Let's trade fishing stories!!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I’ve fished off and on since childhood. I love to fish. Part of it is sitting in nature by or on a body of water, it’s very peaceful. Part of it is the anticipation of getting a bite. Will it happen? When will it happen? Then the burst of adrenaline, getting the bite, setting the hook, and the ensuing fight with the fish. The curiosity of it… what’s it going to be this time?

I don’t think I’m going to get to do any fishing this year. :frowning: I might make it out this fall, but the way our weather is looking, it’s going to be solid rain until it hits 90 degrees with smothering humidity. (I don’t enjoy fishing in the summer when it’s too hot. Sweating sitting still, skin all sticky, hordes of mosquitoes? Nope, I’m a fair weather fisher.)
So, let’s trade fishing stories!! At least I can enjoy it vicariously.
One of mine: I was fishing a lot with my then boyfriend. He had a jon boat. We’d go out in the middle of the night for catfish, then as the night turned to day, we’d fish for crappie. I had bought some battery operated light-up bobbers, (which my boyfriend scoffed at,) but I liked to look around the lake, and sometimes missed the nibble. I got a green one, a yellow one, and a red one.

I had the green one on the line, and it went!! Zoom!! They take the hook A LOT faster than you’d think. It took the hook so fast, there was a solid blur of green through the water. At least an eight foot “trail” of light! (Wow! How cool!! :D)

I set the hook, started reeling, and that bastard broke my line!! On the wrong side of my bobber. Not only did I lose my fish, but he stole my bobber!

Ok, it happens. New hook, new bobber, new bait. Back to fishing.

A little while later he said, “Look down there.” At the far end of the lake was my green bobber! He said we’d go pick it up before we went home. More fishing. Except now, as I look around the lake, I’m watching my green bobber. It’s going 15-20 feet one way, then 15-20 feet back. And again. That’s not any kind of current or water lapping at the shore!!

I told him, “I think that fish still has my bobber.” He watched, and said, “Oh shit, I think you’re right. Let’s go get 'im!!” I was willing to wait, but no, now it was personal. That bastard stole my bobber, and we were going to get it back, and maybe catch my fish, too.

So we reel in the lines, pull up the anchor, and off we go. We get close to the bobber, and he leaned out over the boat to grab it.

He gets the bobber in one hand, reaching down into the water with the other hand to snag the line further down and try to get my fish. He felt the fish come off the line, and commenced to cussing up a storm. (Lord, that man could cuss.)

I cut him off with, “Don’t worry, I got 'im!” What he didn’t know was that I had gotten the net, and was scooping behind his arm through the water. At the exact moment I heard that intake of breath before the cussing began, I felt the weight of the fish fall into the net!!

Pretty nice sized catfish, too!

Your turn! :slight_smile:

2

Here’s my favorite fishing story, posted here nearly 8 years ago!

3

I’m 50 and I like to fish, but I only started fishing again a few years ago, after an experience when I was 12 years old.

I was in a day camp, and we were taken to a river to do some fishing. I was given a quick lesson on how to cast, assigned a very beat-up rod and reel, and wished good luck.

The river had a steep hilly bank I had to negotiate to get to the river’s edge. Found a nice shady spot under a large tree, and swung out my cast in a nice large arc, just like I was shown.

…aaand snagged my line in the tree above. So I repeatedly yanked the line, but the hook was snagged good. Suddenly the reel, which was not attached well to the rod, and was probably not a very well-made piece of equipment, came off the rod, falling apart into several pieces, and fell into the shallow water of the river’s edge.

I carefully reached over to try to get the reel parts, but they were too far to reach with my shoes on. So I took my shoes and socks off and waded in. The bottom was that fine silt that you sink about a foot into and it holds your feet in with suction, so it’s an effort to walk through. At this point I am very angry and frustrated and cursing under my breath with whatever curses I knew at 12.

