Ohhhhh yeahhhhhhh.....personal best today

[6poundtest]

Finally got back on the water today; turned out to be a great day, too. Landed quite a few fish today, including my personal best crappie to date, a 15" beauty. Just barely 15 but hey, it touches the line! Its the fish at the 4 o'clock position in front of the perch in the bottom picture.


If you look close at the fish just above the big one you can see an indent right at the top of him on the dorsal fin. Looks like you closed him in a vise; no puncture marks but significant indentations on both sides of him, like he'd been crushed. When I filleted him, I found blood shot flesh in those areas that I cut away. Wonder what got him like that? He was not a small fish by any means.




Spent the majority of the time at....you guessed it.... THE dock. Everything came from within a 75' radius of it. This is really some honey hole. This lake has 5 species in it: crappie, LM bass, yellow perch, pickerel, bluegill and other assorted sunnies. I caught the cycle today; got one of everything. The only perch in the picture is a real jumbo for around here; just under 13". The 'gills shown are average, I've caught many quite a bit larger than the ones from today but these are still keepers for me. Best lure today was a minnow tube, rotating between 3 different color patterns. The grey with sparkles and a rose colored belly caught the most. Quite windy, mostly cloudy and cool, no sun to speak of. I was on the water for about 3 1/2 hours of total solitude; there wasn't another boat there.

I did spend some time at the swimming float at the other end of the lake. Its the first time that I've been there that there wasn't a bunch of folks using it. Not a single strike there on anything and I tossed a bunch of stuff there, including some of the new jigs I've gotten from other board members.

Had a fun encounter with a fella with 2 kids in his canoe. I had worked my way over to a weedline after working the swim float and noticed them approaching as I started casting. Landed a bluegill on the first cast and tossed him in the cooler. Just a moment later they were close enough to chat with; he was visiting from England and the kids lived in NY but had the most charming English accents. Kids with true English accents make me smile! Anyway, she was maybe 9-10, her brother mayber 6-7. They very politely asked if I'd caught anything (they must have seen me land that 'gill) and could they see my fish. Of course I said yes. She had never held a fish before and when I asked her if she wanted to hold it, her eyes opened wide and her smile took up her whole face. Her brother wanted no part of it in any way, shape or form. I explained about the sharp spines on the fins and showed her how to grip the lower jaw with her thumb and forefinger and assured her that there were no teeth to bite her, just a rough texture that wouldn't hurt her at all. She was so excited to do this simple thing. Then she dipped him in the water, then asked me to hold him so she could see how he was supposed to swim. I took him back, explained about how it all worked.....and then the darn thing flopped out of my hand, bounced on the gunwale and plunked in the water and took off under their canoe in a flash. I thought they'd be disappointed to have lost the fish but the kids were both smiling and thought the whole show was funny. They then wished me luck, thanked me for showing them and they all paddled off. Hopefully they'll remember that encounter for a long time; I know I will.

[mduncan62]

Congrats. You have a lot of good eaters there.

[Luvfatslabs]

Comgrats on your personal best

[ifish4redd]

wtg,nice mess of fish

[NIMROD]

Thanks for posting good photos

[CrappiePappy]

Great report/story, 6lbtest ... and congrats on your catch, Personal Best, and good public relations job with the Brits !!

... cp

[Crestliner08]

Great job out there!

[wannabe fisherman]

nice catch!! the indent could be from a heron and that fish was lucky to get away from it. I've got a goldfish in my garden pond that has a mark like that, I scared a bird from my pond and found it laying in the grass near the pond, threw it back in and he's still swimming around.

[shipahoy41]

Good job. Congratulations on your personal best.

["G"]

Great report