Not all giant bass are smart

[WRB]

Way back in the late 60's and early 70's I tagged big bass with a kit, the tags were yellow tubing with numbers to log. Tagged 7 lb 10 oz bass at lake Sherwood about 300 yards from the south side of the dam caught near a big rock. I caught this same bass 3 times over a 3 year period the same month each year at the same rock, on the same jig. The bass never weighed more than original weight. Some bass are creatures of habit.

Tom

[OCdockskipper]

Tom, I think I used the same kit.  Did it come with little red logbooks like below?  Those are from 1978, it is fun to go through them and read the notes I used to write as a teenager.

[DrMarlboro92]

I would be really interested to see how long it took her to get back to six mile. I think it would give insight as to whether she went there out of memory, or if there is something about six mile that draws bass; and if it's the second option, what drew her there? 

It's still cool to see it travel so far and get caught again though.

[Hez]

On 9/28/2016 at 8:54 PM, OCdockskipper said:

Tom, I think I used the same kit.  Did it come with little red logbooks like below?  Those are from 1978, it is fun to go through them and read the notes I used to write as a teenager.

What is "Crapped on Rod"? 

Very cool, btw

[OCdockskipper]

As a teenage boy, I thought noting that fish #127 took a dump on my equipment as I was unhooking him was worthwhile to remember...  I laugh when I look back at some of the notations I made.

[Catt]

7 hours ago, DrMarlboro92 said:

I would be really interested to see how long it took her to get back to six mile. I think it would give insight as to whether she went there out of memory, or if there is something about six mile that draws bass; and if it's the second option, what drew her there? 

It's still cool to see it travel so far and get caught again though.

The two I'm referencing took about a month to reach Housen'/6-Mile & then be caught again.

Edited October 11, 2016 by Catt
Operator error

[kilroy9988]

I caught the same smallmouth twice last year once in the spring and again in late summer. It was a unique fish as it was missing part of the bottom of it's tailfin, when I caught it again in late summer I compared pictures from the spring and it was the same fish. 

3 years ago in early June I caught the same smallmouth 2 days in a row. First day I caught a bass with a hook and about a foot of crappy line hanging out of it's lip. A sore had formed around where the hook was, I removed the hook and released the fish. The next morning I caught the same sore mouth bass. 

[Raul]

I've caught the same big momma the 3 times in the same week from the same spot, that makes her stupid ? Not really, other than myself nobody has been able to catch her from the tiny pond where she lived, so .... I'm the smart one.

[clh121787]

Didn't dotty get caught a few times?

[Raul]

10 hours ago, clh121787 said:

Didn't dotty get caught a few times?

Yup, and who knows how many times she was caught and released before she became the famous "DOTTY".

[Ken Smith]

I need some stupid fish,....

[Raul]

1 hour ago, Ken Smith said:

I need some stupid fish,....

I need some stupid BIG fish ...

There you go, fixed, anybody can have stupid fish, BIG stupid fish not anybody can.

[Paul Roberts]

There seems to be a mythology that develops around BIG fish: that they are smarter, craftier, etc... I think it speaks to our ego, and I don't mean "ego" in the derogatory; Instead, ego in the motivational sense. It sure feels good when we catch one.

I think BIG fish are instead rare and in many cases represent individuals that have broken trophic thresholds taking them out of the normal range of most angler's methodology (think BIG swimbaits) and ability to delay gratification. This would describe me much of the time.

[Catt]

Anglers often respond to the failures and frustrations of not catching double bass by over-complicating theory and technique. As much as it helps our egos to regard a difficult task as complex, this type of thinking is often the biggest obstacle between you and your fishing success.

[OCdockskipper]

In addition to being less of them, I think BIG fish are tougher to catch because they are big.  There are some distinct advantages for a fish when it is able to break line or fight in a manner that its smaller brethren can't.

I caught a big catfish on a crankbait this year that had a square bill hanging out of one side of his mouth and a jig on the other.  He wasn't so smart, he was just able to continually get away with his errors through brute strength.

[Paul Roberts]

Catt chiming in has me wanting to add something: that catching bigger fish is often the result of overall effectiveness (accuracy, efficiency), location (being willing to fish deep, and inside cover), and in terms of timing (night fishing, say). These fish may not be smarter, just not where most anglers tend to, or are willing to, fish. It is interesting, and telling, that large bass are most vulnerable during the coldwater periods. And they seem to disappear in summer -presumably moving deeper, or deeper under "unfishable" cover, or becoming chiefly nocturnal. This would count a lot of us out. (But, not Catt from what I've gathered over the years.)

OCdockskipper reminds me of something I was thinking about while fishing this past week. I was sight-fishing mostly, to fish in very shallow water in a pond I know well. I know individual fish and had located the three biggest girls in the pond. They were all together in the back of one cove. I was unable to catch one as they were very spooky. Which got me to wondering how much the fact that large fish have larger eyes which, apparently, confers an advantage in visual acuity. Makes me wonder about other senses too, not to mention experience that comes with age. Sounds like I'm reversing from my comments above -as perception is part of the chain that results in "intelligence"- but I'm not. Rarely does one reason account for everything. And some things are more significant than others.

