Bass Fishing Minority

[tholmes]

I'm in central Kansas. Of my friends and co-workers that fish, only a few target bass. Most are going after catfish or crappie in the local lakes or traveling to area reservoirs for walleye, stripers or white bass. Even though one area reservoir has a very good population of smallmouth, no one I know (besides myself) shows much interest in fishing for them.

Tom

[Gangley]

I am the lone fisherman. My boss tries to tell me how much he loves fishing and how good he is at it but I have seen him fish twice in the past 8 years and it wasn't impressive to say the least. Like most bosses, lot's of talking with most everybody else doing the work

Being from Houston, I am very close to the gulf and most of the people that I know of who fish tend to hit the saltwater in their free time.

[Bluebasser86]

I have a few hundred coworkers and there are several of them that I know of that bass fish. I'm a multispecies guy and so are several at the guys I work with so I have plenty of people to talk to. The hardest part is with me having a multipurpose boat that works probably just as good for duck hunting as it does fishing, I've got a long list of people wanting to go and it's tough to get schedules aligned for it to work out sometimes. I'm in Northeastern Kansas.

[bassmaster3541]

I am in Mass, I have made buddies through fishing that I fish with alot but none the usual people I hang out with or used to go to school with fish, I get a couple of them to come out once in a while but none are that into it

[jkarol24]

Its fair to say that im the only kid at my highschool who fishes bass tournaments

However, I will be fishing next year for the RIT collegiate bass club which has a handful of members.

[Scorcher214]

In my school and at work, Im the only guy who bass fishes the way I do. There was a kid at my school who was a big fly fisherman though. We chatted a lot just because we were the only two guys who were really into fishing.

[shane_7901]

Well I work in a small town in southern GA. I'd say 80% of the guys I work with fish for bass. I haven't ever gone with any of them though. A month ago we had a little competition on who could catch the largest bass that week. The winner landed a nice 10lber and the average size of everyone else's best was a little over 4lbs.

[kdionise]

a couple of the guys on my crew at the firehouse bass fish so that gives us something to talk about on slow nights. and im lucky enough to have a best friend who has a private pond on his farm and we fish together every monday evening. I am even luckier to have a girlfriend who enjoys bass fishing!

[tomustang]

Most and I mean 95% of people I run into are collector fishermen. Catch and keep or anything that bites, they mainly go for the crappie/perch/bluegill to eat.

[tomustang]

I've got a few friends that will go fishing here and there, but I'm the only obssesed bass fisherman. I fish Erie a lot and it seems even there (PA section), 90% of the fishing boats I see are targetting Perch or Walleye. It doesn't even seem like people fish for fun or sport, it's all about catching limits for food.

I've been up there and see the same thing, even over at gander mtn every charter is for walleye/perch. I did run into one local who's into bass and was nice guy about it, even was baitcasting. Said he frequents another forum for Erie fishing, nice guy.

[SirSnookalot]

As I mentioned before I don't know any bass fishermen. Almost without exception people are fishing to take their catch home with them in saltwater, I'm the exception, I even give dolphin away. Quite true there are those that fish for sand perch, spots, small jacks and whatever for a meal, many of those people fish with rods that have broken tips, they are not sportsmen. That being said legal fish are always taken home, whether they are inshore fishermen or offshore, people love to eat fish here, any fish caught in a sporting manner is "sportfishing", size and species is irrelevant.

I see nothing wrong in taking home perch or walleye, they are great on the plate, and can be fun to catch.

[Miller's Ferry 8]

I'm from Alabama and at the plant where I work we are right on the river. At break and lunch the subject of bass fishing always comes up. Theres roughly two hundred workers here and I would say 50% bass fish. Just in my office there are five of us and three bass fish. Two of us fish tournaments and the other just for fun. Every Monday is like story time of the weekend fishing trips.

[luisF]

I'm in Orlando fl and my bass rants usually fall on deaf ears. I work in the medical field and it seems like that's all these people know. I love the outdoors and enjoy it with friends or me and my thoughts and the best part is I get all the bass to my self lol.

[dale.m]

At work, I am the only person who bass fishes. I used to work with a game warden who bass fished all the time and worked tournaments in the North Carolina area, but he left recently to do other things. Most of my close friends bass fish and go on fishing trips with me often.

[mod479]

I'm from Northern NY, and by North I mean Canadian border North. None of my friends fish, but everybody up here that does fishes for food, no one can appreciate the creature on the end of their line it seems. They just end up head first into a bucket, which is somewhat depressing at times...although I keep a few walleyes a year for people I know will be eating them.

