Catching The Same Fish

[Sfritr]

Two weeks ago I am fishing my home lake and I landed a really nice 5.6lber on a jig fishing a grassline. I weighed the fish with my digital scale and popped the scale hook through the lower left jaw under the tongue. The girl was full of eggs, tail red, so I immediately released her.

Wednsday, I am fishing the same stretch of grassline with a Fat Ika. No more than ten feet from where I landed the 5lber previously and BAM!! I hook into a nice fish again. Upon getting the big girl in the boat I notice it has similar markings as the previous fish. So, I look in the lower left portion of the jaw and there is my little hole where I popped the scale through. This time she weighed 5.4lbs.

How often have you guys caught the same fish?

I immediately released her again so who knows, maybe I'll try again in a week

[CoBass]

Just last week I caught the same fish with a very distinctive mark on its gill plate three times in two days all within a fifty foot section of shoreline. Two of the catches were only a few hours apart. I think it happens a lot more often than we realize but you only notice when the fish have a distinguishing feature that you remember.

[Mumpy]

@ Frog Turds - That was some Hungry Pike!

[fowlskies]

I had a simular thing happen in the same day. I pretty sure it was the same bass but cann't prove it.

I was fishing a large pond from shore and hooked into a nice 5lber but I had set my drag loose while pulling out a "professional overrun" and didn't tighten it up afterward so I didn't get a good hook set when she bit. Almost got her on shore before she came loose, followed it up tossing a fluke but couldn't get her to bite. I kept fishing different spots on the shoreline for next hour or so and threw at that spot again and WHAM she nailed it, although this time I was prepared and had tightened the drag. The fish calculator had her at 5.5 lbs.

Maybe you were fishing her bed so she was holding on that spot. I think thats what happened with me, the fish was on her bed and I threw my jig on her twice, although I couldn't see her bed from the shore.

[Deadeye-1]

According to research, Bass have a memory span of about 15 minutes. So if you catch or miss a fish you can go back after 15 minutes or so and have a good chance of re-catching the fish.

I used to fish a pond back in PA where in one corner there lived a bass that weighed about 3 lbs. She would hit a purple worm almost every night that I fished the pond, that is until one of my cousins kept her one day.