Pat Brown Posted March 1 Share Posted March 1 The number of big fish I catch somewhere my intuition told me to skip over tells me maybe just cast at everything! 😉🥴🎣😂 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zcoker Posted March 2 Share Posted March 2 This here bird eyeballing the pads told me where the fish was, “right here buddy” So I punched it and bam! 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User scaleface Posted March 2 Super User Share Posted March 2 ^^ What kind of bird is that? Is it a fish eater? I'm not familiar with it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Global Moderator TnRiver46 Posted March 3 Global Moderator Share Posted March 3 7 hours ago, scaleface said: ^^ What kind of bird is that? Is it a fish eater? I'm not familiar with it. My first guess is American bittern Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rgasr63 Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 11 hours ago, Zcoker said: This here bird eyeballing the pads told me where the fish were, “right here buddy” So I punched it and bam! Exactly !!! Great Catch!! There has been many a day when the birds have shown me a place to fish. Sometimes they catch the biggest fish of the day!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Rust Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 I’m hoping the guys spouting off about “just rely on the FFS technology “ and “Fire up the transducers “ were a little tongue-in-cheek. Otherwise, I’m reminded of the hubris the designers of HMSTitantic were displaying. They built their “unsinkable “ ship and it sailed into an iceberg….. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Rust Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Another thought-last spring on my favorite smallie stream, I saw a guy with a flyrod having a blast catching really nice fish on a clouser minnow, tied very sparsely. I was struggling with my soft plastics to just catch a few. So I went home to my tying desk and in short order had a half-dozen of “my” clouser pattern in white and chartreuse with red dumbbell eyes and went back the next day. I got there after some chores at about the hour that the fish had quit biting on the day before. Not real hopeful but he wasn’t there so I waded out and on the third cast caught a 14’’ which in that stream is way above average. Wound up with 6 and the last was almost 19 inches which hardly ever gets caught by ANYone in that river. Very simple materials (deer hair and some crystal flash) but they smoked it! So who really needs the latest and greatest new lures to hit the market-the fish, or US??? Just wondering’ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zcoker Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Yesterday’s legends were once what FFS is today. If you notice these leaderboards like in the elite series, the greats are close to last place. A transition has taken place, from old to new, the power of observation has a new set of eyes! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User ol'crickety Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 39 minutes ago, Zcoker said: Yesterday’s legends were once what FFS is today. If you notice these leaderboards like in the elite series, the greats are close to last place. A transition has taken place, from old to new, the power of observation has a new set of eyes! Considering the number of big bass that are found floating following tournaments,* FFS might do to bass fishing what elephant hunting and ivory poaching has done to elephants, with some elephants being born tuskless today or with relatively tiny tusks. With more big females being killed due to the efficiency of FFS in tournaments, more and more big bass genes are being culled from the gene pool. In a 2056 elite tournament, you might see the winning angler lifting two 14-inchers while the crowd cheers. *In-Fisherman: "For example, in a theoretical tournament where 100 bass are caught, we estimated 15 of them would die at a water temperature of 54°F, whereas at 66°F, upward of 34 would be expected to die. Further, bass caught at five tournament events could result in up to 90 percent cumulative mortality at higher temperatures." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Brown Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Everything that I know about lakes and fish tells me that tournaments don't even touch a fraction of the fish that exist on a lake. Even the ones that get hammered every year. Tournament anglers only lay hands on a small small percentage of the fish. Forward facing sonar certainly seems to be a controversial topic and a point of contention for a lot of people. But I understand both sides of the fence and I personally sympathize with both points of view for and against the technology. I think the fact of the matter is technology keeps moving regardless of how people feel about it and the people who adapt are the people who stand to benefit. The fish are going to keep on fishing like they have for bazillions of years. If regulations need to be put in place, I hope that various state agencies do what's required to protect the resource. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User ol'crickety Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 25 minutes ago, Pat Brown said: Everything that I know about lakes and fish tells me that tournaments don't even touch a fraction of the fish that exist on a lake. I hope you're right about ^this^ assertion, Pat. Why do you believe this to be so? 25 minutes ago, Pat Brown said: But I understand both sides of the fence and I personally sympathize with both points of view for and against the technology. I do think it would thrilling to have FFS finger a fish and then cast to it, knowing it's there, much like spotting a bonefish or seeing a smallie dapple the surface and then casting to the rings. 