Already this year some young guys were using baby bass as bait for musky...which was the breaking point for me, I called the DEC and they all got tickets. I dont really feel bad, as I told them that it was illegal and not sporting the first time I witnessed it. They told me to F off. The 2nd time, I had my cousin (DEC officer) come down in plain clothes and bust them all. Havent seen them since.

Then you've got the amish up here too. They will keep ANYTHING. I mean anything (carp, shiners, chubs, gobies, rock bass....4 lb smallies :/ )

I fish among these types of people daily, some guys talk a lot of smack when I let every smallie go.... anyone else ever get hated on for releasing bass??

[grimlin]

I have one guy at work that fish for Bass as serious as i do. I might fish a tournament with him one day since he fishes a lot of tournaments around here. We talk fishing all day long if we could. I'm blessed,because if it wasn't for him I wouldn't have a single person to talk to about Bass fishing here in person. A lot of people fish around here,but none are specie specific. Even my buddy that I go with usually targets "whatever' that bites. Don't get me wrong though,my buddy can fish for Bass like the best of them. He likes to take a few home every once in awhile where I'm more strictly C & R.

[logan9209]

I feel your pain, flippin and pitchin. My community has a lake and I would say that 95% who fish are fishing for bream, crappie, or catfish. I only know of maybe 4 other people who actively fish for bass. I do however know of a few old coots who are happy to sit on their porch and swear that anyone who says they caught anything out of the lake are liars but that's for another story.......

[Deleted account]

I think its silly to fish for just 1 type of fish...

[Sam]

Within my LSU alumni chapter, church, American Legion and my profession, I am the only one, that bass fishes.

I like it that way.

Bass fishing is for me and I really don't want to have to share it with others within the other organizations or work.

I have fishing friends and belong to a bass fishing club and that is enough sharing for me.

[logan9209]

I think its silly to fish for just 1 type of fish...

Some people are like that. For me fishing for bream and crappie is too boring and I don't have what it takes to fish for catfish. That's pretty much all that's in my lake.

[new2BC4bass]

Live in Eastern Pa, work in Central NJ. Where I work one guy is a serious fisherman. He'll fish for bass.but chases trout a lot and fishes saltwater a lot. Another likes to flyfish occasionally.for trout. I go out with the idea of catching bass, but if I got into a school of crappies or nice size bluegills, you would see me downsizing my lures pronto! I enjoy catching just about any fish.

Met Tom_D on here, and we have fished together a few times, and plan on going after bass again soon. My daughter is my main fishing partner whenever we can get together which hasn't happened this year, and not too often last year.

[prjavelin]

in my family theres a couple people that fish. My uncle has a boat and fishes for food. He fishes for bass but takes anything that bites. My cousin will go fishing for anything also. My father teach me with live bait but he is not a bass fisherman and he is taking chemotherapy so he cant fish anymore. My mother goes one or twice a month with me but goes for panfish.

I am the only one that is fishing for bass exclusively and sometimes i go for saltwater fishing.

One of my coworkers has a boat. I live in a coastal town so everybody fishes in the sea. Im the one that travels into the neighboring towns to go to the reservoirs. (my parents live 5 minutes from the reservoir so i was born and raised there)

It sucks though. i wish i had someone that would go with me every time. Specially my wife, i wish she would enjoy this with me.

[Fish Chris]

Some of you guys might find it surprising, but here in Cali, you could easily be on a lake with a good number of 10 to 15 lb trout-eaters in it, and maybe even a real shot at an 18+ FSLMB...... and yet, 95%+ of the anglers, are fishing for retarded hatchery trout, that they dumped in last week, so they could be pulled out today ! Huh ?

BTW, do you know what the difference in a 10" hatchery trout, and a 10lb hatchery trout is ? {besides about 9lb 10oz} A few extra years in the swimming pool. But ZERO difference in catchability. If hatchery trout fishermen think 10 lb trout are harder to catch, that's because they release fewer of them into the lakes. Simple as that. A trout could live as long as it could live in that concrete pool, and all it would ever learn, would be what time the food pellets get thrown at them

But what they hey.... If you didn't have all those guys out there thinking they were really fishing, we wouldn't have all that high grade bass food being dumped into out trophy bass waters. So I guess its all good

Peace,

Fish

[Bankbeater]

I go bass fishing with my Dad pretty much every week. The people that I work with are either into hunting, or fishing for crappie and bluegill. Some of my neighbors fish, but they like to go out for the quiet and to get away for a couple of hours. Like my Dad says "if your taking it easy out on the lake then your not bass fishing".

[prjavelin]

can I conclude that us bass fisherman are lone people?