I finally retrieve the reel parts and get back to dry land. My feet are wet and muddy up to mid-calf, and I don’t want to put my shoes and socks back on yet. So I awkwardly carry shoes, socks, rod, bait, and reel parts in my hands while walking barefoot back up the hill.

That’s when I realize that the steep bank is covered in prickly thistles. Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow ow. I vowed never to fish again that day, a vow that lasted 30+ years.

4

My favorite is this one - I was on a camping trip with my dad (he hired a guy to fly our canoe and stuff into a lake in northern Quebec - then we would canoe out). We were on a lake that gets very few visitors, as it is hard to get to it other than by flying in (many portages away from even a logging road). So naturally, the fishing was good.

I hooked something pretty large, and was fighting it, when I could tell that it managed to snag something underwater … and it broke my line. Cursing, I was reeling in, when I realized the line was still wrapped around something … it turned out to be an old rope.

I pulled on the rope, and there was a considerable weight on the end. Pulled that up, and found it was … a bucket. Full of beers.

Way we figured it was this: that someone visiting the lake had lowered a bucket of beers down into the water to cool them off, attaching a float to the other end of the rope (there was a bit of rusted wire wrapped around the other end). Unfortunately, the float had broken off, leaving the beers as sunken treasure.

We didn’t actually drink those beers (my dad didn’t drink and I was a kid at the time) … but still, not often that one fishes up beer.

5

Never cared much for fishing, though we’d do it when I was a kid. We lived with easy access by boat to Southold Bay on Long Island and my grandfather liked to take us. Generally I found it boring, though there was one time we anchored over a school of porgies.

Porgies are small, but fight hard when hooked, so it was great fun when you could drop your line and pull up a fish after only a couple of minutes.

We also caught blowfish. They got their name because the blew up like basketballs when in danger (under water, they fill their bladders with water to make them too big to swallow; on land, it’s air). We’d take them and bounce them on the deck. Later we’d clean and eat them. Discovered years later that the Japanese name for them was fugu.*

The other thing we’d pull up were sea robins. No one at them (though they are edible), but they were weird looking fish. We also caught flounder and fluke – very similar fish with two eyes on one side of their body. Fluke have eyes on their left side; flounder have eyes on their right side.

*American blowfish have less poison than the Asian variety, but they still do. It’s concentrated in their liver. Cleaning them was easy: you cut off the tail, kept that meat (and rinsed it off) and discarded the rest. Delicious.

6

I grew up in a house right on a river. Not a good fishing river if you wanted fish to eat, but it had all the carp you could catch. Mostly we would catch them and throw them back, but when one of the neighborhood kids heard that the neighborhood spinster lady with the beautiful rose garden put fish meal in her soil to fertilize the roses, we thought we would do her a favor and give her the whole fish!

We fished all day, yielding about a dozen good-sized carp. She wasn’t home when we rang her doorbell, so we thought we’d surprise her and put the fish in the garden for her. We dug small shallow holes, just deep enough to cover the fish, tossed in the fish, covered up the holes and went on our merry way.

It was the height of summer and VERY warm and a day or two later, the most noxious smell you can imagine permeated the neighborhood. All the adults were talking about it and trying to find the source. Our spinster lady neighbor found the epicenter was located in her back yard rose garden, and after scratching the surface with a rake, found our ‘contribution’.

Thankfully, she took our gift in the spirit it was intended, but our dads had to go over and help her dig out the dead fish and dispose of them. That pretty much put an end to our unsupervised fishing.

7

I’ve been into fly fishing for about 3 years. I like it, but still have a lot to learn. About 3 weeks ago, my wife and I were doing a float trip down the South Fork of the Shenandoah with a guide. We were just pulling smallmouth bass out. They’re insanely fun on a fly rod. I hooked into a hog that was easily the biggest fish I’d ever caught (if I had caught it). In a second, he leaped at me, created slack in the line and shook off my fly before I could even react. I looked at my boat mates and said, “that was awesome!”

