Girlfriend's First Bass!

[Jay Ell Gee]

Hey everyone! Just thought I would drop in and post my very first fishing report... about my girlfriend's first bass!

This past Monday morning, the little lady and I got up bright and early at 4:15 am, microwaved some sausage buscuits, and headed out the door for a little bank fishing in some canals than can be accessed from the road.

We managed to wet our lines a good fifteen minutes before good light, and there were fish hitting topwater EVERYWHERE! Each hit resembled a small explosion in the quiet of the early morning, but we were striking out on both Ribbits and Pad Crashers. I was absolutely dumbfounded. I began telling her that I can't recall a single morning that I have ever skunked on a topwater frog, and after a few more minutes of casting, I just couldn't take it any more. I took out the fly rod assuming bluegill and other panfish were rising to mosquitos and bugs on the surface of the water. I got the long rod all together and tied on a spider right as we were beginning to get good light. Perfect. Low and behold, my girlfriend begins to point out a school of gar swimming inches under the surface. I felt pretty silly for mistaking the sound, but quickly realized that this would be a good opportunity for my first attempt at sight fishing! I managed to get four gar to strike the spider, and even hooked into one, but lost him as he jumped clean out of the water and shook his head, throwing my spider right into my face.

We decided to hit a new canal shortly after. I rigged her up with a weighted baby brush hog in one of my favorite colors (Watermellon w/ Orange Flake) on her new rod and reel setup that she picked out. In mere moments, she was out casting into shallow waters with her blue and orange Tech Spec Elite micro-guide spinning rod and her orange Shimano Sonora. I teased her about fishing too shallow, but she spotted a bass making its way into a small depression near a fallen tree. I made my way a bit deeper and as I began to pitch my first cast, I hear her talking excitedly. As she lifts her lure from the water, a nice crab lets go of the baby brush hog and plops back into the water. After a few laughs, she joined me farther out towards the main river.

As I stood on the bank pitching towards bridge pylons, my girlfriend starts commenting on how neat it was to pitch right to a target and I offered to show her how. I felt a few small ticks and set my hook, only to find out that some panfish had apparently eaten three of the four appendages from my black/blue pit boss. I traded rods with her for a second and tried to pitch with it, and tried my best to begin explaining to process to her. She follows suit and pitches toward a pylon, but it lands quite a bit short of her target. I smile a bit and pitch again to a pylon, and as soon as I close the bail on her Sonora, I hear her talking excitedly. "Ooooh, ooooh, baby, I hooked a fish!"

As I approached her, I noticed the rod bending and begin to hear the drag stripping a bit. She was standing on a tree root elevated about a foot off the ground to stay out of the mud, so I offered to land her fish for her. As she swings the fish slowly to the bank, I see the bass. I could hear the excitement in her voice! This was a nice first bass! I let her lip her monster and she proceeded to pose with my St. Croix in hand, smiling and wanting to take some pictures! After a few quick snaps and letting her handle her first for just a second, we released the bass the fight another day. She said she is going to catch it again one day when it's bigger!

As the morning grew hotter, we packed up for the day and went to lunch. We stopped at the local academy and she proceeded to ask me advice on some lures to get started with her bass fishing. Thirty dollars later we were out the door and on the way home. As I was on my way home that night, she made room in her tackle box (she fishes for specks and reds with her dad and brother) and had it all orgranized and ready to go before I even got home. She sent me a pic of her new organized box and posted her bass pics to Facebook after sending pics to her family. How lucky am I to have such an awesome new fishing buddy?

Here are the pics of her first bass. He was definitely a fatty, and she calls him her first monster bass! We have already planned to hit the water next Monday morning, lol. I hope she lands an even bigger one!

[BassinLou]

Cool story and catch. Congrats on the experience. May you guys fish together for a long time.

[AK-Jax86]

Great story and nice fish. Its good to see women fishing, my girfriend fishes with me but she hasn't lately because we have a 2 month old.

[Siebert Outdoors]

Very neat. Congrats!

[Dwight Hottle]

Great story and a great girlfriend.

[Big-O]

Terrific report and congrats to both of you for awesome day of fishing together!

[Sniffles]

Good story!

Now to get my wife into fishing!

[tomustang]

hehe them pans love eating those legs off creature baits. Congrats to your girlfriend for the bass, and congrats to you for have such a cool girlfriend!

[Bluebasser86]

It's great you can share your passion with your girlfriend. My wife likes to go but barring an emergency like the house on fire she wouldn't be getting up before the sun

[Jay Ell Gee]

I appreciate all the kind words gentleman. I certainly see us being fishing buddies for a long time... If I can help it, anyways!

I'll be completely honest with you guys... If it were up to me, I may have slept in that morning! I'm glad we got our butts up and went though. We had a blast!

She is checking this thread periodically to see what people say about her, LOL. She is still very excited over the whole thing, and enjoys the forum as well.

Maybe I'll have to convince her to sign up, haha.

[Mrs. Matstone]

Awesome! Congrats to her!

[prjavelin]

thats awesome that she is now hooked. I wish I was in you position with my GF(she is scared of the fish pulling her). anyways that fish is better than anything ive caught and the way things are going she is going to be a better fisherman than me in no time!! congrats!

Enjoy the good days and the skunks. the skunks make the good days more memorable.

[BASSHUNTER1961]

Congrats! I hope you realize how lucky you really are... That was a great catch for her, but I think your the lucky one to have a great girl like her...

[Jay Ell Gee]

Thanks for that man. Trust me, I will never forget how lucky I am to have her. She is as much a best friend as she is a girlfriend.

I'll be doing my best to hold on to her!

Besides, If she starts outfishing me, I'll just start taking pics with HER fish. Just kidding.