Hog Basser

Got a chance to get away last minute and take my nephews fishing this weekend on our property. I love the fishing, but making the memories with family is the best part. This is on a 53 acre private lake nestled in the Arkansas Delta with a bayou just over the levee, so we have lots of fishing options and also plenty of snakes. I caught our first fish from the dock before getting on the boat. This is a low profile dock we drag our jon boats up on top of, no roof, so we need to leave the plug out so they don't fill with water. While pushing the boat off the dock, my nephew hollers "SNAKE!!", well, I instantly jump backward and see this guy. Broad-banded water snake that was cut up a little from the boat dragging over him. I was about to step on him before he yelled. Well, he had a mouth full of something, so probably wouldn't have been able to bite me, but I wasn't taking chances. Although not poisonous, the bite still hurts. Well moving on, we both proceeded to land 3.5 pounders shortly thereafter. Notice, I always carry my trusty "judge" for a snake gun. This bream tried to swallow a topwater bigger than him. Shot and killed this cottonmouth that came out to inspect our boat. Another water snake on Sunday morning. He just hung out right by the boat. Well, I've hit my pic limit for now, I have some more to add later. All told, we got 57 bass, 5 crappie and one bream on the weekend. I broke my AG Veritas MH rod trying to get unhung like an idiot and lost about 10 lures between us (very stumpy lake). Made for a great weekend and a good time was had by all!

Wow, nice job and great story!

I eat the ones out of my pond. It's a part of our management plan. And they are very tasty fried or baked if you know what you're doing. If we don't harvest and eat, they become overcrowded and starving really fast. That being said, we put the large ones back, just keep the 10-15 inchers.

Wow, just wow.... Yep, I would have walked out and probably given him a piece of my mind too. Even if he can't go any lower than that, it's no excuse to act that way. You will find the boat that's meant for you, move on and keep looking.

Well, I got the all-clear last night from the Mrs. to take my nephews fishing for the entire weekend and I got to thinking......they always lose several of my lures, so I might as well just stop by DSG and see what they have. Not intending to really buy anything at first, I didn't pick up a cart or basket. Well, they were running a few deals today and I was still resisting. Then the bait monkey whispered in my ear that it's no big deal if I only buy what I can fit in my hands. All Yamamoto hard plastics (reg. $7.99) were two for $10, so naturally I got four. Booyah Pad Crashers were buy one get one half off, so I had to get two, right? I just had to get a Rebel Craw since my nephews prefer this bait and usually lose mine. And why not pick up a few keel weighted hooks while I'm at it? Well, this was on my lunch break and when I got home, guess what was waiting for me? Bagley Diving B - reg. $9.39 Livingston Pro Sizzle Jr. - $11.99 Pepper Custom Baits Micro Jig - $4.49 Bruiser Baits Thrasher - $4.29 (5 pack) Wave Crawdude - $5.49 (7 pack) Mustad Plastic Frog Hook Double Wide - $6.49 (2 pack) Lucas Fishing Reel Oil - $5.99 (1 oz.)

I've heard some say that larger channels aren't nearly as tasty, that's why fillets at restaurants are usually the smaller ones, but heck, if you're frying it, you can make it taste great. I'd take the advice of those above. No need to overdo it, just some buttermilk and flour or cornmeal and maybe a little salt, fry and enjoy. Maybe get a little tartar sauce too. Large Flathead and Blues are supposedly much tastier than large Channels.

Nice work, I'd take a day like that anytime!

You need to check out this section: http://www.bassresource.com/lake-management/ It has articles for everything related to ponds and pond management, including fish feeding.

Try the pond boss forums. There's also a lake management section on this website with tons of info. There are a ton of factors that go into it, but without proper and constant management, this will happen to 99% of ponds (stunted bass). Probably need to cull as many bass as possible and start from near scratch at least before you dump some new bluegill in there. Give the spawn of the current bluegill a chance to grow up and create a situation where there's less competition for the surviving bass.

Caught 3 on a chatter in the10-15 minutes of total fishing I snuck in this weekend. Two hit on the initial drop and the 3rd hit on a slow/steady retrieve.

Well, looks like I'll be posting in the Bait Monkey Thread again soon!

If it comes with a split ring, I tied to that, if not, it is direct to the lure.

Wife sent me to Academy to grab a knee brace for her. I "accidentally" ended up in the fishing section and they had all their H2O Express lures marked $1 off. So I picked up a bunch of their spinner baits, but also ended up grabbing a few rat-l-traps and z-man chatterbaits that caught my eye. Oh yeah, and some z-man shroomz ned heads.

