Do you have (fishing) acquaintances that are a one-way street?

[stratos4me]

Most anglers don't have the ability to catch someone else's fish. I think it has a lot to do with confidence. So, I don't worry about my secrets getting out unless I'm dealing with an elite angler on "my" lake. Talk, share your experience, and have fun! It's unlikely to hurt your pattern.

[Cdn Angler]

I've literally never talked to anyone about fishing in my neck of the woods. I have zero friends that fish and I don't often see people at the ramp either. 

[galyonj]

On 9/15/2023 at 1:30 PM, the reel ess said:

I have some friends, a married couple, who gave me carte blanche to fish their pond. They sometimes ask me questions and when I start with "If this, then that, except when, and then..." I see they get the 40 yard stare and I know they've stopped listening.

 

With apologies to Ronnie Coleman:

 

Everybody wants to catch a bass, but they don't want to lift no heavy-ass tackle boxes to cover every possible set of variables they might encounter.

[T-Billy]

On 9/6/2023 at 8:21 AM, Pat Brown said:

I don't know about y'all but I can't seem to help people.  I'll tell people exact spots and baits and retrieves and I'll still catch the fish.  It's almost like you can give people the keys and the manual but if they don't drive a lot, they won't win the race.

I wish I'd figured this out YEARS earlier. I fish busy lakes. I used to run all over looking for a spot nobody was on. Several years ago I finally figured out, I can fish right behind most people and do just fine. 

[shimmy]

On 9/6/2023 at 7:21 AM, Pat Brown said:

I don't know about y'all but I can't seem to help people.  I'll tell people exact spots and baits and retrieves and I'll still catch the fish.  It's almost like you can give people the keys and the manual but if they don't drive a lot, they won't win the race.

 

Interesting thread. There is a clear discrepancy between people who fish large versus small bodies of water. Have fun sharing specific spots on a small body of water. It will affect the lake. On larger bodies of water like Toledo Bend, I totally understand that it can be easy to share spots and still find ways to work around boats in an area. Small lakes (200 acres or less) is what many of us fish and lakes can permanently change by sharing too much info. Not sure why people think they are taking the moral high ground by "freely sharing/helping" when it actually involves LARGE bodies of water.

 

On smaller bodies of water, sharing with others may not always affect as many 6+ pound bass you catch, it definitely affects the number of 4s and 5s from my experience/observations. Nonetheless, I am still ok with sharing certain things with others if I know they are not going to share with others, not keep what they catch, and be the type to share their info as well.

 

Shimmy

 

[Pat Brown]

It's not a moral high ground at all.  I only fish small bodies of water here in central NC.  I mean I primarily fish a pair of public 5 acre city park ponds.  I think it's more that I can tell you exactly where when and how I caught the fish because you won't replicate my success just because I tell you how and where and when I caught a fish.  Bass just aren't that predictable or consistent and usually it's something obvious like 'i caught her around the full moon on that main lake point on a jig in deeper submerged brush' and most of the time the first thing people say is 'oh I don't fish jigs.' followed by 'i usually lose my bait whenever I work thick brush' or something like that.  'Oh you caught her on THAT side of the public pond.  I usually just fish near the parking lot but thanks for the tip.' etc etc

 

Occasionally I do give the juice to someone serious and in that sort of case I consider it a gift and rarely do they find the same success regardless.

 

I think higher profile bass fishing states, I could see it playing out differently.  Giving up waypoints to a semi pro with lots of fancy equipment seems like it could result in schools getting displaced or lure fatigue but around here, we don't have a lot of anglers like that thankfully.  Mostly just pleasure anglers who don't think too hard about details.

 

Even on a small reservoir with all the information and waypoints in the world you still gotta make them bite and I can't hold the rod and cast for everyone I give tips to and as a result I doubt my tips pan out very often.  I'm confident also that most bites I've gotten are not bites that are freely given at these locations routinely.  

