N Florida Mike

I dont know anywhere that was worse for speed traps than hwy 301 in N Florida back in the day ! Lawtey !! A car with New York tags passed me there once like I was standing still. I thought he wont make it to the city limits before getting stopped. He didnt. He desrved it, but they would get you there if you were 1 mile over. Hampton was bad too, but Waldo was the worst. Got my first ticket there. Speed limit changed so many times you had to be diligent every second or get a ticket. None of them are as bad now .

This thread gets the dovetail award for the year... As for me, fishing has more of a following than many of the others combined. The only one I had to think hard about was the competitive eating. lol. Got a lot of that going on around here....?

I would beg to differ. I cant imagine anywhere ( in the U.S) worse than Fl. I drive in 3-4 counties weekly so I have quite a bit of experience. People going 45 on the highways. People driving 80 mph on the expressway through town. People sitting at a red light even though they could turn R. on red and nothings coming. People drifting way over in your lane on the highway. They ought to give us hazard pay !!

I usually hunt when its cold but couldnt this year. Got other fish to fry.

Dang. I admire your braving the cold. Thought I was a die-hard. Was is the key word. We get so much nice weather here I reckon Im spoiled. Getting a freeze tonight and bluebird skies. Probly wont fish tomorrow.

I was fishing one of my favorite lakes back in the day in my JB , with my gf at the time. I had only told her one rule- be careful when casting not to hook me from behind.It wasnt long and I heard and felt a Swoosh, and on her cast she had hooked my hat and threw it out in the lake. She was so worried Id be mad but I thought it was funny. I did not marry her tho. Another time I was fishing with shiners off a dock in the river. I had a big shiner under a cork , and when I cast got a big birdnest, the shiner smacking the water 10-15 feet out. Im trying to pull it out and it starts tightening up. Cork was under . It had to be a lunker, because the shiner was 10-11 inch. I had no choice but to set the hook, but with no drag , the line broke. My favorite one happenned while fishing a nght tourney on lake Sante fe. It was around 2 in the morning and I had tried everything in my box to no avail. I had tied on a crankbait and just started trolling offshore. After a long time the rod suddenly loaded up and it felt good, real good. Im thinking Ive won the tournament and big fish... But it was not in the boat yet. I woke my partner up and he got a light and net. I would pull it almost up where I could see it , and it would take most of the line back I had gained. Not sure how long this went on and I tightened the drag a little, putting a little more pressure on it. Suddenly it came into view. A trot line. ? I had hooked a dad -gum trot line. I dont think I had ever been that disappointed about anything before. Then I almost cut in in half in anger, but decided to just run it and see... Not even one catfish for my trouble. I did not win the tournament...

PB was around 11 a.m .No scale but taxidermist said 9 pounds. 24 1/2 inch. Only fish I ever mounted. And it was my only bite that warm and windy december morning. Runner up was between 12-1 pm 8.6 pounds

This is another confirmation that winter has truly arrived....

That reminds me of a 6 + pounder I caught off a bed last January. It was bedding right in front of my bulkhead and all I had seen was the bed and the little buck gaurding the nest. Big mama VIOLENTLY attacked that spinnerbait about 10 feet from me. Never heard of many people catching bedding fish on spinnerbaits. It was the biggest bass I ever caught on one . Sorry about the cold weather. I cant relate much to that right now ( temps in the 70s here )?

Still slow at work, so Ive been bank fishing a lot the last 10 days or so. Its been slow fishing too. Fished 7 ponds for maybe 4 hours total, and have caught a grand total of 7 bass . Caught them on flukes mostly .This was the biggest, which is nothing to brag about.

Mann's jelly worms. Caught my PB on one so Im not sure why I dont. I think its because I only have the smaller black ones left in stock , and I caught more with the bigger grape ones. Im not much of a " order on line " fan, and they arent in stores much around here.

