Let's.do it...the one that got away

[capjohnson.mike]

I'm new to the forum, but have been looking on it for some time...any who, I know we all have them. The horror stories of the one that got away. And it was always a monster. But I swear lol, I'm with my buddy were out on istokpoga, In a cut we like to fish right off big island. And the day before he caught a 9.2 pounder. A hawg! And what's cooler is he makes his own spinner baits. I mean these are no jerry rigged baits. These are professional and great baits. The fact he makes them and were the only two that fish them adds to it. But the next day. We're at the same spot. Btw big bass have been caught here before, we've pulled 8 pounders and 7s out of this area. It's a great little hole.But I'm working my favorite frog. The phat frog from ish monroe. And I throw it around some fallen trees and big explosion. I mean huge..And I set the hook like an amateur...she got away...Me and my buddy just look and I try to get her with a dipped.senko and.jig but she was smart and didn't play into it. That was last week. Hopefully next.time I get out on that lake which will be in a few weeks I'll make it up...But let's hear the stories. 

[BassObsessed]

Happened last February at Toho first thing in the morning in pouring rain. One of the first casts with the big shiner in a known hotspot that has been producing for the guide the previous couple days a big bass blew up on the shiner and I waited a few seconds to let her eat it and set the hook . We knew it was big when it was turning the boat. At one point she surfaced and was curled up and looked like someone stuffed a football down her mouth. Not soon after she made one last effort to change direction towards some grass and that's when she came unhooked. It would have been my biggest bass , easily beating my 11lber. I was no good the rest of the day and this happened right out of the gate. Ended up catching other big bass but this one was in the 13lb class. One of the guides clients caught a 13.5 either the next day or a couple days later which could have been the one I lost. Who knows, it was in the same 25ft area.

[0119]

2 years ago up Josephine Creek off of Istokpoga, we came upon a short stretch where it gets very shallow. Timing was perfect the big females were right there with the males at the beds. Using a Gambler EZ Swimmer I hook into a beast and enjoy a great fight right to the gunnel. Then she's just gone! The hook point didn't even break the skin, she was just holding on the entire fight with closed lips, even though I thought I ripped her lips off.  The very next cast one thats even bigger and would have been my personal best. Over ten, 12 by my buddies calculation and he's very good at judging by sight. At the boat she spits it out and the hook point again isn't even out of the skin.  About a half hour later we are further up the creek, past the only house on the creek. At a bend along a fallen oak I'm working a super  spook jr. and the biggest bass I've imagined strikes it.  Bigger than the other two.  So fat she can only wallow with the her nose barely out of water and she takes several deep lunges under the boat along with a run that made me think she was a snook.  At the boat just before we try to use the grippers to avoid the trebles she wallows again hits the side of the boat hard and the spook flies into the air past my face, she's gone.  I drank that night.....

 

[ww2farmer]

I typically move on from lost fish pretty quick and don't dwell on them too long. It happens to everybody. I do have several vivid memories however of lost fish in tournament situations that made a big difference in the outcome of the day.

#1: wnybassman and I were partnered up in an open tournament a couple years ago, and the bite was on fire. People were NOT cashing with 17 and 18 pound bags. We caught almost 19lbs that day and finished 2nd by about .25 of a pound...........We had our chances. I broke off TWO 4lb + fish that day, and he had a heavy fish break him off too. To rub salt in the wound...........I caught one of the fish I broke off 2 days later fun fishing in the same area, with my hook still in it's yap. It was 4.5lbs

#2: Again fishing with wnybassman in a fall tournament, in perhaps the worst weather I have ever been in for 8 straight hours. The bite SUCKED. The team that won, was the only team that caught a limit, and they had 15lbs. We came in 2nd with 14+lbs, but with only four fish. I think we each caught 2 that day, he had the  5th one on,  and to the boat, and it was decent one...........3+ lbs, but instead of waiting for me to net it, hilarity ensued and he went full retard trying some combo boat flip/horse collar shenanigans and it broke off. LMAO.

#3 Just last season my regular opens partner Rick (the small dude in my avatar pic.) and I were having one comedy of error after another. Fish coming unbuttoned left and right. The bite was actually good that day, and the guys that won smashed them with 20+lbs, we  were just out of  the money with 16. One cull would have put us in the $$, and it was my fault that we didn't get that fish in the boat. Rick hooked a good one in some heavy matted stuff on a frog, on the end of a LONG cast. I said "just hold him tight, I'll go in after him" . I cranked the TM up to 100 and got right in there. As I am running my hand down his line into the grass I yanked the frog out of the fishes mouth. In hindsite, I should have netted the fish, wad of grass and all.

