N Florida Mike

I’m planning to go shortly. Waiting for a little storm to go by. Should have the lake to myself as usual. went yesterday evening for about 45 minutes( storm drove me in ) and it was dead- no runs, no hits, no errors. You might wonder why I’m going fishing and a hurricane is coming. I don’t have much storm prep left, I’m off, and caught up with other responsibilities. Prayed up too. My heart goes out to those in the Bahamas.

Yeah, I get it Sam. I’m not saying he’s great but he’s pretty good .He had enough grit to get that last TD for the win. I think he’ll go on to have a good season. LSU looked dominant by the way, which is more than I can say for many SEC teams.

Well now it looks like it may go up the east coast of Florida in a similar track to Matthew. It is predicted to be a slow mover which would potentially devastate the coastline again. The hopeful scenario would be that it misses land completely ( including the Carolinas) . My cousin in coastal NC just got her roof fixed from last years direct hit there, so hopefully she won’t have this one to deal with. For me, it’s looking like a very slow work week. ( Very few people are wanting to buy what Im selling until the hurricane is past?) But with loss of life and property for Floridians looming I can’t focus too much on my next check. The experts are saying that maybe if it slows down enough it will have a window to escape open up and thus miss FL. ?.( and hopefully miss the Carolinas as well) @Fishing_FF I like your Turtle analogy. That pretty much sums up our situation, doesn’t it?

In that case I would pull out the 4 inch senko T-rigged and weightless and fish under docks, lay downs and shade . Flukes rigged the same way would be a close second.

Seeing some negativity on question #3. I wouldn’t advise you to break the law but wondering why that would be against the law? Its legal in Florida, as long as you obey other laws , such as not keeping sportfish caught in a cast net, or snagging them, etc. I’m talking freshwater here. We can use live bream for bait also as long as they are caught with hook and line. Chum the bream and the bass will come. Can’t see how that hurts anything.

I don’t think these questions are silly at all. Especially compared to some that people post?. 1. I think bass are somewhat line shy, especially the clearer the water. The murkier it gets the less it matters 2. I don’t use snap swivels. 3. I keep fish chummed at my dock. When I had more time I did it at various spots all over the lake. I mostly use stale bread. It gets the bream concentrated , then the bass come for the bream. It doesn’t work as good just to go to a random spot and chum that way , and expect fish to immediately show up.Sometimes it takes days and even a couple weeks to get a good concentration of fish. But it does draw in bass that can be caught in a variety of ways, including using live bream ! 4. Just get the local fish and game dept. number and a back up number for them. But they may not answer on the weekend or after hours, so it’s good to know a local warden you can call just in case.

The 2 most accurate models I’m told are a few hundred miles apart as to where it will make landfall. One takes it north toward where We live and the other to south Fl.One prediction gives us 15+ inches of rain. Much of the North Florida area is very low, and this would cause real bad flooding, maybe even worse than Irma that was the worst in my lifetime in my area. I also went through Dora as a small child with 90-100 mph winds and had no damage to my childhood home. We are 21 feet above sea level where I live, but live on a small lake. One side of my house is only 30 feet from the lake but we’re kind of on a hill. With all the storms we’ve had recently, the lake has never gotten anywhere close to level with the house and then we have a crawl space too. But the lake is only a few inches lower than full pool at this time. Our lake was actually a foot and a half higher with Matthew than Irma, but still didn’t breach the top of our bulkhead , although Irma had unprecedented flooding in the St Johns river system that is only 1/2 of a mile away from us. Sorry to ramble , but hurricanes are very interesting to me , although very tedious and scary. Us in Florida covet your thoughts and prayers.

I was one of many Gator fans that didn’t like Franks at first. Other than the stupid interception in a the 4th Qtr , and the fumble during the exchange with the running back, he played fairly well last night. He actually had decent passing numbers and ran for a a TD, and threw 2. He is actually the best statiscally since Tebow , although that ain’t saying much compared to the competition. That would have to rank as one of the worst played games I’ve ever seen. There was a game last year we played ( against another SEC team in the east )that was probably the worst game played by another team against the gators I ever remember seeing. We may not be championship material yet but I don’t think one game defines a whole season. And we did win ya know!?

Any time we beat Miami it’s a good night, regardless of all the mistakes. Mullen now knows what they need to work on , that’s for sure.

Well, it wasn’t pretty but... We get a W.

Probably is a carp. They do that consistently.

I have problems with mine when using heavier casting gear( Like my frog rod ). It hurts less with lighter casting gear, and doesn’t hurt at all with spinning.

Oldeagle, you are 2 weeks younger than me, and I missed being born in NC by 2 months. Welcome to the forums. I have a lot of family in S.Eastern NC.

They are great. Them and The Stanley brothers are my favorite. My favorite newer group is blue highway. I used to love it when Roland Martin had bluegrass instrumentals as his back up music on his shows...

Yep, it’s that time again.? Who ya got? Give a shout out for your team!! GO GATORS!!!

