Swamp Girl

Whoa, @bp_fowler! I think that's around five. It's long and has a gut.

I paddled with the kid and his friend. The kid's parents joined us too. I caught 11 even though I was pretty busy coaching. This was my biggest, a 19-incher (I didn't measure it because the boys had my bump board, but it sure looks 19ish, four-poundish: I'm fishing with the kid again in the morning. I've caught 1,055 in 2025.

Whereas I certainly helped jump the shark, I also directly answered your question, with tens of thousands of miles of paddling experience and tens of thousands of bass behind that answer.

I know just enough to second everything that Pat says.

Oh, I know. I found walleye and smallies on a point in the Upper Peninsula. The first morning, I was alone, but then another boat saw me boating fish the second morning, so they joined me. By Day Five, there was a flotilla. I've had that happen to me on the Mississippi too. I've even had boats troll around me, glaring the whole time while I boated fish and they didn't.

I don't argue with science. PB, @WaskaCrank12! And back-to-back biggies. @BluegillsTightlines: I see a scale in your bottom pic. Did you get your long girl's weight?

I love how you keep telling the truth, that Mexico is a safe place to fish. There's too much fearmongering in this world and it can get in our heads and curdle our thinking. I was walking through the woods in total darkness this morning and for a sec, fear took hold of me, but I cast it out and kept walking, focusing on the thing that was most likely to hurt me, which was tripping on a root or rock and falling.

@the reel ess's story about his five-bass honey hole reminded me of another beloved honey hole. There was a cascade in northwestern Ontario, a series of drops. The water than ran straight and shallow before slamming into the lake. If you fished the current, you'd catch pike. If you fished the collision of current and still water, you'd catch smallies. And if you fished the agitated water below the impact zone, you'd catch walleye. I'd fish for all three species, one after another. Well, one morning, I'd done just that and decided to return to camp. You know how I love to troll when traveling, so I paddled across the agitated water trailing a crankbait. Walleye on. "Hmmm," I thought. So I paddled back through that roiled water, a short distance of perhaps 20 yards. Walleye on. Back and forth I went, catching 17 walleyes in a row, a walleye with each pass. It taught me that you might think you caught all the fish in your honey hole, as I had, but switch tactics and you might catch many more, as I did.

@BluegillsTightlines: 24"??? You rock, buddy! @N Florida Mike: You almost doubled my morning's catch. If you fish again this afternoon, don't just change your sequence. Change your line, your pants, your mind, your hair, etc. Change works for you! @The Baron: That's a lotta boy, soon to be a lotta man.

I watch YouTube videos of other Florida bassheads. You're exceptional.

Dottie's stomach makes her mighty mouth look small by comparison.

Another thug.

@Aaron_H! So happy you fished again! You're too good an angler to not fish. I have always been amazed at the size of your bank bass.

I paddle mid-canoe solo most often. I can paddle with a straight paddle, but I prefer a bent shaft. I don't know the degree of the bend. Ha!

@The Baron: What a great day! How big is Wes??? I fished my pond this morning and gosh, quantity-wise, it's fishing tough. I only caught seven again, giving me 1,044 for the year, but quality-wise, it's fishing great. This was my first bass: I didn't measure her, but she was big-headed. Then I caught three eighteen-inchers. The first was caught on a skinny, minnowy Keitch on a weighted hook (open water), the second was caught on a thick Keitech on an underspin (narrow river), and the third was caught on a Whopper Plopper in a mid-pond weed field. The smaller bass represented too: And here's a couple of the 18s on the bump board so that you can see they were thick too: I didn't bump board the first one, which was the longest, and regretted not measuring it, which is why I bump boarded the other two. I'm fishing with the kid this evening and he's got a friend, so I've got to put the boys on bass.

It's the identical situation in Maine. All Mainers own the water greater than 10 acres, but increasingly, our access is denied, which is why I have granted access to several dozen Mainers to my pond. I am so glad the wakeboarding woman was busted. She is a criminal. A thug.

Yikes! I've twice seen boats dredging for a body and the one time I tipped, I had no warming whatsoever. I was above water and then seemingly, I was immediately below water. Hmmm. All that animosity should be saved for jet skiers and wakeboaters.

Thanks! I'm just glad Peyton Manning wasn't in the boat. He would have reflexively thrown her. Hopefully, he would have yelled "Omaha!" first giving me a chance to yell, "No, Peyton, NO!"

Good to know. Thanks!

You'll be fine.

@Kirtley Howe: Wow! She was pretty good-looking for an old, old gal.

And ^THIS^ is why Minnesota-based In-Fisherman says that a 10-pound largemouth caught in Florida is equivalent to a 6.5-pound lmb caught in the north. It's cool that you watch OLA too! You see the smallies she catches. I've never seen her land a smallie as big as the one I caught. Of course she might have and I just missed it, but I've caught hundreds (thousands?) of Maine smallies and the one above is my PB. I catch enough bass to run my own surveys. A four-pounder comes into my canoe about every 40 bass. I see a five-pounder about one every 400 bass. So, they're rare in Maine too.

Yikes!

This sky/front killed the bite yesterday. It announced pelting rain: However, I'll launch tomorrow morning and I expect to catch some good bass. It won't be the clear skies/calm that Glenn mentioned in the video, which can clamp bass mouths. It will be a 4 mph to 9 mph wind and overcast. In other words, the perfect sky for me and today's clear skies will probably suppress their feeding and have them hungry for me tomorrow morning. Even better, it'll be cloudy all night tonight, so my fingers won't be freezing tomorrow morning and the pretty steady temps should encourage even more feeding.

Yeah, I can imagine. However, many people think their mansions are prettier than a natural shoreline. Freshwater shoreline lots here in mid-coast Maine are increasing exponentially in cost. I bought my five acres for $75,000. There's a same-sized lot listed now just down the road for $850,000, which is why the realtor who sold me my lot whispered into my ear after the deal closed, "You understand that when you sell your lot one day, you won't sell it for what you just paid." I assume your coastline was slammed with those two king tides and gale force winds a couple winters back. The consequence is that area oceanfront lots, which used to be covered, are now lingering on the market...and I think only fools are buying them. I saw seawalls comprised of boulders the size of F-150s dismantled by those king tide waves. So, the wiser rich folks are looking inland and building the mansions that they used to build on the sea on freshwater lakes instead.