Thread: Weekend Report- Really Light on Results- Novice Stuff

Oh...when we finished for the day we wanted to eat at the Eagle’s Nest Restaurant. It is right next to the ramp, but about a five mile drive. Crazy how far you have to go to circle back to it. Food was good and the pricing seemed fair. Anyways I saw this map on the wall.





It also had a legend.



But all the numbers were gone off the map. Still looked cool though.

Sounds like a fun time. You'll get on the fish good before long. Have fun on the water.

lesson #1, enjoy the time on the water. Lesson #2 , keep trying , the fish will come in due time. The BIG lesson !!! it's her boat too.

Enjoyed your tail. Thanks for sharing.

Good post. Seems you enjoyed anyway, even if the fish didn’t show up. Keep after it, you’ll be catching before long.

The new rods arrived a day early- Grizzly jigs was fast.


I noticed these are nothing like my heavy surf fishing rods. Very light very whippy and loooooooong. I added a reel to one and an earball sinker ( 2.1 ounce ) and the end bent right over. This means that I am going to have to drop down in sinker size- obviously.

Last night I added hardware to some of the egg sinkers I have, and now those will clip on and off for me, the same way as the ear balls do. Being able to switch sinkers by clipping on and off makes changing weights easy and fast. 1/2 - 3/4 and 1 ounce sinkers are now ready to test. I am thinking there will be an exact weight the rods will work best at.

I liked the way the earball sinkers trolled, and looking at the new sinkers they should match that. No tangles or wrap arounds. I added a small double swivel to the ends of the egg sinkers to allow for that.

From the rod there is a clip, the sinker attaches there, then the leaders clip onto the sinker’s extra swivel, jigs clip onto the other end of the leaders. Still learning with single jigs at this point. I like clips as they are fast to swap out and I can go from pushing out the front to pulling out the back in a few seconds. The jig follows the sinker’s path and the leaders are about 16 inches long.

It will be interesting to see what happens when I turn the speed up on these light weight rods and sinkers. I hope to start catching the fish that have been hitting and running on me. I also want to explore using sinkers for pulling jigs and crankbaits to limit the amount of line out.

I appreciate the words of encouragement- thank you very much.

Hey there Micanopy- Was wondering if your name was Mike and your wife's name was Opie?(Andy of Mayberry) j/k I know your town. Formal, personal welcome to FLA C.com. Been watching your transitioning to Fla. and your targeted new specie pursuits. It looks as if you have a certain degree of creativity(egg sinker conversion etc) The heavier weight scenario, especially in shallow Florida, is meant for vertical presentation- aka spider-rigging(pushing) typically done @.5 mph(+-) from boat bow. Florida l/l'g(pulling) is a more horizontal technique @1.0 mph(+-) from stern and sides of boat. While l/l'g Florida's waters, your lure depths are determined by line length, speed, size/numbers of jig/s, split shot/s and also whether you want to add a bobber into the equation because of weeds etc. It's nice to see, as new arrivals to our Sunshine state, that you folks have an open-eyed visitor's mindset(look at that/let's go over there/boy these mosquitos/gnats/no-see-ems are bad). Keep the faith, looks like your headin' in the right direction. With the assistance of C.com members, help is only a question away. Incidentally, pm(private-messaging) is a good way to sometimes get/give "secret info" from more "laid back" individuals! Hopefully, this and other reads will help shorten y'alls learning curve.

u2s

ps-Did you add barrel swivels to egg sinkers(via glue) or did you mean barrel sinkers?

Well actually......she has lived her whole life in Florida, and I have been here for 30 years. I was a surf fishing fool for the past twenty, and have helped thousands of people catch fish at the beach. Did seminars and such and entered contests. I was very innovative and actually made some discoveries and inventions. A man wants me to do some YouTube video seminars for his channel. I taught him plenty and now he is off teaching others. Not just what I showed him of course.

So I am here because of the drive. Just got tired of driving an hour and 45 to get to the beach, fish, then another hour and 45 back. Then there are the idiots that can’t pass by without gawking at my stuff and wanting to engage me when I am trying to fish. Surf fishing is one of the hardest forms of fishing there is, and I wanted to try something new. Wanted to explore new places and test myself with new challenges. Wanted to learn something completely different. Tossing lures into weeds trying to drag out bass wasn’t gonna do it, but crappie fishing.....well now there is a challenge.

I made these.




Ordered a mould to make bell sinkers with just a brass eye. 1/8 oz up to 2 oz. These will be useful to me and I can develop a system around them.

The new rods were wonderful today. They were perfect for the task at hand. With 1/2 oz sinker as shown, I clipped a leader about 16” long with a jig on the other end. I could see the fish strike the jig and there was time for me to set the hook. I was careful about swinging them into the boat afraid to snap a rod, but everything worked great. They were small to mediums so back they went. One was bleeding heavily and an osprey came behind the boat and snatched him away.

Made friends with some of the locals.





Then when the winds picked up I decided to pull jigs out the back of the boat. The new rods were excellent for that as well. I could see the fish strike. I also experimented with setting two lines out long, two shorter with light weights, and two close in with heavy weights. This allowed me to make tight turns and such with no tangles. Looked like a great way to fish.

The system I am imagining has a clip and rubber bead on the end of the main line. The bead prevents the clip from passing back through the end guide. Rod stores with line straight through guides. Attach bell sinker to clip. Attach leader to bell sinker and fish. For two jigs I am going to use a green wire leader, and instead of attaching the rod’s clip to the sinker, add that leader in between leaving the bottom jig as is. At the top of this leader, a four inch boom that will spin 360 with a swivel to handle the top jig. I am concerned with tangles when I land a fish in the boat and I suspect a mono leader would tend to wrap up and be tough to discern how to unwrap it after he flops about some. 4 lb test is tough to see unless it is close.

I felt the rods stepped my game up considerably. Just accepting what is discussed here and monkey see monkey do would probably be best for me, but I have to monkey around and re design the wheel. A wise monkey never monkeys with another monkey’s monkey. I think I got that right.

Anyways I am grateful for what Crappie.Com has done for me so far. Thanks.

I sent you a late night, last minute pm yesterday. If you were on Orange 2day, I was in the sister lake(lochloosa) thru the adjoining canal(see post). Looks as though you already possess the creativity skills to rapidly upgrade to a go-to crappie expert. You're layout is taking shape. Patience through the non-active doldrums eventually rewards successful reward!
Doug