N Florida Mike

I have a lot , but some my Favorites are: The Outlaw Josey Wales, Lonesome Dove, The Searchers, Open Range, El Dorado, Dances with Wolves, the Sacketts, Quigley down under. Good , the bad, and the ugly. Hell on Wheels… What are yours ? 🤠

My son went to St Augustine at one of our best spots and caught 14 sheepheads, ( my favorite fish to eat) and a bunch of small bluefish and black drums…

He is a very good saltwater fisherman, to the point of almost being a captain /guide before his boat broke down beyond repair…We will be posting some saltwater fishing pics soon.- that’s his favorite . He’s going to Rodman this weekend though, to catch whatever he can.

I’ve eaten them for 50 years now. The first 15 years or so I kept nearly every bass and ate it. (My dad’s idea of catch and release was catch and release into your ice chest). But I began releasing a lot more bass after 1990 or so. Now , I never keep any bass over 17 inches, but will keep some occasionally under that size. I like filleting bass because I believe the skin of a bass takes away from the taste some. Keeping some also helps keep the fishery from overpopulating. They are good if filleted, lightly battered, and fried. There are better eating fish , of course. As far as the ethics of it, I don’t have any problem with people that keep their legal limits. I try to discourage people from keeping large bass, because they are the big egg bearers.

My son just moved back from michigan. He’s already getting into the fish…

Got some bream this afternoon…

I would. Half of the public lakes in Florida are already overfished. Adding one more wouldn’t bother me in the least. A fish that big would have to be at or near the end of its life anyway, but I wouldn’t want to kill it unless necessary. In Florida , there’s a good chance the fish would be caught in a private or semi private lake though. My personal opinion is that a state record swims in Kingsley lake Fl. I wouldn’t necessarily say world record there, but it’s possible. 2 fish over 15 pounds were caught there fairly recently. It’s semi private at this point, and is probably the deepest natural lake in Fl., with depths over 90 feet deep. I believe it’s around 2000 acres also. But I’m getting off track. I mostly fish non public waters anymore, and if it was private who would care? Maybe it would increase the fishing from those with access on the lake .. If it’s like most private lakes in Florida only a small % of the owners ever fish at all anyway. On my lake , only a few besides me ever fish. And I probably do 90% of all the fishing on the lake.

I’m getting 7.527 thanks to google search.

I would never eat sauerkraut again 🤢 Finally got on the board with much effort. Florida State Record : 17.27 pounds Todays fish: 1 pound 3 oz . Not sure how to convert it to hundreths so … Maybe someone can help me convert it 1.3/17.27 times 100= ? My calculator isn’t helping 🤠

I can’t get motivated any more either. A lot of it is that the areas I used to hunt are now neighborhoods. I have to drive a long way now, don’t have time to scout, and it’s public land . I’ve lost contact with most of my old friends that hunted also. I almost went squirrel hunting once over Christmas break but just didn’t have it in me. I was tired from a fishing trip the day before… My oldest grandson is really getting into it so I may end up going with him at some point, but he’s got his buddies that he likes going with instead of me…

Most the freshwater fishing Ive done has been in Florida. And salt for that matter. I have fished shoreline structure mostly, but do fish offshore in my small lake some. I have fished all kinds of waters from remote to urban. So for me to flip it’d be fishing offshore in waters where I haven’t, and more at night. Ive done some night fishing but not much. I would also have to switch from largely fishing plastics to everything else. And I’m with katy on the electronics. It ain’t happening at this point. Boats? To flip I’d have to go back to a bass boat, which won’t happen either, unless it belongs to someone else. 🤠

Good work @T-Billy !

Got a beautiful 3 .6 this morning.

So far this going a lot like when I used to fish tournaments. No tournament- load the boat. Tournament- Can’t find a fish. Fished several ponds so far without a bite.

I don’t directly chum for bass. For one thing, it would take a long time to draw fish in. I chum bream and shiners a lot though. If you get them holding in an area, the bass will come too.

I’ve hooked dozens of turtles while bream or catfishing. Most commonly soft shells.

I ( sort of ) caught a barred owl once. I had set out a bait and went in the house to eat. When I went back out , my line was slack. I reeled and reeled, and it was on my left property line in a big bush that’s in and out of the water. I couldn’t reach whatever it was from the bank , so I paddled the JB around and began getting the line tight. As it got tight, I realized the line was up high in the bush. As I shown the light up in there something moved. I moved a piece of the bush out of the way, and was shocked to see an owl staring at me. For a second I thought he might attack me with that hooked beak and sharp talons, but he had enough slack to hop up higher. I could never tell if he was hooked or if the line was wrapped around him. I thought about netting him, but realized that would be a catastrophe. so I decided to cut the line as close to him as I dared, and that went well. I went back to check on him the next morning, but he was gone….

I hadn’t planned to fish my lake again today but conditions were perfect in mid afternoon so I gave in to the temptation.Temps in the 60s, Mostly cloudy , day before the full moon, and the perfect ripple of wind. I fished mostly the east bank today going south. I thought maybe there’d be some fish there in a traditional bedding area , and I was right. I was using a watermelon red chartreuse tail trick worm. The first fish I caught blew up on the worm as I pulled it over a small patch of weeds, but he missed. I threw over again and got nailed. The very next cast I got a slightly bigger fish., and another within 5 minutes of that one . All within 50 feet of each other. I caught a couple more around the eel grass patches then it got slow for a long time. Got one off a friends dock by our island, and switched to the yum dinger coming back. The one fish I lost nailed the dinger and when it came up and did a head shake it got off-3-4 pounds ? Went back to the bedding area and caught another fish on the dinger. Ended up with 7, but the bite was better today than it’s been lately….nice average size today too.

First time for me. Rooting for ol miss. Next team if ol miss can’t do it : Indiana, then Oregon. ANYONE but miami.

We would traditionally have black eyed peas , greens, cornbread, and ham or fried chicken. My mom was a north carolinian so I’m sure that was the biggest influence. Nowdays, my wife and daughter have a traditional thanksgiving and Christmas supper but not on new years . I had a jimmy dean meat lovers bowl for breakfast, some kind of delicious italian sandwich for lunch( although my wife isn’t italian), and stir fry chicken and vegetables for supper. Apple pie for dessert. Nobody going hungry around here ! 🤠

Sounds like fun. I guess my lake wouldn’t be included because it’s private. Even though it was only stocked once , around 70 years ago. I avoid public waters as much as possible because Florida waters are SO pressured . so this will be a good challenge for growth , in finding new accessible waters and as a bass fisherman. thanks AJ !

Here’s one for you @TnRiver46

First Catt ( Tommy ) , now Tom this year 😢. Will miss his knowledge and desire to teach and share his expertise.