Originally Posted by
fishingtim
Craig,
I think the Fishing Information Nights have been good, informative, and enjoyed them but there lacking something to make them great. I’m not sure what that is but the problem with giving out fishing information is that everyone is looking for something different and have varied skills in fishing. Some people would be interested in the basics of the general pattern of fish throughout the year and how to type a palamer knot, others are fishing techniques, and still others would like to know where exactly do I catch fish on a particular lake, not just there are a good number of fish in the lake. One thing I would like to see in these FINs or newsletters is more of the history and projects going on at specifics lakes. For example the biologist write up on the history and renovations at Lyons SFL, and also the responses you’ve given to me on the history of the whites and wipers at El Dorado the last several years have been very good.
About fishing reports, I like reading them to see if there is anything interesting and see what’s going on in general but I don’t rely on them to totally make up my decision whether or not or where I’m going to go fishing. It’s impossible for you guys to get a good feel of the fishing success in lakes week in \ week out and relay that in the fishing reports, especially the small SFL and county lakes. I don’t know if you rely on hearing from tight lipped anglers or gathering information from the boatramp, I’ve been stopped by gamewardens very few times to ask about my fishing success. I guess if anything to add to the reports it would be general location and depth. Public fishing reports can be tricky to give out, on one hand you want to give people enough information when fish are biting to get people out to use the resources we have but not overwhelm a particular spot or lake with pressure. Plus a lot of times by the time the fishing reports gets out the hot streak is over, best solutions is to get out there and try it, there is only one sure way to see if the fish are biting today.
I really like the fishing forecast KDWP puts together and appreciate the hard work you guys do on this. Like it states on the forecast main page is that a lake with a high ranking doesn’t equal great success. From my perspective you can still have a very successful day of fishing if the lake is not in the top 10 lakes for that species, and there are a lot of ‘sleeper’ lakes out there and like you said there a lot of variables that can damper sampling. Looking around the internet for other states for a similar forecast, I can’t find anything that comes close to this type of information you guys give out on Kansas lakes.
I also really enjoy the video’s on the KDWP website especially the ones that highlight a particular lake. I would like to see videos on fishing at different lakes around the state, Kansas really has quite a diverse population of lakes, no two of them are alike. I’m always up for venturing out and exploring a new lake, and some of the videos have spurred me to go to a new lake farther away.
Appreciate the hard work.
Tim.