etucker1959
09-29-2013, 03:09 PM
Kenny Rogers immortalized the expression in his hit song the gambler, "you got to know when to hold them and you got to know when to fold them." Fishing is the same way in many instances, sometimes you just know this is going to be a great trip. Other times you just know, you are just going to go out and catch some nice scenery, and meet up with some good friends and not catch many fish. Or at least you should know more often then not, if you do your homework. Well Saturday night was one of those nights for me, in a positive way. I've got a good friend of mine who claims everything I do successfully in life, is more based on luck then good planning and skill. Needless to say we argue all the time about that. Back to fishing!!!! If your going to fish for planted fish, be it stocked by the DFG or a pay lake. You better figure out how the game is played, or you will be crying in your beer and blaming others all the time for your short comings. This report is about SARL, but the same logic applies to all pay lakes. Every week I check who is planting what and how much. If I do find something interesting, I then have to ask myself this question "what do I know about that lake and can I catch those fish that are being planted." If the answer is positive, I start planning a trip. In watching SARL'S stocking video this week I noticed two things, first of all they planted twice as many fish this week then the week before. Also they stocked several 35 lbs catfish and are having a fishing derby Sat night. Couple that with the latest intelligence I have, I was there the week before and my friend Jared was there twice the week before that. In those 3 previous outings we discovered right where the fish like to hang out at. We also figured out what the best bait to use and the best technique to fish it with.
With every thing I just explained, is my success going to based on luck or skill. For those of you who think skill, please tell my friend Alan he's full of Crap. (He's the one who thinks all my success in life is based on luck)
On to the fishing.
I was able to get my buddy Bruce to go with me on this adventure. The plan was to rent a boat and join the fishing derby. When we got to the lake, Bruce was a little hesitant to join the fishing derby. Since it was $50 a team to join and Bruce has had so many bad outings for catfish at SARL I didn't push it. (Big mistake) He forgot who his captain was. lol We just for kicks, asked the tackle shop for any hot spots and got locations that conflicted with my Intell. We started off in same general area, where Jared had some really good success a couple of weeks ago. When I play captain I have my own style, I like to start off drifting and keeping a close eye on my fish graph. In drifting my number one bait is shrimp on a number 4 bait holder hook. We spent about an hour drifting and caught 2 fish and broke off a nice one. But more importantly, I noticed a very small area that every time we drifted thru it, I detected catfish on the bottom. I took note of a couple of land markings and depth calculations and knew exactly where I wanted to anchor up. I got to about where I thought I need to be and cut the motor, immediately the graph lite up with catfish and over went the anchors. We landed perfectly on them, we didn't have to move the boat all night. In fishing and talking to Jared we already knew the hot bait and setup. (Fly lined shrimp) Out went 4 shrimp poles and we immediately started getting bites. Hooking the fish was a different matter, since we weren't in the derby we both were experimenting with different things. I was using a large circle hook and Bruce was fishing with a baitrunner reel. Needless to say we only hooked half of all the bites we got. It didn't matter, we got easy limits so we got to stay till 10. The biggest catfish we caught was about 6 lbs but most were in the 2-3 lbs range. After awhile a lot of boats kept coming by and asking us did we catch anything? Most people seemed to be struggling, the boats that did anchor up near by did start to catch a few. But when the fish were really biting, we had the whole area to ourselves. As for the derby, I really don't know who won. But with a full stringer of fish, I know we would have got something pretty nice. Thanks for listening to my story.
With every thing I just explained, is my success going to based on luck or skill. For those of you who think skill, please tell my friend Alan he's full of Crap. (He's the one who thinks all my success in life is based on luck)
On to the fishing.
I was able to get my buddy Bruce to go with me on this adventure. The plan was to rent a boat and join the fishing derby. When we got to the lake, Bruce was a little hesitant to join the fishing derby. Since it was $50 a team to join and Bruce has had so many bad outings for catfish at SARL I didn't push it. (Big mistake) He forgot who his captain was. lol We just for kicks, asked the tackle shop for any hot spots and got locations that conflicted with my Intell. We started off in same general area, where Jared had some really good success a couple of weeks ago. When I play captain I have my own style, I like to start off drifting and keeping a close eye on my fish graph. In drifting my number one bait is shrimp on a number 4 bait holder hook. We spent about an hour drifting and caught 2 fish and broke off a nice one. But more importantly, I noticed a very small area that every time we drifted thru it, I detected catfish on the bottom. I took note of a couple of land markings and depth calculations and knew exactly where I wanted to anchor up. I got to about where I thought I need to be and cut the motor, immediately the graph lite up with catfish and over went the anchors. We landed perfectly on them, we didn't have to move the boat all night. In fishing and talking to Jared we already knew the hot bait and setup. (Fly lined shrimp) Out went 4 shrimp poles and we immediately started getting bites. Hooking the fish was a different matter, since we weren't in the derby we both were experimenting with different things. I was using a large circle hook and Bruce was fishing with a baitrunner reel. Needless to say we only hooked half of all the bites we got. It didn't matter, we got easy limits so we got to stay till 10. The biggest catfish we caught was about 6 lbs but most were in the 2-3 lbs range. After awhile a lot of boats kept coming by and asking us did we catch anything? Most people seemed to be struggling, the boats that did anchor up near by did start to catch a few. But when the fish were really biting, we had the whole area to ourselves. As for the derby, I really don't know who won. But with a full stringer of fish, I know we would have got something pretty nice. Thanks for listening to my story.