Fishlegs

$5 well spent @Bluebasser86. That is a cool catfish. I like that it put on the tuxedo for your family. 😂 @king fisher we’ve seen the fish you catch so we know your skills are not the problem. You’ll figure them out.

I caught this one in a friend's pond. My scale said 5 lbs 1 oz, which was less than I expected, but it's what it said. My friend bought this property 3-4 years ago. We were actually on the boat fishing when he was talking to the agent. The first time I went with him to see the pond after he bought it there were thousands of tiny bream, tadpoles, and frogs everywhere, but zero evidence of anything else. He had tried fishing with lures, and live bait, but caught nothing. He decided to pay someone stock the pond with catfish, crappie, and some type of small minnows. The next year he decided that we should catch a few bass to release into the pond...which we did. He wanted to transfer smallest bass that were legal to catch (15") because he didn't want a lot of big bass eating everything he had stocked. We did put one healthy 3 pounder, and one 5 pounder in there to make sure there were a couple with good genes in there. We've caught catfish to eat out of the pond, but this is only the second time I've fished it for bass. I'd say that they are doing well. We fished less than two hours and caught 8-10 small bass, 10-12 large bluegill (one big enough to get a 3/0 EWG inside its mouth), 4-5 catfish (a couple close to 5 pounds), one crappie, and the big bass right at the end. I caught the big bass running my favorite spinnerbait past a laydown, and everything else on a weightless, tx-rigged purple-ish zoom z-craw. My friend used a bobby garland baby shad the whole time. I'm happy to see his pond is doing well. We actually talked about how we should probably start culling fish to keep it from getting overpopulated. Looking forward to our next fish fry.

I’m with you on that @Swamp Girl. I may start saying “dewee” every time I catch a fish now. 😊

That’s a wonderful post @IcatchDinks. One thing I learned with my kids is that they don’t really care what they’re doing as long as they get to do it with you. Keep loving your kids, stay involved in their life, and they/you will be happy, and blessed.

Looks like a little slice of paradise. Beautiful place @TOXIC.

Yes, ma’am! There is what we’ve all been waiting for! The ice has been broken, and the floodgate of bass catching is about to begin.

Sorry you're having to deal with this, but I hope everything goes well, and they find the best treatment for you. Be strong!

We may be on the board before you, but after about three trips you’ll put more bass in your canoe that most of us will catch all year. Hang in there @Swamp Girl…your day is coming soon, and we’re all looking forward to that day.

I heard from him last week @WRB.

I bet those look irresistible wacky rigged. Nice work!

@softwateronly, if you keep catching and posting fish like that we may end up in a bidding war to see how much it takes to get those coordinates from @Swamp Girl. 😂 Congrats, again!

First jerkbait, huh?

Absolutely!

We have the same problem every year near our fireplace. I put a Terro liquid bait trap near where they come in, and they're usually gone in a couple of days. You can get them at Lowes, Home Depot, Ace Hardware, etc. My wife thinks it's gross because there are 1000s of dead ants in the traps, but it beats having live ants in the house IMO.

You get to catch it. You get to eat it, but it’s cleaned and cooked by someone else? That’s the life, man. Well done @gim.

Has it always done this, or is this a new problem? I have one of the reels, and I've never had the problem you're having. I use it a lot, and mine opens & closes normally, and has never closed on a cast. I'm not sure what you need to do to fix it, but it definitely sounds like something is wrong with the reel.

Prayers for you, your family, and doctors.

Black bass were tough to come by yesterday, but the fishing was not slow. We caught 6 smallmouth in the 2 lb range, but we caught a total of 45 fish in about 6 hours. My friend caught a 10.5 lb buffalo, and I caught the longest skipjack I've ever seen in person (over 18" & over 2 lbs). Everything else was white bass after white bass. The dogwoods are blooming, and the white bass showed up on cue. We tried several lures, but the only thing that worked was a mid-depth crankbait. Everything I caught was with a green/brown craw pattern with a red belly (pictured), and my friend was using an orange belly craw pattern. The only bad thing was the wind stealing my favorite fishing hat. They were releasing water at 80,000 cfs so we couldn't catch it before the current pulled it under. It's hard to complain about a day where you average catching a fish every 8 minutes, but I'll sure miss that hat. Otherwise, it was a great day.

Congrats, and happy birthday!

That sounds like an "ask me how I know" type of comment @TnRiver46. I bought myself some snips to put in my bag after reading this thread. Yikes!

Abundant, fun to catch, and pretty good eatin’.

I had about 15 minutes to fish before a family dinner, so I took advantage of it. The water was nasty from a recent round of storms so I reached for the brightest lure I had in my box. This little guy really wanted to taste a chartreuse jerkbait. He went for it twice. I was reeling my lure in when I saw something swipe at the lure right beside the dock. He missed, but went after it quite aggressively so I had to try again. I cast out far enough to get it under the water about where the swipe happened, let it sit for a couple of seconds, and...BAM! A feisty largemouth on a jerkbait followed by a nice dinner with another set of largemou...umm, I mean family members. 🤣 It was a very nice evening.

I had about 15 minutes to fish before a family dinner, so I took advantage of it. The water was nasty from a recent round of storms so I reached for the brightest lure I had in my box. This little guy really wanted to taste a chartreuse jerkbait. He went for it twice. I was reeling my lure in when I saw something swipe at the lure right beside the dock. He missed, but went after it quite aggressively so I had to try again. I cast out far enough to get it under the water about where the swipe happened, let it sit for a couple of seconds, and...BAM! A feisty largemouth on a jerkbait followed by a nice dinner with another set of largemou...umm, I mean family members. 🤣 It was a very nice evening. I just realized I posted this is the wrong thread. I meant to put it in the latest catch thread. Oops. I'm going to repost it in the right place. Delete if you need to mods. Sorry about that.

Congrats! Nice fish.