“This Prevents Me From Fishing History”

[J Francho]

Y’all cannot imagine the number of e-mail I get stating these kinds of discussion do more for teaching than who has the “best” rod, reel, lure, line ect.

Actually, I don't need to imagine. I just look at my inbox on the four forums I post on.

[hookingem]

Actually, I don't need to imagine. I just look at my inbox on the four forums I post on.

[Big-O]

Thanks catt and Gene, nice topic And I'm glad it has been a positive for everyone. Also I agree that (excluding blind hog luck) our history or experience is ultimately responsible for consistant results!

If we have trained ourselves to be proficient at analyzing and working through certain types of challenges, regardless of the challenge that is before us, our past training or abilities are ultimately responsible for our successful results. If the challlenge is more difficult than we expect, but we have the persistance to work it through it with whatever abilities and proficiency we've acheived from past experiences, in due time we'll be successful. Without our past training or understanding, we will be much less ept at completing such a challenge on a timely basis that we feel is acceptable. Also without such a new challenge, we can never aquire more knowledge and experience. That's Fishing!

To simplify this long dissertation into a more understandable example...

If Spring transitioned to Winter and failed to allow the Summer season to have it's rightful place in History... "History tells me that I need to put my coat on"

Big O

www.ragetail.com

[WRB]

This site covers bass fishing from coast to coast and we sometimes forget that fact. Bass are bass, however not all bass are largemouth.

Lakes are lakes, not all lakes are reseviors.

Time changes what we know or thought we knew. If we could go back and fish yesterday with what we know today, would we catch more or bigger bass? That is exatly what fishing memories or history is, going back and hoping to do better.

Sometimes it works, most the time it doesn't.

Example; Lake Havasu on the CA / AZ border. Deep canyon reservior on the Colorado river system. The 50 years I have fished this lake, it has changed from a largemouth fishery to a mixed largemouth and smallmouth fishery. The largemouth now are mostly located in the north end and smallmouth mid lake towards the dam south end. Fish for largemouth where you did 5 years ago and you will be blanked, however fish for smallmouth and catch 20+ lbs 5 bass limits. You need to know how to catch smallies at Havasu today.

Most of the local lakes I fish have silted in with 50' of sand and silt, the outside structure is gone in the upper 1/3rd of some of these lakes today and a waste of time trying to located where the breaks used to be.

GPS has had a major impact fishing outside isolated structures on big lakes, 5 years ago few bass anglers ventured off shore, today it's common. Time changes how we fish and where the fish are located.

Tom

[scrutch]

I AM that inexperienced angler. I AM that guy reading this post and trying to absorb the years of knowledge being spilled out in this thread. This -to me- is invaluable in trying to figure out HOW to put "the puzzle" together each time out.

I believe that experience is totally irreplaceable when it comes to fishing.

J Francho... you argued that "the average angler would have taken what he got at the top" and "Had I fished the past I would have failed" I would like to point out that it was "your past" or your experience that told you to fish deeper for the larger fish. BECAUSE you were experienced enough to step back in that situation and add that last piece of the puzzle --the cold front-- to your equation. If that were me on that structure I would have been doing cartwheels in the boat because I was killin 'em.

Point is...experience is what everyone relies on to COMPLETE the puzzle more often. As BIG O says "consistency".

Whether it's NEW water, old spots, deeper, shallower, whatever.

It's no accident that the best fishermen are the ones that have been doing this a very long time.

I think we all are saying the same thing, several different ways.

Thanks guys for a great thread.

[Randall]

I think sometimes the best examples or answers to problems or questions are experiences or stories from your past. Lake Varner used to be a lake with pondweed as the dominant vegetation. It had both threadfin shad and gizzard shad up till around 2007. I knew the lake well and had no problem catching fish there.

Then we hit a couple years with very cold winters, drought, and a huge amount of three and four pound hybrids that totaly wiped out the threadfin shad population. On top of that hydrilla started growing and really changed the lake.

With all these changes in the lake a lot of people kept fishing the lake and spots they had always caught fish on for 10-15 years but couldn't figure out why they weren't catching fish there anymore. They just kept fishing the same ways and same spots and complaining. Because I had fished other lakes that were more like what Varner was becoming I knew I had to change the way I fished the lake and did so. I still go out to Lake Varner and see the same guys fishing what worked 10 years ago and still complaining. Both the people fishing the way that used to work and myself used our history to decide where and how to fish. The only thing they were/are missing is the WHY.

