January 2012

Managed to get out fishing on Saturday. It wasn't as warm as the last time, but it was still pretty nice out. Nick and I got out about 12:30 and on his first cast Nick had a nice smallie. As I glanced over to watch Nick pull in his fish, I noticed my bobber quickly disappeared, unfortunately I hadn't been paying close attention, and missed it. We were both pretty stoked though and thought we were in for a good day. Unfortunately, that wasn't the case. We both struggled for a while so Nick moved further upstream. He managed to catch a few more ending with five for the day.

I hadn't gotten another bite and was getting pretty frustrated so, since no one was downstream from me, I just opened my bail and let my bait drift. About 75 yards down, my bobber plunged under the water so I flipped the bail and set the hook hard. It felt like I just set the hook into a stump. After pulling hard, I was finally able to get my line to start coming back upstream. As I was reeling hard against the current my mind started to race about what could be on the other end of my PowerPro braid. It felt heavy and was pulling hard and pictures of a monster smallie or big pike started running through my mind. I was ribcage deep in the water so I figured I'd better move in a bit shallower. I kept reeling and walking at the same time trying not to stumble on the rocks and fall on my ass in the water. I finally got to knee depth water and finished reeling in. My bobber was only 5 feet away but I still couldn't see the fish. I moved a little shallower, got a glimpse of the fish, and started laughing. The guy fishing next to me looks over and says "catfish huh." To which I replied, "yeah it is." He looks back over at me with a big smile on his face and said" thought it was a smallie didn't ya." Yeah, I did" I said and we both had a good laugh. It ended up being a 24" channel cat (about 6-8lbs). Honestly, I think it was the first catfish I've ever caught.

About an hour after that, Nick was out of bait and took off and many of the other fishermen left too. I moved upstream a little bit determined not to leave until I caught at least one smallie. Finally, almost an hour later, my feet and hands almost numb, I got a bite. The whole time I was reeling it in I was saying "please be a smallie, please be a smallie." I knew I had to get going and needed to get warmed up so as I reeled it up and finally saw the fish I was pretty happy. It wasn't a big one, but at least it was a smallie.

After I struggled to get the hook out, I knew I was done for the day. It was a grind of a day, but at least I was out fishing.