The Real Story

It's a fact-when social media hit the scene it became almost a requirement to condense information into minutes, or less. Even when media was primarily in print, seldom would an author spend pages of print describing all the twists and turns getting from point A to point B. Following are a couple of fishing outings described in the manner that I've experienced causes a lot of others to react with, "Well...what am I doing wrong?! Why can't I do that." And then I'll repeat the two outings stories with as Paul Harvey used to comment, "...the rest of the story."

Story 1: Sunday evening a little more than three weeks ago, now. My golden standard is always averaging a catch rate of five fish per hour. Bonus points if it's the target species at that rate. And this particular Sunday evening would not disappoint. Fly fishing a main lake point with a San Juan worm modified, I hammered red ear and large bluegill. Key to five per hour was after cleaning up on the fish closer to the bank, taking a chance and shooting line and fly farther away and sure enough, there were probably even more "out there."

Story 2: A recent weekday and late afternoon, I waded out into a flooded lake reaching what would be the usual waterline. Proceeding to cast a tiny little plastic jig, I hammered crappie at a catch rate that averaged over five per hour, that day.

Story 1-the rest of the story: The theme of this update and several other blog updates to follow (as I catch up), is the oddball, tornados, monsoon, cold-hot-cold spring we're having. Having tricked some big red ear, fly fishing, on my trophy red ear lake a couple weeks ago I was after 'em again. The deeper banks holding a few a couple of weeks ago were no longer suspect, but high water spreads the fish out so that good fishing still seems like slow fishing. So I use a rule of 5's and fan five casts, move 50 feet, and so on. Forcing me to fish the deeper banks, anyway. No joy there. No joy at the first "always a good place"! And prospects were only improving as I kept executing the rule of 5's yet, after about 10 x 5 casts and having moved-stopped-moved...another 500 feet, still no joy!

I was in to this adventure a little over an hour now-no fish. I'd caught a number of small bass on a rounded main lake point in the fall. Credit Missouri Department of Conservation beginning an aquatic research program on that point last summer. But it's just not the place to look for red ear and bluegill this time of year. Maybe small bass-and at this point I'd settle for them on the fly rod.

A general rule is to start close, catching those fish nearer your feet first. In short order, I'd landed four red ear and bluegill. That slowed quickly, and I supposed that where those seemed to be running the aquatics, there may be more farther out. So I stripped about another 35 feet of line from the fly reel, looked behind me to be sure I could load the rod with a backcast of about 15 feet of line, and shot line about 25 feet away from me. Then 35 feet. Then 45 feet and by now, the finesse and effort it takes to shoot line 50 feet away was more like a lottery. But the payoff at each distance was a total exceeding 21 big red ear and bluegill.

The rest of the story: I averaged OVER my five fish per hour goal. But remember, I was almost at two hours and no fish. I was out there almost four hours. And this is how those numbers work more often than you may think. It's seldom five or more fish from the first cast and hour. It's usually mind bending, eye squinting, headache thinking and strategic moves-obstacles be damned-gotta fish in 'em anyway, before I'm on fish that I'm landing every few minutes. Total which when you do the math = the five or a little more per hour.

Story 2-the rest of the story. I seldom "lake hop". As difficult as it is, and as disciplined and maintaining confidence as it requires, I usually scold myself if I think of leaving telling myself, "The fish didn't sprout legs, crawl onto the banks and walk to another lake! Find 'em!"

But today, 65 years of doing this had honed my intuition so that I was confident that I-me-maybe not you-but I...wasn't going to catch these crappie in this particular lake, today.

A reason I may look older than the fisherman the same age I hike past, is my general belief that I have to handle the snakes (really "handle" the snakes), perform forestry operations, walk with the eagles, scale bluffs and pick through the thorn shrubs...then stand in 'em...to catch fish. More often than not, this is a major factor why I catch more fish than the dock walker or parking lot stalker. But some days, it's a lot of pissy snakes, impossible forests, eagles that won't share, sweat and blood for nothing. Only to be headed back to the vehicle to see the parking lot stalker hammering the (crappie) in a place more comfortable than my living room. And so it was on the lake I'd see a couple personal records of more than 1000 crappie in one spot, over a period of 6-8 weeks during the last few years. In several spots x 1000! But not this temporary luxury hole.

Worn out from not catching fish, I decided that walking to the luxury hole at the other lake was worth the try-if the old man I'd seen hammering the crappie there-wasn't there. He was keeping fish to eat-even if I were there first because of what I'd observed, I'd let him have it if he showed up. And I guess I was really impressed with what he was doing that day, because I'd also paid attention best I could, to what he was using! I seldom care where you're fishing or what you're using because I believe, "You can't catch another man's fish." But remember...this day I was already tired and the luxury hole was just a stop where the nose of the vehicle was still pointed toward home.

I tied on the itty bitty jig though it's against my nature to do that when the spawn is about on. Because whatever he was throwing was itty bitty-I couldn't see it. But I could see the pink jig head. Which told me if I could see the pink jig head but not the jig, that jig was probably a pretty natural close to clear, color. And so this is the combo I tied on. Waded out in the high water-figured that was already an advantage the old man in sneakers didn't have that day-and proceeded to whack 56 crappie in a little more than an hour.

The rest of the story-I "reported" wherever I may have reported verbally or in writing, that I averaged more than five crappie per hour that day. But it was 0 crappie for four hours. And 56 crappie an a little more than an hour.

And now you know...the rest of the stories.