That sickening crunch under your foot

[king fisher]

    The first time I heard that sound I was about 12 years old.  I thought it was the end of the world, but somehow I did survive.  Since then I have heard the sound more times than I care to admit, and it's always the same.  End of the world at first, but the Bait Monkey manages to save my life every time.

[Zcoker]

It's not so bad when it happens on a fish. I broke a nice Daiwa few weeks ago on the hookset. I've often wondered how these guys on tournament bass boats side-step all those rods under their feet without crunching any of them lol 

[thediscochef]

5 hours ago, king fisher said:

    The first time I heard that sound I was about 12 years old.  I thought it was the end of the world, but somehow I did survive.  Since then I have heard the sound more times than I care to admit, and it's always the same.  End of the world at first, but the Bait Monkey manages to save my life every time.

That monkey is always around with a fix...

3 hours ago, Zcoker said:

It's not so bad when it happens on a fish. I broke a nice Daiwa few weeks ago on the hookset. I've often wondered how these guys on tournament bass boats side-step all those rods under their feet without crunching any of them lol 

The first rod I ever broke was actually on a fish...a very fast and light action low-end store brand rod on what I estimate to be a double digit flathead. It was early in my solo fishing days. I was trying to high stick it up onto the bank like a dingus. My rod tip broke off, it chomped my line, and took off. I felt worse about the light wire hook being left in its cheek than anything else. Cats handle that better than bass do but I still hate that it happened.

I learned several lessons from that fish

[Zcoker]

7 minutes ago, thediscochef said:

I felt worse about the light wire hook being left in its cheek than anything else. Cats handle that better than bass do but I still hate that it happened.

I learned several lessons from that fish

 

I hear ya on the hooks but fish find a way to shake them. There was a study done on northern pike using crankbaits with transmitters. They purposely hooked the fish in multiple locations and then released the fish. Here's the wording on the actual results which I found very interesting: 

 

These fish were all somehow finding ways to self-release (or most likely shake out) well set crankbait treble hooks in a matter of days. In fact, the barbless hooks usually came out of the fish’s mouth and hit the surface in 24 hours or less!

And even the deeply hooked crankbaits with barbs were usually fully free from the fish’s mouth in just a couple of days!

 

 

 

 

[DaveT63]

The last time I heard that sound was on our fourth wedding anniversary.  My fiance knew I was a fishing fanatic when we got married.  Before the wedding, she took me shopping for a new rod and reel as a wedding present.  So more as fun, since she doesn't fish, I bought her a combo as well. 

As I said, she doesn't fish, but likes to ride along on the boat. She brings a small lawn chair to sit on the rear deck.  The first time she actually brought her combo along was on our wedding anniversary.  She laid it on the back deck, continued loading her stuff onto the boat, then accidentally set the lawn chair right on the rod and sat down.  I knew without looking what that sound was.  Even though I was tempted to buy her a St Croix Pearl Avid to replace it, I thought better and got the pink lady Ugly Stik.  That was 8 years ago, and she's still never used it.

[geo g]

This is one reason when bank fishing I never take more than one rod with me.  I have broken more than just one by forgetting it was laying on the ground.  BPS have replaced one of mine 2 years after purchase.  I don’t know if they would do that now.

[PBBrandon]

I snapped an H2O Xpress Ethos a while back and took it back out of warranty, no questions asked they let me replace it and I picked up a tac-40. Carbon monocoque handle, SiC guides, really nice rod for the price. Academy is really good on exchanges. Maybe see if they will take it back

[Clumsy fisherman]

On 4/19/2022 at 12:40 PM, thediscochef said:

H2Oxpress tac40, not particularly expensive but it was my favorite rod. I also didn't feel like spending more money on gear I already had but oh well. Ruined my morning tbh, that plus a skunk is furrowing my brow

So I had stood it up, but it's so windy that it blew over while I was up the bank and I didn't hear it fall. I had casted up the jetty and was walking slowly backwards to my tackle box. A true accident but it's harder to accept my own mistakes.

 

This probably belongs in the moron moments thread

I think that rod was maybe a month old

You may be related to me. That sounds exactly like something I would do. Lost a cellphone last year that popped off my belt into the lake. ?

[MRG]

Always happens to the rods you really like. The not so great ones hang around forever.

[Maggiesmaster]

A fishing partner always leaves his rods with the tips protruding outside the boat. We’ll, he’s broken at least two tips off.  He knows everything, so I haven’t gently suggested to him ‘ KEEP THE d**n RODS INSIDE THE BOAT!!’?