Swamp Girl

Man, you are one funny guy! I agree with @Susky River Rat that this is an interesting topic and I think that @papajoe222's lake is an especially interesting lake because the usual culprits aren't in play, such as heavy pressure that educates the bass (@AlabamaSpothunter, a heckuva stick, is a strong believer in bass learning our lures.) or development, which Maine Fish & Wildlife says is the major predictor of water quality. I just told Alex that the frogs hurt my ears at the pond where I caught my PB and since frogs are the first to go when water quality goes, that pond is healthy, thus producing thick bass (I share one of them below. Yes, it's not a long fish, but it shows how this pond is humming.). All this has me thinking that it's a eco-health issue if a flotilla of anglers aren't educating the fish. I've caught some at this pond that are even fatter than the bass above, but I've have to look through a lot of photos to find them. This is a strong possibility. I used to fish a nearby bog and average 30 to 40 bass, but the last time I went, I had three or four otters swimming beside me and there were far fewer bass and they were smaller too. I haven't returned.

We hit four below last night (It's still one below at 8:42 a.m.), but I'm on the coast, which warms our weather in the winter and cools it in the summer, so we don't get as cold as inland Maine or even inland NY, as @Jar11591 just demonstrated. I'm a Boomer and our parents used to dunk us in vats of liquid nitrogen before we walked to school...and they dunked us both leaving and returning!

Wow, that's a good bus driver.

@NorcalBassin: Sportin' some new facial fur I see. Looks good!

I once taught in a school district that never closed for snow. All the surrounding districts would close, but not us. Then came an afternoon blizzard and a school bus was trapped atop a hill. The bus slipped so much going up that the driver refused to drive down the other side. The superintendent and the principals drove to rescue the kids and by the time they arrived, it was dark and the hill was so slippery that they crawled up it to reach the kids to escort them down. After that, guess which district was the first to cancel?

WOW! What. A. Story.

You are the chilliest guy afloat. Whatever happens, you're happy...EXCEPT when it comes to your century old grudges between the goal posts! Here's you 99% of the time: And here's you on Saturday afternoons in the fall:

I love how you shrug at a foot of snow.

Unlike me. I would be so fraidy. And I'd look so silly and sad, shivering in my canoe sitting atop ice.

Do you remember when you got seven feet in three days? November of 2014, I think. I was driving from Buffalo to Rochester when that storm hit. The wall cloud was black and terrifying. That was the only time in my life I've seen such a thing. My gas gauge was reading empty, but I didn't stop until Syracuse because they were shutting the freeway down behind me and those drivers caught on it were trapped by the blizzard. Ha. That's goofy, huh? Oh well, they meant well.

Yes, I did. I cheer for all BIG10 teams, but some a little more than others. Michigan beat Alabama too, which is heckuva finish to their season, beating both the national champs and the winningest program of all time. However, what Ohio State did has never been done before. According to the end of season rankings, this season the Buckeyes beat the teams ranked 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, and 8. The two games they lost, they lost by a total of four points. They won four games to win the National Championship, which makes the old way of winning one game seem easy-peasy.

I've been inviting guys to launch from my dock, use my canoes, and keep some fish, asking them to keep the smaller bass. I don't eat like to eat bass.

Impressive.

I am oh-so fond of my southern basshead brothers, but after years of the SEC thumping the Big Ten, finally winning two natties in a row has me grinning.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrr! Here's a pic of Gim. That's me in the background photobombing him:

With Photo Shop, it sure looks like I do, huh?

You're a heckuva angler, Pat.

Tom, you ascended Mount Olympus a long, long time ago, Once you're there, you're forever golden. I actually have some footage of you arriving. Yeah, I was the Mount Olympus videographer for a few years.

Ha! You are so close to my reality. I caught hundreds of bass in 2024 with poppers. I love fun, noisy lures like poppers. Thankfully bass like 'em too! In 2024, I caught my first bass on spinnerbaits and walking-the-dog lures. Now I'm gaga for both those lures. My avatar bass was a walking-the-dog bass and that morning, I had to paddle a creepy canyon in total darkness with white, fallen trees looming out of the foggy gloom and then paddle a couple miles of a little river winding through mud flats. It was coldish too and oh-so-muddy. I worked for that bass, but at least I caught it with a fun, noisy lure!

Sure! Caveat: You're pretty new to Bass Resource, so just be forewarned that I'm pretty much the village idiot here. I'm an affable idiot, for sure, but I'm the girl who can only remember the names of about five of my lures and has no idea which rod is right for flipping or jigging and who power fishes with spinning gear, so my fangirldom comes a little smudged. I think this might be the favorite thread I've started because while there are outliers with stunning big bass percentages, many of us are in the 3-5% range and many of us up north consider four pounds to the cutoff and down south, consider five pounds to be the cutoff. I wouldn't have guessed that there'd be so much consensus because you can put five bassheads in a room and have seven opinions. So true. You'd need that number, even if only an estimate, to determine a percentage.

Now I'm your fangirl.

Kya likes the snow, but I love Kya! What a fun pup! Cool car, Rockhopper!

Fingers crossed for you, Crow! As you might know, my pond is full of three to three-and-a-half-pounders. My fingers are also crossed that they grow into four-pounders. That's still great fishing from my perspective, Tom.