Fried Lemons

I’ve done it on the water a bunch of times using my foot to hold the leader line in tension and wrapping the braid around my left hand.

I've met some good friends through social media so it's not all bad. I only follow fishing though and it's mostly locals. On the water I tend to stay far away from other fishermen so without the online space I would probably have zero fishing friends.

Worst thing I’ve eaten is takuan, Japanese pickled daikon. I’m a pretty adventurous eater and I like most pickles but these were really bad. Already posted this in the pictures thread but hey why not here. Caught on Jan 2nd in Maryland. (6.06/11.375)100 = 53.28

Got a few on a jig. I couldn’t get them to come up for anything despite them only being in 10’.

Tell me about it, I snapped off an expensive swimbait when my line guide iced up on a cast.

Great start to 2026! 6.06 ate a football jig crawled over a rock pile in 20’. In honor of our resident jig master @WRB-2.0

Whatever knot you are confident in tying. I’ve used a palomar for baits up to 9oz without issue. Make sure you are cinching slowly and not burning the line.

Big loss for this forum, his knowledge and insights were second to none. I’m going to miss hearing from him, I always paid extra attention to his posts. Rest in peace Tom.

Couple more glide eaters on bigger water. Small lakes are a bit too iced to fish right now. Bites so soft you really need fluorocarbon this time of year.

Long skinny fish 22” 4.8lbs. Also got a snot rocket and a few smaller ones in the same area.

Shad bait that I foiled up while my lakes were frozen. I was going for that faded look they get in the winter around here.

Healthy one on a suspending glide

Nope! I thought my home lake was a bluegill/crappie/stocked trout forage lake. Just yesterday I found a 6” gizzard Shad killed by the cold. First time I’ve ever seen or heard of them in this lake. No mention of them in any of the DNR literature either.

Nothing big but fun bites. Mechanical jerks with 3 second pauses.

Reach “master angler” (catch 10 citation sized fish of different species). I plan to go for crappie, flathead, blue cat, pickerel, and perch/walleye for the remaining 5. As far as bass fishing, break 9lbs.

It's been a while since I purchased new tackle from Japan. Anyone order anything recently? How bad are the tariffs on say a $350 reel?

Still getting bit shallow. I dumped what would have been the biggest fish of the year unfortunately. Lost her on a straight pull. The hook was fine and everything - just bad luck I guess.

Been hunting for a citation (15”) crappie. I got on a really good bite but couldn’t quite hit the mark. They were biting nonstop for about 90 minutes. Caught and released around 50 with the majority of them in the 11-13.5” range. Not sure if I’ll search for a new spot or keep hoping to find a bigger one mixed in.

If ice is forming in my guides and causing backlashes it’s probably time to call it. I’ve still caught fish in those conditions though.

Fall into winter is actually a good time to search for them. I tend to find them suspended on vertical structure like docks or the ends of trees in deep water. If you have any weeds left look for them on the outside edges . Usually the difficulty is figuring out the depth they’re at. I’ve caught them suspended at 10’ over a ledge in 16’. Electronics make it easier but I don’t have any.

It's hard to catch them with any consistency here. When I look back at my best catches though, I realize none of them were random. I can see why the fish were in those particular spots at those particular times. However I am still far from having them figured out. Plenty of times I think I'm in the right place at the right time and nothing happens. I prefer to fish in the nastiest weather when most people would stay indoors. On windy days I always seek out the windblown side of the lake as the fish seem to be much more aggressive in those conditions, so any big ones I cross will be more likely to bite. All the biggest fish I've caught with one exception were on various swimbaits.

Back when I used to throw jigs from the bank I would commonly go through 5 per trip. It was legitimately more expensive than swimbait fishing. I've made a few adjustments that have almost eliminated my losses. 1. I stopped throwing jigs from shore. When fishing rocks you are going uphill and the odds of snagging are just too high. When fishing laydowns the angle of approach means you are getting caught in the forks of the branches. 2. I started paying more attention to the weedguards. For open water structure fishing you don't need a strong weedguard but for flipping into trees you need a good one to not constantly hang up. I'm partial to the hack attacks. I throw them into the gnarliest branches without worry. 3. Heavy line for heavy cover. I lost many a jig setting the hook on a fish deep in a tree with 15lb fluoro. I've been running 50lb braid either straight or to a 20lb fluoro leader.

I would like to think I would, but probably not. When I got off the bank with a paddle board I caught plenty of fish I never could have gotten from the bank. On the other hand, when I look at the last year overall, I haven't gotten more or bigger fish since I got off the bank. It’s easy to think if I just had more shiny tools I would do better but experience says reality rarely matches expectation.

Here’s an account of an adventure I had searching for a citation size snakehead this past August. I launched at about 6 am and made the 1/2 mile paddle to my first spot. It was the last hour of outgoing tide so the grass was almost topped out but there were still pockets with about 6” of water that I could fish. Within about 30 minutes I had my first fish, a nice thick 28” fish that smashed a ribbit frog. It was then that disaster struck. The grass was so thick that my paddle which I had been using as a push pole broke. With no other options, I used my net to make the 1/2 mile paddle back. In hindsight I was lucky that the failure occurred at the first spot and not miles up a creek with not a soul in sight. Three hours later I was back on the water after having made it back and replacing my paddle at a local vendor. I put in at a different spot with a skinny creek right next to the launch. The tide has switched to incoming so I drifted in with the current. About 1/4 mile in I spotted a dark shape moving through some coontail. I made a cast well past it and the fish struck as I stopped my retrieve, letting the ribbit frog sink. The first thing I realized was that this fish was much bigger than I had thought. After a short but chaotic fight I had the fish in the net. It took several attempts as the fish was simply too large to easily net. I made the 1/4 mile paddle back to the ramp to get proper measurements. The fish measured 34” and weighed 11.5lbs. That was my most exciting trip of 2025. Hope your surgery went well.

Pulled this pair off the same exact cast about an hour apart. Funny how two fish of identical length on the same structure can look completely different. Both took a jig.