Well what was the why that changed? Threadfin shad are more of a deepwater pelagic type fish where gizzard shad after they reach a larger size feed more on the bottom and relate more to shallow areas creeks and flats. Growth rates and adult sizes are different as well. After the threadfin shad were gone alot of steep deepwater banks and points that used to hold fish didn't hold fish or a many fish anymore. If there were fish there they were tough to catch. There just wasn't enough deepwater schools of shad roaming over and off those points anymore to hold the fish that used to live there. Then the hydrilla spread and made some the shallower areas of the lake that never held many fish more productive while choking out some other areas that used to be good. The grass created structure in some spots where there was none before and moved or scattered fish that used to stack up somewhere else.

I used my "History" of fishing other lakes as well as that lake and was able to draw from my past experiences to adjust and find new or different spots and ways to fish. The people using the "History" of only a few locations and techniques on that lake that worked in the past are still wondering what happened because they are missing what changed and never understood WHY the fish were there and they were catching them in the first place.

[Catt]

Gene, please accept my humblest apologue there was no malice intended, you just put up the right post at the wrong time and I’m truly sorry.

I’m just not the kind of person to let questions go unasked and if I burse someone’s elbow in the process I’m sorry.

[Gatorbassman]

Catt, There are no hard feelings at all. There never were. That's why I jumped right in. Then I thought I saw this thread going in the wrong direction. I might have jumped the gun a little.

[grimlin]

I for one enjoy the occasional "Bickering" posts that are put up here by some of you, As Catt stated it opens our minds to new ways of seeing other pionts of view and with the amount of info supplied by these type of posts has tremendously helped me not only on the water but also in life and I for one can not thank you all enough for going through the motions of really driving the point you make home.

Thank you all very much!!!

In many ways me too....I just sit back and absorb all the information...LOL

[Dwight Hottle]

Catt, Keep em coming. We all enjoy going to school.

[J Francho]

J Francho... you argued that "the average angler would have taken what he got at the top" and "Had I fished the past I would have failed" I would like to point out that it was "your past" or your experience that told you to fish deeper for the larger fish. BECAUSE you were experienced enough to step back in that situation and add that last piece of the puzzle --the cold front-- to your equation. If that were me on that structure I would have been doing cartwheels in the boat because I was killin 'em.

That wasn't a cold front. The warm air over the lake won the battle, LOL.

Yes, I drew from my experience. That's not what we mean by fishing in the past. Some people fish spots. you hear it at the ramp. "They were in that weedline all last week, today not a bite." Fishing in the past.

[scrutch]

That wasn't a cold front. The warm air over the lake won the battle, LOL.

Yes, I drew from my experience. That's not what we mean by fishing in the past. Some people fish spots. you hear it at the ramp. "They were in that weedline all last week, today not a bite." Fishing in the past.

Pardon my ignorance J. I'm still on the upswing of the learning curve. So are you thinking when you hear those type of comments at the ramp, "I knew that already." Or would you have tried the weedline for a few minutes and realized they weren't there.

[J Francho]

Good question. If it's midsummer in that example, then I'm staying close to the weeds, or slowing down immensely. Those fish didn't move far, if at all.

[Gatorbassman]

Good question. If it's midsummer in that example, then I'm staying close to the weeds, or slowing down immensely. Those fish didn't move far, if at all.

If it's fall then I'm staying close to the weeds too. But if I figure that the bite is shut down I'm going to grab a shallow flat crankbait and set the boat so I can make parrallel casts along the grass. Then I'm going to tweek line tie on the crank a bit so it runs into the weeds and gets hung. Then I'm going to rip it out of the weeds and do it again. Working the weed line hard.

[J Francho]

Nice info. Up here, in fall the weeds die. Where there are decaying weeds, there usually isn't too much O2, so I avoid those areas. But, find healthy weeds, and you might out fish the structure guys. There's a case of geographic patterns being totally different.

[Gatorbassman]

Yea, Our weeds don't die untill late November. October is speed fishing time. Burn along the outside weed line till you catch a fish and then slow down and catch the rest of them with a Spro frog on mats or a fluke if the weeds are submerged.