[Mainebass1984]

On ‎9‎/‎28‎/‎2016 at 4:49 PM, bigbill said:

I caught a large perch and put it in a different body of water on the way home. It was in my minnow bucket. I decided not to eat it. It's in another healthy spot. Haven't caught it again. Yet.

Careful. Stocking fish into another body of water is highly illegal in some states, especially in the Northeast.

[Raul]

1 hour ago, Paul Roberts said:

 catching bigger fish is often the result of overall effectiveness (accuracy, efficiency), locationally (being willing to fish deep, and inside cover), and in terms of timing (night fishing, say). These fish may not be smarter, just not where most anglers tend to, or are willing to, fish.

In my experience big mommas are most vulnerable during the prespawn because they feed a lot and during the spawn, just because they are there guarding the nest.

When I had the chance to do it I followed the spawn throughout the country starting by the North ( yeah, believe or nor there is a "north" in Mexico ) and near the coast, then moved up in height above sea level to move south as the year progressed, so for me it was late Feb /early March in Tamps and Nuevo Leon, Mid March/early April Sinaloa, Nayarit and coastal Jalisco, Mid April until May in central Jalisco, Guanajuato, Querétaro and San Luis, in Guanajuato, Estado de Maxico and Puebla the spawn extended until May/Jun in the Sierra so I climbed to reach the spawn.

Most of the 10+ pounders I caught were caught during the prespawn and the spawn.

 

[soflabasser]

21 hours ago, Raul said:

I've caught the same big momma the 3 times in the same week from the same spot, that makes her stupid ? Not really, other than myself nobody has been able to catch her from the tiny pond where she lived, so .... I'm the smart one.

Same here. There's a public park lake down here that I caught a +10 pound bass bank fishing a couple years ago. There are hundreds, if not thousands of people that fish this lake every year and most people never get a 6 pounder fishing this lake. Big bass from these highly pressured waters are far from being dumb and if they where truly dumb everyone would have a +10 pounder as a personal best.

[Paul Roberts]

36 minutes ago, Raul said:

... yeah, believe or nor there is a "north" in Mexico ...

 

There are even trout in northern Mexico. I'd say that's plenty "North".

[WRB]

Some or most giant bass are only caught during the spawning cycle, I'am talking about bass over 15 lbs. I joked that catching retarded big bass was easier then smart bass. The fact is most of these giant bass are very wary creatures and don't strike artificial lures as food. Life like swimbaits that move and look like the real thing, soft plastic worms and jigs that tend to give off very few negative clues hard for some big bass avoid. I don't believe it's the size alone of big swimbaits that sometimes fool big bass, it's a combination of size, coloration and movement that represents what the bass are targeting fools them. Every one of the giant bass over 15 lbs that I have caught were pre spawn fish that targeted crawdads when I caught them on hair jigs with pork rind trailers that looked, moved and had the right texture and taste of the real crawdad.

Tom

[TnRiver46]

4 minutes ago, WRB said:

Some or most giant bass are only caught during the spawning cycle, I'am talking about bass over 15 lbs. I joked that catching retarded big bass was easier then smart bass. The fact is most of these giant bass are very wary creatures and don't strike artificial lures as food. Life like swimbaits that move and look like the real thing, soft plastic worms and jigs that tend to give off very few negative clues hard for some big bass avoid. I don't believe it's the size alone of big swimbaits that sometimes fool big bass, it's a combination of size, coloration and movement that represents what the bass are targeting fools them. Every one of the giant bass over 15 lbs that I have caught were pre spawn fish that targeted crawdads when I caught them on hair jigs with pick rind trailers that looked, moved and had the right texture and taste of the real crawdad.

Tom

I will die happy if I can say "all the bass I have caught over 15 lbs" second thought I will die happy if I can say "that one bass I caught over 10 lbs"

[Raul]

3 hours ago, Paul Roberts said:

There are even trout in northern Mexico. I'd say that's plenty "North".

There's trout in Central Mexico, I fished for them. Not exactly north but high.

[Jeff H]

On 9/27/2016 at 7:23 PM, Paul Roberts said:

Doug Hannon has written that the largest bass are often the most aggressive ones

This has not been my experience.  When I've worked concentrations of fish, it seems I always get the small ones first.  The bigger fish in the group always come last for me.

[Catt]

8 hours ago, Jeff H said:

This has not been my experience.  When I've worked concentrations of fish, it seems I always get the small ones first.  The bigger fish in the group always come last for me.

Aggressive does not mean they feed first!

Smaller bass are willing to chase your lure down...big momma will not!

Given the choice of a 4" shad 10 feet away and a 8" shad 20 yards away big momma will choose the closest

Minimum output...maximum intake!

Of the measly 35 double digit bass I've caught only one was during pre-spawn, all the rest were during summer.