8

Years ago I was fishing from a canoe with my then-brother-in-law (now friend) on Crooked Creek. He hooked a nice small-mouth bass that snagged onto a submerged tree branch. I was in the stern of the canoe, so I maneuvered over so I could lean forward and free his line.

He thought I was maneuvering to allow him to free the fish. So, we simultaneously leaned over the side of the canoe, efficiently flipping the craft.

He lost the fish, but I am always anal about securing gear. Not a single beer was lost!

9

Is it considered fishing if the fish eat your bait and laugh at you? Cause that’s what I usually do.

10

I was with a friend at Rock Creek Lake in the eastern Sierra…he was trying his luck from the shore, cast after cast after cast with zero luck. This went on for an hour or so and his frustration level was getting pretty high.

I’m not a fisherman, so I was spending the time wandering along the creek that fed into the lake. I spotted a small trout in the creek, hiding in the shade of a fallen branch. Just for fun I snuck up on it and somehow managed to grab it! I held the fish up and yelled at my friend–“Hey! Check this out! Maybe you’d have better luck over here!” Boy, that really ruined his day!

11

it was thiiiiiiiiiiis big

12

My Great Aunt loved to fish and was a member at a private lake. One summer, while I was staying with Grandmother, my Aunt took both of us to the lake for a day of fishing and picnicking. I was ten at the time and a little squeamish so I wouldn’t use the bait worms to fish. Instead I used bits of hot dog. I caught nine bluegill - a personal record. I wrote out a statement about it and made my Aunt and Grandmother sign it as witnesses so my brothers would believe me when I went back home. (Still have it.)

13

My wife loves to fish, I don’t, but will go along occasionally. When our daughter was 4, we took her with us to a pond. She was not interested in casting a line. After a short time wandering the bank, she reached into the water and just grabbed a fish and threw it on the bank. Why we needed to dangle sticks over the water eluded her.

14

I was 9 months pregnant and we were camping at my parents’ river place. Everyone else was having fun and getting silly drunk while… I was fishing. I had 2 of my own poles set up and 2 my husband was letting me tend. But since they were hooting and hollering all I did was feed the turtles.

We headed to bed in the wee hours. I could not get comfortable: pullout couch and preggo. While I lay there and tossed and turned I swore I heard the tinkle of a bell. Mistermage said I was just imagining things. Then I heard the bell go clang, clang, clang!

Well, I waddled outside and started checking poles. None of them were clanging and all still had bait. Then I realized one of my poles was missing. By that time Mistermage had came out and had brought a decent flashlight (I was using the moon to see by).

Down the 4 foot bank and about a foot into the water was my pole. Mistermage slid down the bank and grabbed it. This particular pole only had about 20 foot of line on it because I had set it up with 50# line. So he started winding it in and then… about 5’ out in the water a huge fish surfaced, rolled and twang went the line.

While I would have loved to have pulled that big guy in whether a cat or a carp… I was much more happy to have gotten my pole back. It was a left hand pole my oldest brother had given me. It lasted another 10 years before the reel fell apart.

I passed my love of fishing on to all 3 of my boys. 2 weeks back the oldest brought home a few pan sized cat and one perfect sized carp. The catfish were cleaned and fried along with a pound of Smelt. The carp was smoked.

I’m hoping we make it out to the In-laws’ river house this summer because they are selling it off in the fall. I love to cane pole fish for bluegill off their dock or along the bank. If we catch enough FIL cleans them and MIL fries them up. If we don’t catch enough we release them and MIL fries up some catfish fillets.

My most expensive fish cost me a $40 fine: I was 19 and the DNR caught me fishing without a license. I didn’t realize that even if you are on private property the river requires a license. It was a nice 12lb catfish.

15

My Aunt Phil and Uncle Jack, from England (mum was English), visited us few times over the years. They used to love coming to the States and when they’d go home they’d scrimp and save for the next few years till they could afford another trip over.

They were poor, but determined.

