Made Up Weights

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

There was a post earlier last month about a fish in the "lunker club" of the latest Bassmaster magazine. Long story short, guy posted a pic of his claimed 11.4 pound fish, that looked like a skinny 4#'r. Well, this has been happening on a couple Facebook pages of pros I "like" and also some of the fishing company pages. Jimmy Houston in particular posted 2 pics today of guys with so called monsters in the 6 pound range. One of them is easily no bigger than 2 pounds!!! I'm serious! We have all had our share of fish tales, but I seriously doubt any of us would "go to the press" with them. I know everyone is entitled to post what they want in numbers, but I'm curious if anyone else has seen similar.

[Raul]

It happens oftenly, the eyeballmeter can be quite inaccurate, BM magazine was notorious for publishing pictures of "subsized" fish, when you haven´t caught or held an X weight fish is hard to know the real dimensions of a fish of that  X size. Several years ago BM published the pic of an elederly gentleman holding a "12" lber.

 

Man I´ve caught a few 12 lbers ( not to brag about it ) and only in a planet twice the size of Earth with twice the gravitational pull that fish in the pic can weight 12 lbs.

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

Yep, I hear ya. It's kinda hard I guess to really "validate" the pic when it is received. A picture of the scale would be good, but who knows if the person didn't throw some rocks in the bass' mouth or even rig the scale. Just have to go by best judgement I imagine.

[flyfisher]

well my thought is yeah they probably aren't what they say but it was a big fish to them so that is what matters.  Kind of like the what weight would you have a replica/mount made thread earlier.  Some said 6lb and others said double digits.  A fish to brag about is different for everyone and i don't really care if i think a bass is no way larger than 2lb and they say it is 6 because i have seen pics of 6lb fish that were weighed to validate that if i judged by the pic i would say were no more than 2-3lbs tops....

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

I have yet to see a fish 5# or more that looks less than 5#. Just saying.

To me, if you're going to brag on a fish (especially having it published) then be honest about it.

[Hi Salenity]

There was a post earlier last month about a fish in the "lunker club" of the latest Bassmaster magazine. Long story short, guy posted a pic of his claimed 11.4 pound fish, that looked like a skinny 4#'r. Well, this has been happening on a couple Facebook pages of pros I "like" and also some of the fishing company pages. Jimmy Houston in particular posted 2 pics today of guys with so called monsters in the 6 pound range. One of them is easily no bigger than 2 pounds!!! I'm serious! We have all had our share of fish tales, but I seriously doubt any of us would "go to the press" with them. I know everyone is entitled to post what they want in numbers, but I'm curious if anyone else has seen similar.

Out of quoriosity what does the fish in your avatar weigh?

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

6.6

BPS digital scale. Friend with me used his analog and got 6.7. I went conservative.

March of last year. Private pond. My PB.

[Hi Salenity]

Yep, that's one off those pics. No Offense but it looks like it could be a 3#.

I've almost given up on judging the size of fish from a pic

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

Good for you and your two cents guess. 6.6 though.

[long island basser]

roland martin adds 1 to 3 lbs to every fish he catches

[Goose52]

I don't pay much attention to photos anymore - too hard to tell. Nor do I respond to threads where folks post a photo and say: "how much does my fish weigh - I don't have a scale!".  Well, time for those folks to at least carry a tape measure to get length/girth, or better yet..........buy a scale.

 

As I said in that other recent thread...photos capture memories, accurate scales capture the weight...

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

One thing I do if I catch a decent size fish (usually 5#+) I will take a video of the weigh in and pics with the fish on it also. The one in my avatar I didn't do that with. Just was proud to land a PB. Also, people have showed me pics of their "10+" fish and I just nod like "cool". My point of the while thread is if you post a pic with a weight, make it legit. If your scale says 5 pounds for example, put it down as 5 pounds. Or don't guesstimate off the charts like 3 pounds for a dink. Especially pros on Facebook and Bassmaster with such a large publications.

And if people don't believe my avatar, good for them. I was there and two others also for the weigh in. And I'm certainly not posting my 6.6 as a 10 pounder nor a 3 pounder.

[Nice_Bass]

One thing I do if I catch a decent size fish (usually 5#+) I will take a video of the weigh in and pics with the fish on it also. The one in my avatar I didn't do that with. Just was proud to land a PB. Also, people have showed me pics of their "10+" fish and I just nod like "cool". My point of the while thread is if you post a pic with a weight, make it legit. If your scale says 5 pounds for example, put it down as 5 pounds. Or don't guesstimate off the charts like 3 pounds for a dink. Especially pros on Facebook and Bassmaster with such a large publications.