25 minutes ago, Pat Brown said: what's required to protect the resource. This is my concern, as I stated above. If FFS increases your catch and because tournaments kill bass, there will be a genetic, downsizing shift. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Brown Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Because if you've got maybe 30% of 52 x (5x4x X number of anglers) dying at the ramp on lakes that have maybe 2,000,000 bass swimming around that have never seen a lure or been caught.....how many fish are you really affecting? Also I believe I heard it said on a podcast with a fisheries biologist that 40% of all fish on a lake die every year without anglers contributing at all and this is all species. Of course all of them are reproducing constantly and replacing fish that die of natural causes every year. What would radically change things is people starting to keep bass to eat regularly and especially the large ones. I don't see that happening anytime soon so I don't really feel afraid. There's actually a lot of data that suggests if people started to keep the 12 to 15-in bass on their home lakes routinely, they would produce record class bass pretty quickly. Another really important thing to remember about bass fishing which is primarily a catch and release sport is that when we release the fish and they do survive, they are well educated and very much less likely to bite again All things being equal. And then there are the fish that will never ever bite a lure in their entire lives because of their genetic predisposition for caution. How else can you explain on 2 million fish lakes, bass with cull tag holes in their faces. I think we kind of catch the stupid ones most of the time. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Global Moderator TnRiver46 Posted March 3 Global Moderator Share Posted March 3 Everything is always going to kill all the bass and ruin all the fishing, same story for decades. Yet the fish thrive, I can catch them in a trash heap 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User ol'crickety Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 21 minutes ago, Pat Brown said: There's actually a lot of data that suggests if people started to keep the 12 to 15-in bass on their home lakes routinely, they would produce record class bass pretty quickly. I think it was a BR article that argued this same point. The writer used a hypothetical pond and said that it could support 100 pounds of bass, whether that number was comprised of 100 one-pounders of 10 ten-pounders. As I recall, the writer also said that you had to keep culling or the pond would revert to more numerous, smaller bass. 17 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said: Everything is always going to kill all the bass and ruin all the fishing, same story for decades. Well, that sometimes happens. Tom (@WRB) wrote recently that one of the great lakes he fished in California is no longer producing big bass. I don't know if that was due to overfishing, but I've read a couple accounts of the glory days of those two monster-producing lakes and they were pounded. I saw it on a smaller scale on ponds I loved as a child. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Rust Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 No offense TnRiver, but most of us ain’t as talented as you are with a ‘stick. I still maintain that tournaments make fishing tougher for us average Joe’s. I’ve proven it on trout streams about gosh becoming conditioned to dry flies. Whereas the first easy to get to Meadow only produces a few takes of my flies, when I hike to the second or third meadow ( another 45 minutes up the trail) the amount of rises and takes of my flies usually about triples. Seen it happen way more than a few times 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User ol'crickety Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 15 minutes ago, Tom Rust said: when I hike to the second or third meadow ( another 45 minutes up the trail) the amount of rises and takes of my flies usually about triples. Seen it happen way more than a few times I've experienced this phenomenon in Maine and northwestern Ontario. If you're willing to climb another 45 minutes or its equivalent, fish will rise. I'm grateful for the ease of ramps, which keep most anglers from making the climb. I've told the story of catching five muskies in an hour and losing a sixth, but to reach those muskies, I paddled across one lake, portaged half a mile, paddled across another lake, portaged a quarter, mile, paddled across another lake, bushwhacked a half mile, waded a swamp, and worked my way down a tumbling stream before reaching the lake where where those six muskies were. The adventure and challenge of all that paddling and portaging and bushwhacking equaled the thrill of six muskies in an hour. For those of you who are still young and want to reach such water, I advise now. Go now. The door to such adventure will close sooner than you think. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Brown Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Tournaments do make fish harder to catch which makes them more likely to survive people who are just casually trying to catch them with the intention of maybe eating a few or something like that. