Fishing 8-7-08

Well I finally made it out fishing yesterday. The fish are starting to co-operate a little more now. The water is still high but the bigger fish are starting to bite again. The last time I was out I caught a fish that was spitting out minnows and when I got it in the boat it spit out 5 minnows in the boat. We caught quite a few fish yesterday but only kept 14 all together. We had 13 very nice Crappie and 1 Hybrid Strip Bass. These fish are just gourged with food. They look like footballs they are so fat. The fish we kept usually would weigh about 3/4-1 lb but these are about 1-1/4 to 1-1/2 lbs. They looked like they was ready for the spawn they was so fat and those were the males. Couldn't believe the size of them for the weight.
I caught a 12 inch Crappie and was bringing him to the boat and a huge Bass came up behind him and sucked him in his mouth. I opened the bail and was waiting for the Bass to turn so I could stick him and he got about 3 ft from the boat when he seen the boat and spit the Crappie out and turned and was gone. It had to be a 7-8 lb Bass.
One of the guys I had with me hadn't been fishing in over 20 years and just retired last year. He said that got him eager to fish just watching that. He isn't use to the spinning equpment and wasn't to sure about them. I worked with him thru out the day and he caught a few of the fish that we kept. I told him I would take him to the local pond in town and work with him getting him use to the equipment. I think I just added another fisherman that is hooked on fishing.
The water temp was 83 degrees and the fish were in 15 foot just off the bottom. We started with jigs but was only catching smaller fish so went to minnows and started catching the biogger Crappie. As I always say give them what they want and not what you want to give them. We caught a stripper and that was the highlight of the fish catching for the day.