guitarglynn1

caught this today on a watermelon red tiny fluke

Nice fish boostr! It was perfect weather for fishing yesterday here in Jersey. wish it could be like that every day and then go from Oct right back to spring.lol

Thanks man! And will keep that in mind about their mouth. It was a blast to catch that thing. It put up a nice fight and i would be happy catching them any day of the week

Thanks guys! I am not 100% sure but I think it is a black crappie. I have never caught either a white or black so this is my first time dealing with them. I searched around a bit and based on some features like the coloration and mouth it points to black. I did not count the spikes on its dorsal fin which is said to be another clue. I'll be back out there today hopefully catching another :-)

I went out saturday and it was windy, rainy, and cold. I was out there a good 5 or 6 hours and I didn't get a single bite. And I have certainly had my stretches without catching fish. I just take it all as a learning experience. It's the tough times that make me read more and practice different things more and it always seems to help turn things around. So I always look at the failures as part of the process and part of the success in the end. You'll get em next time.

My fav spot has schools of bass in this one area I always fish. If it is not windy I can always see them hanging around. Lots of smaller guys but the size varies in the school. You see babies and you see adults. Some days they won't stop biting and others I can't get them to even show interest. But other days it is about just hanging around long enough and they eventually start biting

Yeah buddy!!!!!!!!! I went to a new spot today called Drakes Brook and was hoping to fish for trout but there was nothing but a bunch of mutant minnows or whatever the heck they are? There was a decent sized pickerel there and I was using mini flukes with a drop shot and got it to take my fluke and both times he took it I pulled it right out of its mouth. I was having trouble setting hooks all day! That spot was beat. Lost a bunch of lures to boot. I went to my old standard Lake Musconetcong and I could see adult sized bass swimming around and they were bigger than I normally see there. I was trying spoons and mini flukes and i could not get anything going. It was frustrating because they were there but I couldn't get them to bite at all. I only had spoons and mini flukes with me and so i finally decided to do a straight mini fluke with no weight or anything. That got them going! I had a few bites but couldn't set the hook and then finally I caught a bass. Caught about 5 smaller guys. Then I saw a fish follow my fluke in but turned away at the last moment and I cast out in front of where I saw it go and bam!! Got that sucker! I thought it was a bass. I had my ultra lite with 4lb test and it put up such a fun fight! When I got it out I wasn't sure what it was? Figured a crappie but I was not 100% sure. i looked it up and there are black crappie at the lake and the pics matched my fish. too catch a species of fish I never caught and on a day that wasn't going so well on the fishing front made it a special night of fishing for me. And mini flukes FTW! I just started using them and once I went straight fluke the fish wouldn't leave it be. I wasn't doing anything special, just casting and slowly reeling in with a couple jerks here and there. And the crappie ate my entire fluke. Luckly not my hook though 8) Sorry for the "crappie " pics, but you get the idea.lol A few of the fish wiggled off before I could snap pics.

I much rather fish in nice weather but I will fish in the rain. Fish were biting like crazy one of the last two times I fished in the rain but yesterday it was miserable. Cold and rainy and windy and I got skunked. Its gonna rain all day tomorrow and I will be out in it trying to catch fish.

An older guy who always fishes during the summer at a spot I am always at caught one on just the beetle type plastic lure but not the spinner part. I have a few of those beetle spinsners and I will have to give them a try. Still no luck getting one and I tried a new spot that is supposed to have big pike in it but I only got to fish it for an hour and not a bite of any kind. I ordered some 1/8oz side winders to try this weekend. I have caught more pickerel on a smaller generic silver side winder than any other lure. See how it goes.

I am the same way, if a fish is a bit beat up I just get it back in the water. Glad to hear the spoons worked for trout where you fish. A lady was fishing at a spot I got to recently and told me abut a trout spot a town over I had never heard of so I am going to try it with spoons and hopefully I can catch one. I have that same spoon almost except it has the reflective eye on it. That color seems to always land me a yellow perch or two

Man if I was catching 5-6lbers consistently for a week I would sign up for a month of tough weeks lol

ha thanks man! I'm no expert that is for sure. I am just learning. They are a lot of fun to fish with though! I have had the same experience as J Francho albeit not nearly as many species of fish. But my best pickerel all came on spoons, yellow perch love them out here, baby blues go crazy for them and in late summer you can catch a fish a cast with spoons from the surf fishing for snappers. I even catch the occasional bluegil.

