The fall for me was stellar, the spring had me in a funk that had me bemoaning the notion of even going fishing.
At 54 years of age I need serious motivation to keep me going, I found it at three locations and for 13 nights in a row in September until the first week of October I fished dusk to dawn on a rabid hunt for bass. The old adage of time on the water ( or standing in it) still holds true, you cannot catch them if you are not there.
You have to force yourself to go sometimes, to be where you know they should be and believe that they will show no matter how many hitless casts you make. You have to think differently than the others fishing around you. This fall the small baits took the biggest fish, night after night on the smallest Stetzko needles outfitted with oversized hooks, the smallest Super Strikes with a flag on the ass end in heavy current just swinging past the ambush spot.
Knowing intimatly the spots you fish at each stage of the tide. Where your needle should land and where it will sweep to with the tide. I spent countless hours under the midday sun studying these spots for each subtlety that might give me an edge.
Bait. Knowing where and what type of bait was present and if none was, niether was I.
Last night Sauerkraut and I stood in 40 knot winds and pouring rain with a touch of lightning on a beach and the school bass were just nudging our plugs. No one else was around and we commented to each other we must be insane but insanity has it's rewards and though the fish I really wanted to land won the contest the quarter sized scale on the tail hook of the needle confirmed my suspicions.
Luck is part of it but sometimes with some work you can make your own.
It was a great fall.
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