And if people don't believe my avatar, good for them. I was there and two others also for the weigh in. And I'm certainly not posting my 6.6 as a 10 pounder nor a 3 pounder.

I don't think he was saying he did not believe you, but pictures really are not worth much anymore.  Your picture really does not look 6.6 however I have no doubt it was 6.6

It is all about who takes better pictures these days, up close, from an upward angle, I bet we would guess your fish better than  6.6

'Big O' catches monsters, but he also takes the right pictures to get the point across imo. 

[slonezp]

Yep, that's one off those pics. No Offense but it looks like it could be a 3#.

I've almost given up on judging the size of fish from a pic

I would have pegged it 5+ because of the size of the mouth in relation to his hand.

[Hi Salenity]

I honestly wasent trying to say it was a small fish or that I don't believe it's as big as you say it is but I'm agreeing with you that it's hard to judge a pic... I saw your fish looks like you could fit your fist in your fishes mouth but it looks like it's all head. <<< LOL

[FD.]

I have pics of 4 pounders that look like 8's and pictures of 6's that look like 4's.  I caught a 28" bass that only weighed 8 lbs  and a 24" bass that weighed more in tournaments.  Unless you have a scale you can never tell.

[5 Dollar Fishing Game]

She was a little piggy. :-)

[WIGuide]

I honestly wasent trying to say it was a small fish or that I don't believe it's as big as you say it is but I'm agreeing with you that it's hard to judge a pic... I saw your fish looks like you could fit your fist in your fishes mouth but it looks like it's all head. <<< LOL

 

I hear ya! It can be tough to judge. I deal with this issue at times probably more than most being that I'm 6'6" Fish that look big with others don't look as big when I hold them. Sometimes angles can play a part of it too. A great example is this picture

The smallmouth in that pic was just under 4 lbs and it looks tiny. I know it weighed that much because I caught it in a tourney and It was big smallmouth that day.I actually took home a check because of it. 

[crankcaster100]

Why do people have to lie?

[joeyfishes]

I caught a 10.2 beast the other day with two witnesses, AND the fish was weighed on a BOGA. Still had a person on my bass club call BS on it. Some people just need to stop being jealous. 

[geo g]

Unless its a tournament or a contest, I would not waste too much time worrying about it. I don't like to sweat the little things. I do believe we should be as honest as possible, but its hard to control the actions of others. So don't worry about what you can't control. That's my personal opinion, and view on life, its just too short!

[senko_77]

Pictures can be incredibly deceiving.  Like Hi Selinity said, the fish in your avatar looks to be about 4lbs to me but I have no doubt that you are telling the truth and that she weighed in at 6.6lbs.  Camera angle, the way you are holding the fish, lighting, the background, how big of a person you are, etc. all come into play in screwing up pictures of fish.  I've had 3lbers that look MASSIVE and my personal best was 14.7lbs and even though it looks huge, It doesn't look like some of the other 14lbers caught by other anglers.  I wish I knew now what I know about taking pictures of fish when I caught that beast.  The picture I have of a 10.4 caught 3 years later when I was a much better "fish photographer" honestly looks as big if not bigger than the pic of my 14.  Oh well.  

 

For any of you reading this thread, go to google and search for Fish Chris's tutorials on taking photos of fish.  It helped SO MUCH in how I set up my shots and will make it so you get the best possible polaroids of your fish of a lifetime.

[Munkin]

The secret is to hold the fish really close to the camera that way they look bigger

 

Allen

[slonezp]

So, Can we assume breast enhancements good, fish enhancements bad?

[Bluebasser86]

Yep, good angles can make a fish look heavier, poor angles can make them look a lot smaller. A good buddy of mine taught me how to hold a fish properly so they don't look smaller than they are, and often will look bigger than they really are. A couple examples;

This fish was caught on a jig at Table Rock, the weight...

3 1/4 pounds. Just seeing the picture made me think I should weigh it again because it looks so much bigger.

Or this big ol' buckethead,

I think I could say it was 7 or 8 pounds and most wouldn't bat an eye at it, she weighed 5lbs 6ozs. 

 

I see those pictures that I think, no way that weighs what they're saying it does, but I've seen some fish that weighed more than they looked and a lot less than they looked. So now if I don't believe them I just give them the "Nice fish!" and leave it at that. Even if it didn't weigh what they said, they're obviously proud of it and I'm not going to try to steal their thunder.