I went camping/fishing with my middle son one time and got up at the crack of dawn. He was still asleep so I decided to go down the lake for a little while. I pulled into a small cove and slowly cruised along until I saw a nice fish blow up on something. I killed the motor excitedly grabbed my rod, but my sons reel handle was between my line and rod. So it flipped overboard. I quickly went to anchor but the anchor was gone! So I tried to stay where I was but the wind was blowing. I was about 150 feet off the bank in about 6 feet of water. I said a prayer and jumped in . Walked around for about 10 minutes hanging on to the boat and stepped on it !!!

I don’t listen to music much when I fish...but when I do I listen to bluegrass!! ?

We were fishing Sante Fe lake one time and I had to pee. So my friends let me out on a cypress tree so I could get a good angle. So they took off and drove around for awhile laughing before finally picking me back up. We fished a night tournament in the same lake. An ALL night tournament. You know it’s bad when it’s 230 in the morning and you find yourself trolling a crankbait. So I hook something big -My partner who had been asleep -finally woke up after I yelled enough. If you’ve ever fished much at night , you know how it is- normal things become distorted, it’s hard to tell what’s really happening, at least until you find the light. So I would reel, gain line, and it would pull all of it back out, all this time the boat is moving around with the wave action etc. AFter much effort, I finally get it up to where I could see it. I just knew I had won the tournament and it was a .... trot line. A dad-gum trot line. It didn’t even have a catfish on it. I did not win the tournament. Another time my dad and me were fishing on a pier and right as he cast out a seagull flew by and He hooked it. But he didn’t realize it at first. He said something like “ What in the world “ The seagull was flying away and my dad had to reel it in. That thing was NOT happy!

My dad started taking me when I was 4 . He liked pier or surf fishing , and that got me started. Oftentimes my whole family would go, which included Me and my brother, 2 aunts, an uncle, and mom and dad. Basically, these were to put food on the table. My dads philosophy of catch and release was catch it and release into the ice chest. We also bank fished a creek near the house for catfish. I started fresh water fishing in earnest when I was 14 at the lake down the road, catching bream and catfish. One day I saw a more streamlined fish swim by and realized it was a bass. Love at first sight!! Something drew me to bass then , and still does now. It wasn’t long after that I caught a 4 pound bass on a ...( wait for it ) DOUGHBALL , while fishing for cats. It got tangled up in a brush pile out from the bank. I immediately jumped in and grabbed it. Wish I could find the pic. The first bass I remember catching on a lure was on a red and white spoon. I think I caught one other fish on one. Then I discovered plastic worms ? Ever since then, bass fishing has been my favorite. I have done everything from offshore fishing to running a trot line for cats in remote lakes and everything in between and love bass fishing the best!!!

I keep some 12-16 inch LM bass every now and then .. I like bass filets, although there are other fish I’d rather eat. I have never seen one worm in any bass Ive cleaned. We fry ours and they are good. I don’t like bass quite as good on the bone. It has a stronger taste, I think from the skin. Still pretty good though.

I don’t get too specific on my home lake. Maybe I’m a little selfish, but if I don’t know the person asking me, I don’t tell them specific baits that work , just general terms like “soft plastics “:If I knew they would conserve the fishery like I try to, then I would trust them more. I just don’t want someone keeping all the fish and ruining it. If I know the person and trust them I tell them more. I gave a zoom fluke recently to a friend on the lake and the next time I went by his house he said he caught a 4 pounder on it. When I’m not on the home lake , I am usually on as remote a lake as possible . I don’t enjoy fishing crowded waters near as much, So discussions are few and far between out there.

I listen primarily to bluegrass/old time and Gospel music.Between those 3 , it’s probably 80% of what I listen to now. I know I’m in a minority with bluegrass, which I just don’t understand. It is so pure and pleasant to my ears, especially. Instrumentals.Favorite older artists include the Stanley brothers, Tommy Jarrell .Flatt and Scruggs. Favorite newer group is Blue highway . As far as Gospel/ Christian music There are too many I like to even try to list . I also like old time Cajun music ( like the Balfa brothers ) I occasionally like to hear some hill country blues( Rl Burnside ) I will occasionally get on a wild hair and listen to some Skynyrd, which was by far my favorite southern rock group . I also like some select country songs ,mostly from the 70s to around 10 years ago.

^^^ Thats hard to follow^^^ I have done one state : FLORIDA. But for other reasons than above ? Thats not likely to change any time soon.

My favorite rod is a 2 piece that is stuck together. That particular rod is less sensitive, but it is a med. -heavy action. I don’t have any problem detecting a strike though, and it’s got the backbone to pull a fish out of the weeds. I think one piece rods are somewhat more sensitive but for the kind of fishing I do , it doesn’t matter at all. I agree that buying rods is very hard for me. Esp. If it’s not a matching combo. I probably have more one piece rods, but that’s for no particular reason.

I use the 3/0 ewg Gammies too. My best day for numbers this year ( 32) was using these hooks and the speed worms. I didn’t miss very many that bit. I haven’t used the round shank hooks in years because it seem d like my hookup % was lower... but it was mostly using Culprit worms then.