Thread: Nice thing about fishing - there's always something new to learn

The 78 y.o. gent I fished with yesterday and I caught 73 fish from 11:30 am - 3 pm under a bright sun. He and I fished before and it is always memorable. He knows I go out of my way to give him room to cast to areas I sense hold fish and sure enough he caught fish that revealed good areas in the pads. Granted, most were sunnies, yellow and white perch, a few bass and crappie caught in 4' or less, but the fights were strong on our light action rods!

The wind was less than 15 mph and boat position corrections kept me busy keeping exactly in spots that had high potential for both of us. Once fish were found - I ANCHORED. I must have anchored 40 times and my arm and shoulder ached from pulling that 15 lb anchor into the boat! The comparison with the other dude's handling of the boat is obvious and where anchoring was rare. My suggestions were ignored and he may just as well have been fishing by himself.

Fishing-as-team goes back decades when I fished bass club tournaments. Granted, we were in competition for year-end total weight, but all partners - boater and nonboater - worked to find patterns which included calling out depths seen on the sonar and the presence of fish. This way the partner who couldn't see the screen knew what to use and where to cast it (depth).

The other nice thing was that my partner yesterday was willing to try different suggestions that most of the time proved fish catchers.
example: he has a hard time tying a uni-knot so I attached a clip/swivel to his line. No problem catching fish even using 1/32 oz jigheads.

example: we both lost lures to pickerel so I gave him a thin wire leader attached to the clip - and again - no problem catching fish.

example: he had forgotten the small tackle box I given him that held my homemade lures that did so well the last time we fished. I always keep more than on board - enough to give to my partner when I'm catching fish and he isn't. Plus, that always helps me take note of all of the lure designs that do well and that I will always want to keep supplied on board. In fact, at timesI would swap rods with him after catching more fish and he would then catch as many if not more than me. Confidence in what you're casting is as important as what you're throwing.

The above is about fishing ettiquette, mutual cooperation towards the goal of catching fish AS ONE UNIT, experiementing so BOTH of us can learn and discover new things and be able to congratulate the other when nice size fish and good totals are caught.

Food for thought.