You're welcome. I was the same way kind of. I had some in my tackle box for a long time and never tried them. for some reason I had this thought in my mind I would never catch a fish with something that looked like a spoon. One day early this summer after about 3 hours of nothing I was frustrated and started digging through my stuff and tied on a 1/8 gold Colorado and on my very first cast with it I caught a bass. Completely changed my outlook on things.

Holy moly! When you catch fish that big you are the man

I am by no means a spoon expert. I just started using them early this summer and they are all I have used 99% of the time since and I have a ton to learn but at the same time I feel like I have progressed well so far and I am having more success. I can't speak for trout because I am yet to fish for them with spoons. But bass yes. For me it has taken trial and error to dial in the right size spoons. I primarily have rotated from 1/8,1/4,1/3 and I keep several different shapes, colors, and designs with me at all times. I try to match the size with the bait fish in the lake. Small fat head type minnows are what I see in the lake. I love the cleos and that bass in my avi I caught in Aug with a tiger striped 1/3 cleo wigl dancing girl. The past month or so I have switched primarily to kast master type spoons and side winder type. They have much tighter action and I think they can nail a distressed bait fish to almost a T and I have success with them. If I am not having success with one type I will try something else. On saturday for example, I was using a very small under 2" silver/chrome weber champ which is like a kast master design and is so small I can't even get a weight reading on my digital scale. I figured it might be the perfect size and design for one spot I fish and I did not get any bites on it after trying for about an hour. I switched to a kast master design brass spoon that is a 1/4 and the bass wouldn't leave it alone all morning. So it was the same exact style but slightly bigger and a different color and it seemed to make all the difference. And it seems like I can almost always find a spoon that gets fish biting Right now I am have been doing a pause when I retrieve the spoon after a few turns of my reel. If you keep your pole tip up high when you reel in and then when you pause you drop the tip a bit to create slack so when you pause the spoon flutters down deeper like a distressed bait fish. If you keep the line tight it won't ' dance ' down deeper the right way. It just sinks basically. Hope this helps some and good luck!

Thanks a lot guys for all the great replies! I did not expect all that and I appreciate it. Makes me feel good to hear from others because I don't really know anybody who I am close to who loves to fish as much as me and you talk about fishing in the rain and people think you are nuts. I have the same deal as one guy above posted and that is only being able to go on certain days and it is hard to not take advantage when I can. It is supposed to rain tomorrow and so long as it is just rain I'll be out there. I will gear up well and see how it goes. If the weather forces me to bail I will. And I do enjoy the fact that rain keeps a lot of the other fisherman away as some mentioned above. I have noticed the football season does the same on Sundays. I love it! Thanks again for the input fellas

Wow that fish is a true monster! I couldn't imagine getting towed around by that thing? I have snagged much smaller carp and they were tough to get in and you gotta have skills to get that beast into your boat. Great job! I am going to set up a pole for carp tomorrow and I was really excited about maybe catching one already but this thread might have me dreaming about carp tonight lol

Kind of my experience as well. I don't sit at one spot too long if nothing is happening, and often I will just rotate a few locations back and fourth the whole time I fish. Some times it feels almost like the fish in a spot become desensitized to what I am doing and I move over to another spot and bam I get a fish within the first handful of casts and when the action stops I can move right back to the original spot and I catch a fish. I think my ADHD is also a factor in constantly moving back and fourth from spot to spot.lol

I seem to improve little by little. This past spring summer was the first time I used spoons and it was love at first cast. My ability to catch fish with them from when I first started and now is almost night and day. And I know I have not even scratched the surface. I just joined up here and only a few days in I have learned a ton from reading others experiences ect..I feel like I have stumbled on a gold mine with this place. I never fished for carp other than snag them when I was younger. I read a post about carp fishing and it hit me " my fav spot is loaded with carp " what have I been thinking not fishing for them? I have a bunch of stuff to try thanks to that thread and I guess you can say I have also progressed into a carp fisherman.lol

I typically bring one pole with me and that is it and I bring a handful of lures for the day and I will try different locations/retrieval speed ect..If nothing is happening I might switch. Like I said I only bring a handful of stuff and some days I can run thru everything I brought a couple times over during the time I am fishing. Other days I may just stick with a single lure and keep at it. I tend to move or rotate thru locations and try things with the lure I have much more often than I switch my lures though. Too many times I have had that feeling that things are not happening and to switch it up and pushed past that feeling and next thing you know I have a nice fish on the line. So I tend to stick it out longer with things and just try to keep working with what I have.

So are you saying where the mind goes the fish will follow?

I ordered a pack of super flukes last night and a pack of mini flukes. I have a lot of luck with very small spoons around here so i figured i would see if the same holds true with those. I am going to try them this weekend and see how it goes.