Bad luck partner?

[burleytog]

I have this one friend who fishes with me a lot.  Even more so this summer because he's been on strike.  Since he doesn't have a lot to do, I've been asking him to go out with me every couple of weeks.

So far, we've been out four times on the boat this summer and once in the canoe (four of us on that trip, both of our wives went along).  Over those five trips, he has caught a total of 7 fish (6 bluegill on one trip, 1 smallie on the canoe trip).

I haven't done a lot better, catching around 20 or 25.  None of the lake fish being exceptional.

Take the one lake we've fished the most this year for example.  I can go up there alone and catch 7 or 8 fish over 3 or 4 hours.  I take him up there, we fish for 7 hours, I catch 5 small bass and he doesn't even get a bite.

We go up there again, I have him fish the dropshot along the banks.  He gets quite a few bites, but isn't very good at hooksets and doesn't catch a thing.  He's only fished rivers with Rooster Tails and whatnot until this year.  I've been trying to teach him plastics, but he's got that 'feel a tiny tic, set the hook like you're trying to penetrate the jawbone of a whale' syndrome.

Yesterday we hit a lake that neither of us have ever seen.  Supposed to have great populations of bass, crappie, and musky.  We fished for four hours, got 3-4 bites each, then a hellacious wind picked up and we had to leave.

I'm going to take him to my 'can't miss' lake next time.  I've only gone up there once this year and failed to catch a fish.  I'm going to get him on some fish if it kills me.  He's killing my mojo!

[SPEEDBEAD.]

Jeez, if he has that bad of luck I wouldnt take him to your honey hole....j/k.

It sounds as if he has a lack of experience rather than a lack of luck. Find a day when conditions could not be more perfect....overcast, late spring day w/ a front moving in perhaps? Then teach more than you fish. If, ultimately, you want him to become a better angler, you are going to have to put up with not fishing as much and tending to him a little more. You may also want to have him go out on his own and learn.

Just a few thoughts...

Wayne

[Raul]

Yup, a friend of mine is the most jinxed person I 've ever seen, we no longer invite him to come along with us cuz chit happens ! At first I didn 't belive it, as the years went by the only explanation we could find about our misfortune in ever aspect when he came along could only be attributed to his presence. Got many stories and coincidentaly every time chit happend he was around.  :-/

[burleytog]

I told him yesterday that if he didn't catch something then, he was going to be banned from my boat.   ;D

But since I didn't catch anything either, I gave him a reprieve.