 

It's like wow: 'Sometimes fish feed on things around pieces of cover near main lake structure and if ya cast popular lures into said cover, you can catch them occasionally!' isn't actually nearly as damning or helpful as we think it is. 😉🎣

[Susky River Rat]

@Pat Brown around here you could tell someone you caught a 8lber in a puddle at a Walmart parking lot on a toothpick with hooks and people with pound it till it dried up using a toothpick with hooks.

[Pat Brown]

4 minutes ago, Darnold335 said:

@Pat Brown around here you could tell someone you caught a 8lber in a puddle at a Walmart parking lot on a toothpick with hooks and people with pound it till it dried up using a toothpick with hooks.

 

 

You can't fix people.  The Walmart parking lot puddles around here get pounded whether I'm catching 8 lbers or not.....the good news is the winter is just about here and puddle pounders don't like wearing coats or standing in the cold.  😎😎😎

[Swamp Girl]

@Pat Brown: This past summer, a guy from another fishing website contacted me about fishing one of my bogs. With considerable hesitation, I met him at the edge of bog at 4:00 a.m. (Scary! Never again.) and guided him. I gave him all my best spots, hovered nearby if he had questions, and told him what I'd use.

 

He fished a shoreline that normally gives up 35-45 bass with one or two big ones and lots of 15" to 17" bass. He caught ten and they were undersized. Meanwhile, fishing a far less productive shoreline within sight of him, I caught 25 bass with one four-pounder and I lost another four-pounder.  

 

So, I literally led him to a great stretch loaded with healthy bass and told him what would catch them and he still couldn't catch them. 

[Susky River Rat]

@ol'crickety that would be how I fish it. Catching dinks in a monster filled bog. I mean someone has to catch the small ones!

[immortl]

@ol'crickety - a buddy of mine and I call it the 'knack'.  Some folks have the fishing knack, others not so much.  This buddy has a cabin on a little pond up on the Upper Peninsula of MI.  We used to go up there every year to fish.  Between he and I we would reel in northern pike all day long.  Another friend of his, we'll call him Bob, would come up often as well. 

 

We could hand Bob the rod we were using with the same lure (silver/blue hammered nickel daredevil was king), have him cast to the same exact spot, and he wouldn't so much as get a bite.  He'd hand it back to us, we'd case to same spot, and reel in another pike.  Over the years, he did start to develop the knack a little.

 

Now Bob was a tick OCD and man, he filleted pike like nobody's business.  We loved when he came up and handled the filleting for us.  If we knew he was coming up, the pike were kept in a live box off the dock for a day or two until Bob arrived to fillet them.

[Swamp Girl]

9 hours ago, immortl said:

@ol'crickety - a buddy of mine and I call it the 'knack'.  Some folks have the fishing knack, others not so much.  This buddy has a cabin on a little pond up on the Upper Peninsula of MI.  We used to go up there every year to fish.  Between he and I we would reel in northern pike all day long.  Another friend of his, we'll call him Bob, would come up often as well. 

 

We could hand Bob the rod we were using with the same lure (silver/blue hammered nickel daredevil was king), have him cast to the same exact spot, and he wouldn't so much as get a bite.  He'd hand it back to us, we'd case to same spot, and reel in another pike.  Over the years, he did start to develop the knack a little.

 

Now Bob was a tick OCD and man, he filleted pike like nobody's business.  We loved when he came up and handled the filleting for us.  If we knew he was coming up, the pike were kept in a live box off the dock for a day or two until Bob arrived to fillet them.

 

I'm guessing the knack, both having it and not, applies to many activities. When it comes to something mechanical, give me enough time and I MIGHT blunder through, just as a chimpanzee might blunder through the same task, but I lack that mechanical knack. I'm glad that Bob had his domain.

 

Bob should have said, "By sea, it's never me, but on land, I command."

 

I used to take non-fishers fishing for white bass with minnows. Easiest fish in the world to catch, right? Well, I'd be fishing two rods and I'd keep an eye on their rods and time and again, I'd say, "You have a fish." because their rod tips were twitching. Fishing rewards those who don't miss the details. 

 

Thanks for the story, immortl!