For some reason, I have tended to use the zoom lizards mostly around beddin' time , and for long periods of time dont use them. I always have them in my box though. I use the zoom pumpkin 6 inchers with as little weight as possible. The more weight I use, the less fish I catch. Every time. Where I fish, they mainly want it horizontal and I catch a high % of them with it moving. Throwing it through and around eel grass edges is deadly in late spring, summer, and fall when the eel grass is emerged. I catch better quality fish on them than baby brush hogs. One struggle I have is that they dont cast as good as I like with the small weight I use. But if I add weight they just dont bite it as much, even if I try to keep it up on top. I can cast it just far enough to get bit so I guess thats all that matters. And the bites on lizards are usually violent !

The one that happened to Bill Dance is my favorite. The exact same thing happened to me once.

Maybe one of them could haul your boat or kayak overland into a remote area. Of course, youd probably go homeless to afford one.

I caught my PB in the month of december in 2 foot of water. I just caught a 5 pounder in a foot of water. Caught 3 6 pounders the last 3 decembers, all in 3 feet or less of water. My theory is that the shallow water warms up faster in the winter. Also, Some of these fish were either bedding or right before it, since our decembers have been mostly warm lately. Your water temps wont be much colder than mine. The main thing I do differently in the winter is just slow down my presentation as much as I can. I personally dont catch much in deep water in the winter. Of course, where I fish there isnt much deep water !!

I told this one on an old thread, but it's been long enough now I can re-tell it. When I was in my late teens, early 20s, I had a friend... (crazy mel ) that was a few years younger than me. He was actually a decent fisherman. One day we were out and he noticed my rod and reel combo ( that I had caught my PB on.) Without any warning he picked it up and said " Is this an ugly stik " , as he bent the rod tip to butt like they used to do in the commercial . SNAP went the rod. I could not say a word. I could not move. All I could do was give him the stare down. He jumped out of the boat and swam to shore without saying a word. He ended up giving me his sorry rod. Another time he decided to see how it would be to put two big chews of red man in, one in each cheek.After awhile I realized he hadnt said anything in a while ( he was normally very talkative ) I turned to see what was up and he was green. ?About that time he barfed. I put him out on an island until he got to feelin better.

Reply of the month !!!!

When I used to fish for them more, we did some drift fishing with minnows . We used a split shot and no cork so it stayed on or near the bottom. Did well with numbers of smaller fish, would get nice catfish that way too.

@Catt Your story was similar to one I had .One of the few times I got a genuine " skeer " , ( not a bad dream , but reality ) , was when I went wade fishing in a big , cypress tree filled lake out in the woods. I had gone maybe 500 feet or so from the ramp, and hadnt caught anything. I suddenly heard something crash back in the swamp and heard something coming. It had taken me probably an hour to get that far, but I dont remember it taking me but 5 minutes or so to get back out !!!?

I have one every now and then. Im fishing my home lake and when I get out there , someone has cut down all the trees on our Island and Im trying to understand why. And one part of it is I never catch anything. It is definetely my lake, but its surreal, kind of like wearing yellow tint sunglasses. In the dream , I think there is a little creek going out of it at the south end that goes to another lake ( There isnt in reality ) , and Im always trying to find it in the dream and cant. When Im really fishing I remember it in the dream sometimes. Not a scary dream, just weird.

Maybe it was a roogareau.?

What is the " big rock show " ? never heard of that before.

So why not just wait until the 7th person dies, then go look?? Maybe thats too simple?

Glad things are turning around. Many memories are built fishing favorite waters and we certainly dont want to see it end. I have mentioned this before, but I am on the board of directors for the small lake I live on. We always have a tension caused by excessive weed growth from spring to fall. The lake is shallow, so if we never treated the weeds we would have a swamp, not a lake. It is very difficult to get the right balance from year to year. Also, we have a wide range of opinion between our residents. Some dont want to see ANY weeds , no matter how much herbicide is needed. The other extreme is people who could care less if the lake is completely overrun with weeds. I am more on the weedy side, but dont want it taken over. As long as I can get my jb through it, we're good. Our lake sprayer is very good, but we still have trouble keeping the weeds from taking over. My excuse to the " no weeds " folks, is that we dont want a fish kill like the one we had in 2011. Most, if not all the big bass died in that fiasco. We are now getting 8 + fish again, and I want that to keep increasing!

Ribbon tail worms, flukes, trick worms - texas rigged ! That will broaden your horizons. ?