdads, lizards, and worms, and wacky-rigged Senkos, as well as poppers and Ploppers. My funnest bass were caught on walking lures.

That's what worries me. I hope so. Fingers crossed.

I haven't fished Bemar, but it's in the region that I've fished. Probably due to climate change, the smallies are growing thicker than what I caught 40 years ago. Look at this first one. She's a 19-incher, but look at her back. Peyton Manning would want to toss her if her saw her: And look at the shoulders on this 20-incher: Still, six-pound test will land these fish. What won't work is a ML rod. Their mouths are too thick for a ML rod to penetrate. I even caught one that had a sagging belly like a lmb. I tried to find the pic, but couldn't. I also landed 40"+ pike on my six-pound test line. Heavier line is for lmb in cover.

I don't doubt this. What I do doubt is my ability to elevate my baitcasting accuracy so that it's equal to my spinning outfit accuracy in short order. I figure I have ten years of fishing remaining and by ten years, I mean having the vigor, strength, and balance to rise at three a.m., walk through the dark woods, and cast into the black. I am an expert at casting my spinning rods. How long will it take me to become an expert at casting baitcasting outfits? If the learning curve is long, that could be a year or two of fishing where I'm missing the openings I can hit with spinning gear. A year or two is a lot when I'm down to my final ten years. Still, I'll start using them in 2026, as I've said more than once. I'm persuaded. I'll march to the beat of the baitcasting drummer. I'm just hoping that my years of using baitcasting outfits to catch muskies will shorten my learning a little.

Boy, did this thread ever go sideways. It was an invitation to share your bass fighting tips and somehow, some of you decided to make this about my spinning outfits. What you don't seemingly recall, even though I've shared this data more than once, is that I'm accurate with my spinning rods. I paddle along shorelines and hit notch after notch and I tuck my lures under overhanging branches, again and again and again. Please film yourselves casting into heavy cover for hours and not missing a single opening with your baitcasting outfits. I'd really like to see that because I have mornings when I do exactly that with my spinning outfits...and I'm not casting to the easy openings. I'm casting into deep cover where an errant cast will mean I'd have to leave my canoe and slog through the swamp to retrieve my lure. I note that I'm not the only one who prefers spinning outfits, but I'm the only one who is pushed to switch to baitcasting outfits. FWIW, I've read your positions and stated that I'll be carrying a baitcasting outfit or two through the woods come spring. They'll be old reels, just like my spinning reels. I'm not buying new ones. I'd rather hire the men to work my land than buy new reels, but I can catch bass with my old gear. Remember that I'm Nouveau Thoreau, a New Englander on a quiet pond marching to the beat of my own drummer, however measured or far away.

I wouldn't take it. Way too heavy for Canadian Shield smallmouth, where there are nearly no weeds and even if you see weeds, they'll hold pike, not smallmouth. Your MH rods are overkill too. M, 7' rods are fine and I fished with 6-pound mono. I've caught thousands of northwestern Ontario smallmouth with an average length of 17 inches. I also caught 19, 20, and 21-inchers. 6-pound test handled all of them. I did cut off the first few yards of line every day because the endless rocks will be hard on your light line. My best lures were F13 Rapalas and brass Mepps, but I'd take some Plopper lures too. Go get 'em, Tiger!

@AbelG: What a fish! @Bankbeater: I envy you fishing a full month after I quit. My pond was ice about ten days ago and we're getting seven inches of snow tomorrow.

I bet!

It's a rare fishing trip when I only lose 10%. You've made a good case for it, King. I am most persuaded by lighter drag with the option of mashing my thumb when I need more drag. I'm also persuaded by the enormity of your experience fishing all manner of gear for all manner of fish. You're a pro and I heed expertise. I'm glad that you understand this. I do have some baitcasting outfits in my basement. I kept meaning to use one or two this past year, but I'll make a point of it going forward because it's fun to try something new and because you've made a great case for using one. I'll never, however, have the advantages of anglers who can stand on their boats and thus use all the muscles in their bodies and even anglers like you who can backpedal from cover with your pedals. Then there are anglers who are advantaged by youth, who are strong and nimble. My fellow silver-haired anglers understand this better than any young person can. My simple boats, of course, render me advantages too. Oh, yeah. Been there and had that done to me. It's amazing how quickly they free themselves. However, this past year, I wasn't catching six, seven, and eight-pounders because I was rarely fishing the bogs. I did catch scores of four-pounders in the two ponds and I think I only lost one. I remember her because she jumped and threw the hook. I didn't realize until she jumped that she was big. Speaking of jumping, I applied the tactic of seeing a jump coming and jabbing my rod into the water to drive them down again and that worked and worked.

I should have titled this "What am I doing wrong?" for some of you instead of inviting you to share what you do right. FWIW, I have a blast fishing with my old spinning gear.

Do you have a bass fighting tip or two? The muscular bass in my pond wait about a second before punching the accelerator. My tightened drag doesn't slip much because of all the weeds, as I need to have the ability to turn them if they run for the weeds. However, when they punch it, they can apply so much pressure that if they turn their heads as they sprint, the hook pops free. So, I keep more buttoned by bowing my rod when they surge. I extend my arm and drop my rod tip as they bolt and that works like a slipping drag. I also don't switch my rod from one side to another in mid-fight. A Bass Resourcer suggested that and I think it helps too.