#4...Again just last year. My rod builder and I had teamed up to fish an open, and the bite was good again. This tx. also kicked out a 20+lb winning bag, and we finished 1 place out of the money again with almost 18lbs....... again due to a lost fish that would have been a big upgrade. I pitched a jig under a dock and the fish exploded on it as it was skipping under there, I had him pinned on the surface, up against some cross members, and could see it was a 4+ lber, as I kept pressure on him and got my partner in position to net him, she wiggled every so slightly and got off.

[Darren.]

As Legolas said when Gandalf died, the pain was still
to near...

The best one (I assume) was one of two. The first I got 
to see, the second I did not. First: youngest son was in
the front of my 12' Native Ultimate kayak. I had cast a 
4" Stik-O in Black/blue flake over toward a shoreline and
BANG. Had a serious fight on my hands.

Got the bass to the boat, a couple feet off the bow, my 
son was stretching his short arms with the net to get it
when she tail-danced, spit the hook into the net, and dove
back to the depths. Laughing the whole way down.

The second one was when I was experimenting with Storm
swimbaits. Very similar experience to the first but my son 
was not with me then. Each of the fish I guess were in the 
8 pound range. I'll never know....the pain is still too near, LOL

[clh121787]

Yall probably wouldn't believe it

[Cgolf]

I have two, one I never saw, and a monster largemouth underneath the dock at our vacation rental. The one I never saw had to be one of the monster Muskies I see hanging around the shallow reed beds. I was fishing a 5" grub on a spinning reel and all of a sudden line screamed off the reel as I went to set the hook. After I reeled in, I tried to pull line off as fast as the fish did and I am guessing I could only pull it off a 1/4 as fast as the fish. 

The second was a solid low to mid 20 toad that was under our dock when I went out on a couple hour trip. When I got back she was still there and I was able to get her hooked on a tube jig. I got her half way in and she gave a head shake and the bait came flying back at me. What was so heartbreaking is there aren't a lot of big northern WI girls like that in that lake, I am hoping for another shot at a fish like that sometime. This one still haunts me, I didn't do anything wrong, it just wasn't meant to be. 

[blckshirt98]

Mine was a couple of years ago at a local reservoir (Coyote) that's always been the spot to give anglers the best shot at a double digit bass in the area.  I had some bastardized jig/dropshot combo where I was dragging a jig with a dropshot bait about 10 inches up.  I was reeling it in, was pulling it in close to shore to re-cast when about 2-3 feet from the edge in about 8 inches of water "WHOOOOOMP" the great big sucking sound as the bottom jig got nailed.  The fish turned to the side and started going parallel into the shallows and the top 1/4 of it's body was out of the water and I saw the size of it and had to do a double take because I thought it was a carp with how big it was.  It turned towards deep water, made a run, and snap.  Gone.  Don't have any estimate on how big it was, might not even have been a double digit, but it easily would have been my PB.

[00 mod]

I am not sure I have ever lost a bass once hooked.........

Jeff

[yugrac]

I was fishing with my son on french creek in Meadville Pa. several years ago, from his boat, [French creek is more like a river in many spots]

I was using the lightest rig I own, a 4 1/2 ft ultralight St. Croix, 4 pound test line, using a 1/4 oz inline spinner. Had not had much going on, I had picked up a couple 2 pound Largemouth, he hadnt touched a fish. I cast along a tree laying along the shoreline, water was very murky, all of the sudden I thought I hooked a truck, my rod was bent in a 360 degree circle, I had never felt that much power on the end of a rod in 50 years of fishing, I managed to get it close enough to the boat and up far enough in the water to see a 4 ft. Muskie. My son starts yelling, "its a Muskie, dont let it turn its head!" Well, needless to say once it seen us it went under the boat and "ping" it was gone.  

The last time I went out last year, I was throwing into a downed tree, in shallow water, again with a spinner, I made about 3 turns on the reel and it stopped. I thought crap I am hung up on my first cast. So after trying all methods of freeing the lure with no result, I started moving the boat toward the snag. As I was moving forward my line kept getting tighter, I was like what the?  Then suddenly it hit me, idiot, you have a fish!  This thing just started pulling line off like I was not even there, It just swam away moved out toward the middle of the lake and I dont think it even knew it was hooked, then slack line, But I did not lose my lure, It just pulled out of its mouth. Felt like a monster cat.   I did manage to boat my first muskie last fall on Ceasars creek in Ohio, but it was only a 2 footer. I heading to northern Pa at the end of May, I am going prepared with heavy gear and braid this time, the one lake we are going to is known for big Muskie and pike, maybe I will get even!