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Rust Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Thanks Ol Crickety for reinforcing my point. In Montana I’ve experienced it on stream after stream. Pounded fish are just way harder to catch a second, third or fourth time (for them, not me!! Lol) 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User Team9nine Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 4 hours ago, Tom Rust said: I’m hoping the guys spouting off about “just rely on the FFS technology “ and “Fire up the transducers “ were a little tongue-in-cheek. Otherwise, I’m reminded of the hubris the designers of HMSTitantic were displaying. They built their “unsinkable “ ship and it sailed into an iceberg….. Total sarcasm, Tom (insert ‘stir the pot’ emoji here) 😆 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User ol'crickety Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 You're welcome, @Tom Rust, but I think we're opining in a hurricane. FWIW, I admire you for having frosty hair, but you're still ascending to the second or third meadow. You are not going gently into that good night, you are raging, raging, against the dying of the light. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User Team9nine Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 3 hours ago, ol'crickety said: Considering the number of big bass that are found floating following tournaments,* FFS might do to bass fishing what elephant hunting and ivory poaching has done to elephants, with some elephants being born tuskless today or with relatively tiny tusks. With more big females being killed due to the efficiency of FFS in tournaments, more and more big bass genes are being culled from the gene pool. In a 2056 elite tournament, you might see the winning angler lifting two 14-inchers while the crowd cheers. I don't think it will be anything that dramatic, but it likely has a solid effect on top end size and numbers. Since all the big bass drama/eyes are on Texas at the moment, consider it’s been more than 30 years since they set the current state record bass, this despite the efforts of long running programs like ShareLunker. FFS combined with social media will continue to put downward pressure on the chances of growing a new state record. It will likely take a big shift in habitat (environmental conditions) to swing things in the other direction. Texas is fortunate in that it has some immense bodies of water that hold up well to pressure. In most states, it’s not unusual to see the entire population of bass get turned over 1X, 2X or even greater in the smaller lakes. In those cases, tournament mortality negatively affects top end size structure. The same happens with pressure in general. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User Catt Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 2 hours ago, Pat Brown said: There's actually a lot of data that suggests if people started to keep the 12 to 15-in bass on their home lakes routinely, they would produce record class bass pretty quickly Texas ShareLunker Program's research has proven that if a bass doesn't have the proper genetics it doesn't matter how you feed it, it will never reach double digit status. 2 hours ago, TnRiver46 said: Everything is always going to kill all the bass and ruin all the fishing, same story for decades. There probably isn't a body of water in America that receives more tournament pressure than Sam Rayburn. Yet it's still still kicking out numerous double digits, huge 5 bass stringers. Texas Parks & Wildlife manage Sam Rayburn with tournaments in mind. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User WRB Posted March 3 Super User Share Posted March 3 No state comes close to managing their Black Bass programs then Texas. IMO the reason the bass population continues to maintain it’s big bass population is Share A Lunker program continuously restocks bass with superior genetic fish. California is a ounce and done bass stocking for Black Bass putting all their effects into raising and restocking sterile rainbow trout for catch and eat anglers. It’s been over 60 years now since any pure Florida strain LMB have been introduced into California reservoirs. The vigor of the FLMB population has dwindled into a few giant bass caught each year. Consider FLMB only Live about 15 years we have zero pure or F1 strains in our lakes today. Tom 1 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rgasr63 Posted March 3 Share Posted March 3 Ffs the way that has been used at Toledo bend needs to be renamed P.E.E ( performance enhanced electronics) the power output on those saltwater sensor units will run the fish off very fast and all the extra heavy bags of fish will come back down to normal. The A rig had its time and a lot of older lures also. What we don't know is how the Spawn numbers are effected. In the case of Crappie fishing the number to keep per person should be adjusted now because most of them are released to the grease. And they are being harvested greatly with this new enhancements. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zcoker Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 On 3/3/2024 at 5:52 AM, rgasr63 said: Exactly !!! Great Catch!! There has been many a day when the birds have shown me a place to fish. Sometimes they catch the biggest fish of the day!! Yep. Even at night the frogs tell me where the fish are....or even the alligators. With the frogs, sometimes its one particular area that is very active with sound. Just bend the ear and then go over to that area. The alligators the same, although not so much with sound but with the bait that they are trying to corral and eat. The bass are there, too, doing the same thing. Find the frogs, find the fish. Find the birds, find the fish. Find the alligators, find the fish. There's an easy roadmap to follow on any body of water, not only with other animals but with other things like clouds, moon, wind, and rain....simple things to piece together a specific pattern to follow. All there for anyone to make due as they see fit. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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