On one of their last trips, Dad and I decided to treat Jack to something he always dreamed of doing—offshore fishing! He’d done a little pond fishing for sunfish and such as an English youngster, but that’s about the extent of his fishing experience. He wanted desperately to catch a big fish deep in the big blue ocean.

Jack was ~70 years old at the time with snow white hair, short stature and just a bump of a belly. Mom told me his hair turned from pitch black to snow white during the 4 years he was detained in a WWII German POW camp—he made it back just in time (less than 24 hours) to be best man at my parents wedding in May, ’45 (he adored his sister/my mom).

Jack was one of the most modest and pleasant people you’d ever want to meet, big toothy smile constantly plastered on his face, always saying how happy he was to be doing whatever he happened to be doing at the time, even if it was something most people would consider mundane. My aunt was exactly the same way. They, like my parents, were a perfectly matched couple, and it was always a hoot listening to them mock-bicker between themselves in sort of a faux cockney manner, often to the delight of passersby.

So, Dad, Jack and I drive to the charter boat dock before sunrise and loaded our gear into the boat. Jack was a bit overdressed for a fishing trip (starched white shirt, matching shorts and hat), but we let him slide. I lent him a pair of my Costa del Mar sunglasses and one of my prized Penn reels and rod. He would have looked great on the cover of Salt Water Magazine. He just stood there for a couple minutes with his eyes closed breathing the balmy salt air deeply into his lungs, with his big toothy smile (the same one he had in my parent’s wedding photos) and saying how excited he was to be about to embark on his dream fishing trip.

Just then, the first mate untethered the boat from the dock and the captain lurched the boat backward out of its mooring. The sudden motion caught Jack off balance; he did a [rather humorous] double propeller spin with his arms [to no avail], then fell backward smack dab into the large chum bucket—filled to the brim with bloody fish parts and oily guts. The smell was…memorable even 20 years later.

His ass was wedged deeply into the bucket and the blood and guts squirted up between his legs and into the hem of his shorts and down into his naughty bits. It was actually difficult to extricate Jack from the bucket, what with the suction and all. But he took our laughter in stride and didn’t even complain about having to spend the rest of the hot day miles off the coast of Florida, in oily fish gut encrusted pants.

Unfortunately, the rest of the trip didn’t fare too well for old Jack, either: he managed to lose his hat to the wind, impale his thumb with a large hook and become green to the gills with sea sickness. But, he persisted…with that toothy grin. “Don’t you lads worry about me, I’m just going to hang my head over the bow and do a little chumming myself.”

My dad and I were doing pretty good with the fishing: amberjack, king mackerel, cobia and even a wahoo (that’s one hell of a fast fish!). Jack fared much worse, breaking off the very few fish he managed to hook.

But then, success!, he hooked onto a biggun’. His line spooled out almost to the end, while I helped adjust the drag and he fought that fish long and hard.

The last fish caught was my wahoo, so Jack was convinced he was about to land the second one of the day. His muscles were aching and he was sweating profusely (and still quite green from sea sickness). *“Need a break, Uncle Jack?” *

“No thanks, Tibby, I want to land this guppy all by myself!”

About 15 or so minutes later, he did land that fish, his one and only for the day. Wahoo? Cobia? Blue Marlin? Great White? Orca?…Nope, just a smallish Jack Crevalle(very powerful fish for their size, making you think you’ve hooked a much larger fish. Worse still, they taste like crap).

But, Jack had a jolly good time and even bragged extensively about the fish he caught. “I caught a Jack—my namesake!”

