This evening I was able to get out to the river between storms to do some fishing.
When I pulled up, I found someone in my spot. That was OK; he was a crappie fisherman I'd talked to before; nice guy. Knows what he's doing with crappie and tells me about 'em, how to catch 'em. I'll have to get out and try it sometime.
He held up a stringer of some really big crappie; he's not a bucket fisherman. They were all the size you'd expect a responsible fisherman to keep.
I looked over and saw a dead bass on the rocks. I mentioned it. He said, "Yeah, I saw that too. Who would do something like that?" His wife -- she was there -- said that there were more in the river's slack water near the bank. I check that out and ID'd those as drum. Three of 'em. Yeah, they were "only" drum. Still...
That bass would have gone 2-3lbs easy. Around it were Bud Light cans and evidence of night fishing. I don't get it. So, what, a bass (it was very light in color; it had been deep) ate someone's bait and they killed it? The drum, too?
Never in my life have I done that crap. Hell, I throw carp back unless they're Asian carp, of course. Those we're required by law to kill.
I personally don't like common carp, anything about them. They're ugly, and they're a general pain in my butt. Still, there are those who like to fish for 'em, and they serve the environment. They're naturalized. For these reasons I release them.
Then folks come along catfishing and kill a bass because they were too lazy to throw it back.
To be fair, it would have died and washed up. Its eyes were gone, unlike the drum. But how it got so far up the bank is a mystery in that case. The river looked like it had been up that high, but not in several days and not since I'd been there last.
I'm pretty angry.
Josh