[papajoe222]

This happened back in the mid 90's on Table Rock.  I'd found a small point with a lone stump about half way up a good size creek arm. I figured since it (the point) wasn't on a map that it didn't receive much pressure and that lone stump was a dream come true.  I was using a new, low profile reel on my favorite worming rod and had spooled it with 10lb. Stren. I cast past the stump and worked the worm until it bumped the stump and then I just let it sit.  The line barely moved, but I knew a fish had taken it.  I did my normal hook set and thought I'd hooked the stump until my line took off. I knew it was a big girl and tried to wear her down. About ten feet from the boat, she came up and toward me opening her mouth that I swear I could fit my fist inside a boxing glove into. The only problem was my T-Rig was flying out of that monster mouth and straight at me.  That fish just had just clamped her big mouth shut on my worm. There were bite marks on it, but the hook point never exited the worm.  I bought into the Tru-Turn hook hype after that.

 

[N Florida Mike]

I was fishing Rodman in a tournament in the stump field and there was one lone stump way out by itself.I made a long cast and the worm fell right up against it.I felt a tap,set the hook, and the fish did not turn to me in the least.Instead,it turned away and swam off.The line snapped like a pistol shot.I was using 14 pound stren.I'm pretty sure the fish would have been in the teens.Another time I was speckled perch fishing and catching a few on minnows.All of a sudden, my cork just disappeared and I knew it was a catfish.I only had 6 pound test and could not do anything with this fish.I had no net and was out in the middle of the small lake.I tried to keep the fish close while I tried to figure out what to do.I decided to try to pull up the anchor and slowly work him toward the bank but he immediately swam into the anchor line and broke off.I have caught a 22 pound cat on 8 pound test before and this fish was much bigger.Channel cat for sure in this lake.5 minutes the same thing again.Maybe the same fish.About bass though,I've lost 5 or so really big fish that I remember every detail of.Any of those fish would have been a PB.

[NorcalBassin]

I was fishing a smaller local lake around July 4th a few years ago with my dad... slow day and I was mindlessly throwing a wacky rigged Senko around and between docks in anticipation of leaving real soon. The storied cast was just a few feet off the bank away from any significant structure or cover, and about 5 seconds into the fall my line shot off to the right towards the nearest dock. I was in a moment of disbelief and did a pansyish reel/sweep hookset figuring this was big and I only had 6# fluoro. After 2-3  minutes of putting pressure on her I was finally able to get her head turned and headed to the boat. As she was slowly coming towards the boat I told my dad to get the net because this had a chance to be the fish of a lifetime assuming it's a bass, and then she appeared like a submarine hovering in place just a couple inches under the water and 3-4 ft from the front of the boat.

My heart about jumped out of my chest when I saw she was well into DD size, and right as I looked back to check on the status of the net she lifted her head out of the water with a violent headshake and out shot my Senko. She literally stayed in that same subsurface position for at least a few seconds that seemed more like an eternity, and although I didn't hear anything I'm pretty sure she was laughing at me. Even though I can't count it, it was my favorite bass "fight" I've ever had and serves as a constant reminder your PB is always just a cast away even on a slow day.

[trick worms]

Because everyone knows fisherman never lie?

[Derekbass02]

I love reading these threads. I don't think I have ever lost a PB but I did lose a big Pike or musky once...

[Turtle135]

As a youngster back in the mid 1970's I was fishing a local lake and doing well with the bass that particular day. I distinctly remember thinking to myself (rather smugly) that I was getting pretty good at this bass catching thing. Maybe 3 or 4 casts later I hook a fish that I could not stop with my medium spinning rod (probably had 8 pound test mono strung). I have never been connected to a fish with that much line out before or since. I fought that fish for over 10 minutes slowly gaining line and was finally winning the battle.

About 30 feet out the hook pull out and rocketed just past my head. Never got a look at the fish. It has only been 40 years. I'm certain in another 40 years it will pain me less because I should be well dead by then.

[everythingthatswims]

Mine didn't get away 

[bassin' 4 life]

One time I was testing some lures I bought, one being a tube jig, the water was still cold so I wasn't expecting to catch anything, but apparently this bass was moving in for the spawn, I don't remember the bite much and it didn't fight hard, but I do vividly remember getting it to the dock, reaching down to grab it and my 12 pound mono breaking, the jig firmly stuck in the 4 pound largemouth as it literally just sank straight to the bottom and then swam in a wide circle straight back to where I cought it. I then looked at the end of the line, it was hooked, for some reason the line broke inside the knot. Now a 4lbr might not sound big to some of you, but where I was the bass don't often get much bigger.