Another time I was inshore fishing and pulled up an oyster toadfish. Attractive fish, yes?..kind of reminds me of my ex-wife (in both looks and disposition). Toadfish (most species) have poisonous barbs along their dorsal fin, so I decided to just shake this guy off the hook into the water, but he fell into the boat instead (on purpose, I’m sure). As I tried to kick him into the net, he bit down hard (they have sharp teeth) on my big toe. Ouch!. Then, as I tried to pull him off my toe, he spiked me hard with his poisonous barbs (don’t tell me he didn’t plan the whole operation). *Ouch! Ouch! *

16

I once lived everyone’s dream; I became a professional flyfisherman. Guided, made tackle, repped for a couple manufacturers. Even did the Dewars tournies and a couple TV shows. My little operation grew, I added employees -------- and it became a J-O-B. So much so that one day a competitor and friend offered me $X for my contracts and I broke several land speed records finding a pen. I don’t think I’ve worn a stitch of tweed or gone near a pipe since then.

The moral is watch what you dream for out there – you may just get it. :slight_smile:

Now almost 20 years later I’m starting to enjoy fishing again. Catching something now and then isn’t bad but just having time on the water by myself is enough. Nothing big lately although I am looking to a bumper 'gill season with the temps and water we’ve had. Should be fun.

17

I occasionally spend the night on the boat, with the idea of some sunrise fishing. One night while asleep, I felt the boat move slightly. There was no wind, the water was dead calm, but I had felt a slight rocking of the boat. I slowly cracked the cabin door so I could look aft, and on the very back of the boat, in the dark, were two shining eyes looking at me.

The anchor light was on (above the bimini top) and I could see the reflection… there was definitely something watching me. And it was big. The eyes were at least 9 or 10 inches apart, and I could see it was slowly tipping its head left and right, trying to get a better look at me.

I finally got brave enough to shine my big flashlight on it… And it was two ducks who’d climbed aboard in the night. The were each looking at me, head turned, with one eye. And they were alternately raising and lowering their heads, giving the appearance of something tipping its large head to and fro. Apparently both of them hopping onto the swim step had caused enough motion for me to notice.

I got a good laugh out of it, went back to bed and let them spend the night back there. :slight_smile:

18

Reminds me of the big scare I got at nautical dusk while fishing off the jetties from the back of a Carolina skiff (a low to the water level boat). I was already skittish thinking there was a leviathan in the water because a short while before, I hooked onto something huge on the sea bottom that I thought was a boulder until it moved and snapped my 40-lb line with ease (probably a big ray). So, there I am bating my hook inches from the stern, when all of a sudden, from the corner of my eye, I saw a 12 foot sea monster trying to climb aboard the back of the boat with the intent of eating me. :eek:

I stumbled and nearly fell out of the boat…and into the gaping maw of the beast. And then I got a good look at my salt water nemesis. It wasn’t a sea monster at all, just a big-assed manatee that floated up silently to see what I was up to. Whew!

19

I won a fishing tournament with a bait fish. As a teen I just wanted to do some recreational fishing on the lake near Dillon / Frisco, Colorado. While buying some gear at a sporting goods store they told me about the biggest fish tournament, it was the last day and that often if no one caught a really large fish they wouldn’t even bother to turn one in. As the deadline approached I hadn’t caught anything at all so finally I asked / bought a 3" bait fish from another angler and hurried back to the store. Sure enough I was the only one to turn anything in so my fingerling won that week’s tournament. I got a $50 gift certificate (1977 dollars) and my picture holding the barely visible fry on the front page in the local paper.

My granddad, a very avid and excellent fisherman, kept that picture next to his chair in the living room and would tell the story to anyone that would listen, sometimes twice.

20

2005 - so we had cell phones, but they were flip phones, no internet, nor were people as connected to them as they are today. Company I worked for was sold & was in the process of shutting down. We didn’t have much work, but we had to be available to answer issues when they came up. Many a long walk at lunch or reading a book/magazine occurred to get thru the day.

Normally if you called someone & they weren’t there to pick up, it would ring 4 times then go to voicemail. One cow-orker learned that we could forward our phones to another, outside phone #. He also belonged to a fishing group that owned some land with a creek or two on it. If you called him & it rang four times, then paused before ringing again, you knew he had a rod in his hand. He took me with him once or twice; best day of ‘work’ ever!