Make sure you have a good forage base for them to eat before stocking any big predator fish.

Yep, that's it. Just remove, remove, remove. It would be best to keep a log if you can, so you know what you've done so far. I do this managing my own pond and refer to it often. Record length, weight, date, conditions, etc. You can judge the health of the fish by following the directions on the attached document I got from the lake management section of this site. Fish Wr Value.docx

It is a total weight per acre thing. To maintain a healthy pond, it is recommended you remove 25-35 lbs per surface acre per year. It will be more than that for an already overcrowded pond. The links posted earlier for the lake management section of this website and the pond boss forum have tons of info on this, study them. Moving a few larger fish will not usually help. Fish become adjusted to their environment and often lose weight if transferred once they have become accustomed to a particular pond. It would be better to clean the whole pond out and start from scratch with some good genetics from a fish hatchery than to use bucket biology. Younger fish have a better chance to grow and become accustomed to a new environment than older ones. Your main problem will be maintaining a forage base. With all those hungry mouths to feed, it will be hard to get it balanced again. The large bluegill should be breeding well, but all their offspring will be decimated too quickly with a hungry overcrowded pond. You can fix it by removing as many bass as possible, it will just take time. This will also be a consistent effort and can't stop once things start getting better, it has to be ongoing management. Remove as many bass as possible first, then you might look at restocking more small bluegill to get the forage base up. Of course, that is up to the pond owner. It will take longer for the forage base to recover on it's own.

Sounds like the "death rattle" my jeep has when I go over 50MPH on the worn out mud tires I need to replace. Usually an alignment or tire wear issue causes this.

Still a long shot it is worth that much. But hey, if it works I'd do it for some new setups!

Prize koi that command the big bucks are more rare than you might think. They consist of the top 0.2% of the offspring from the breeders. They always keep the best ones and the ones that make it out to people's fish ponds, while pretty, do not meet the standards that command such high prices. While you might sell one that big for hundreds of dollars due to size, the multiple thousand dollar ones are bred specifically to meet certain criteria. It would be very rare to find one in the wild that got much more than $1,000 at best.

Me: Rat-L-Trap on first cast of the season, immediate snag....Rebel Crawfish (old one I'd had for a long time) a few trips later. My Teenage Nephews ("borrowing" my lures): 3 brand new Booyah Spinners, assorted older spinners, another Rat-L-Trap (replacement of the original one) on his 2nd cast, and various older crankbaits from the bottom of my box. This is on 5 days of fishing, only two of which were with my nephews. I bought them both their own tackle boxes for Christmas and loaded them up with starter lures, but they keep "forgetting" to bring them when I ask them to go fishing with me.

That little one would make a nice snack for the big one.

I know it isn't the law that you have to kill them, but I believe everyone should do their part. While you may never eradicate them completely, it still helps keep the population in check and possibly limits them from spreading even farther out. They are not meant to be there and change the whole dynamic of the fishery. If everyone does their part to help eliminate them, it will at least limit the numbers and impact they have. If it is suggested that you kill them, there is a reason. I hope they never get a foothold here.

Straight from the MD DNR website: http://dnr2.maryland.gov/fisheries/Pages/snakehead.aspx What can you do? If you catch a northern snakehead, kill it and DO NOT put it back in the water. If the snakehead has a tag, measure the length, make note of the exact location of capture, and call the toll free number printed on the tag. Information that you provide is important in determining control and management strategies. We had a minor problem with snakeheads down here in Arkansas and it was quickly quarantined and eradicated before getting into the river system. There is no guarantee they were all eradicated, but there haven't been any reported sightings since. They are detrimental to sportfish populations such as the LMB and must be eradicated whenever possible. It is not about killing for the sake of killing, it is about removing an invasive species that doesn't belong in our ecosystem and will have long-term negative effects on it.

Can't be the reliability and toughness of Abu Garcia round reels. I have several in my arsenal. I recently purchased a Lew's (haven't tried it out yet) and I have almost 20 year old Shimano Curado and Quantum reels that are back ups and need a little cleaning up. I'm not particularly loyal and will try anything, but feel most comfortable with Abu. In fact, I just picked up my first Abu spinning reel today to use with a Ned Rig set up.

I was under the impression that snakehead are an invasive species and should be removed and disposed of if caught?