The Day after

The Day after

(or "what the heck just happened")

When I was in college, we were taught that when writing a paper you should always start with a thesis statement and build the paper around that statement. For this blog, I guess my "Thesis statement" would be:

Knowledge and equipment go hand in hand.

With all the knowledge in the world if you don't have the proper equipment your knowledge is not going to get you very far.

With the right equipment and no knowledge you also aren't going to get very far.

Now if you read my first blog you are probably already laughing because you know what's about to come but hang with me and you might get a chuckle.
Armed with our new found knowledge <see my first blog> my son, my dad and I set out, the following weekend, to see how much we understood, without our buddy Jeff to guide us.
First off our motor is a beautiful 40 HP Force with a 6 gallon tank (remember that part; 6 gallons). Jeff's motor was a 200 HP (I believe) so it took us a little longer to get to our spots to say the least. But we found them and felt very pleased with ourselves.
The first stop we made was to acquire the shad we need for catfishing. Jeff made this look so easy and although we knew we needed some practice throwing the bait net, we didn't realize that the rope for the net was not quite long enough and truthfully the net wasn't quite as big as Jeff's either. My son threw like a champ sometimes the net flew open like a parachute catching the wind and other times it fell to the water as though it believe itself to be our anchor, in a sad flat kinda mess that frustrated my son for all he was worth. After many very disappointing tries (disappointing to him, not me, I was actually impressed he didn't end up in the water hahaha) he was able to pull up a few tiny shad that would eventually, at the very least, be a great cause of joy and relief to he and my father. Now before you laugh too hard I ask you, have you ever tried to throw a cast net to catch shad from a 16ft aluminum bass boat in wind blown, choppy water, while trying to run a trolling motor and all while your dad and grandfather watched you? ok then :)
With a few tiny shad (and one big enough to chop about 4 pieces off of) we headed to our new found crappie spot.
Now I was pretty sure the Crappie were closer to the bank than we had been fishing the weekend before but we had come out to use our new found knowledge so we stayed out in about 18ft. of water.
Now, we do not have the spider rigging setup to actually say we were spider rigging but we did put out a few lines hanging from the side of the boat at the depth our Fish Finder was showing fish. We decided to tie off on a stump and try our luck in one spot. I found out later why many of you are already laughing about that idea but apparently when you are spider rigging you want to be moving, VERY slowly trolling but moving nonetheless. I also did not have the hooks rigged in the same manner that Jeff had showed us (a point my son continuously made clear... at one point he got so frustrated with my setup the he actually said "we paid Jeff X amount to teach us how to fish and you guys didn't hear anything but the bait" and shook his head. he was right though and I learned a few more things after this trip as well.
Next time I will rig up as follows:
A 1 1/2 oz. weight at the end of my line.

A Crappie hook about 1ft. up the line from the weight with a minnow.
A second hook another foot up the line with a minnow.
With this setup you want to move only fast enough to say you are moving but not fast enough for your line to drag at all. The line needs to stay directly vertical at all times.
After about an hour of nothing much but a single small crappie just large enough to keep (but we didn't) we decided to move on to catfishing.
While heading to our catfish spot, which happened to be just between our crappie spot and the marina, we noticed the engine missing quite a bit. Due to my past issues with motors my adrenaline of course began to rise and I started to worry. With thoughts of "man we can't afford to have this motor in the shop" and "I really don't want to get stuck 5 miles out from the marina, no one's gonna want to tow us in", I asked my son to check the gas tank when we made it to the catfish hole. I did relax quite a bit upon his announcement that we were simply getting ready to run out of gas. That may sound strange but no gas can be fixed with about $12, a far cry from needing the carb. rebuilt.
We fished for about another hour at our catfish hole and I am proud to say that my son and dad did catch 2 fairly nice blue cats. We threw them back as we did not feel like cleaning only 2 fish, especially when we already had 20lbs of fish in our freezer.
We decided to head back in as it was getting late, the motor sputtered from lack of fuel. I had my wife praying from home and all 3 of us, you bet, were praying. At one point it stop altogether. My mind began to wonder to whether or not any of my Facebook friends might be out fishing if I needed someone to bring us a gallon or 2 of gas :). My son crawled back and tilted the gas tank to the side to feed what little gas was left to the hose and we made it back to the marina.
When we were out of the water I opened the tank to find there was absolutely nothing left in there, if you were dying of thirst you couldn't have even rinsed out your mouth (not a good idea anyway).
We/I learned that if you are going to pay to be taught something then it is probably a wise idea to:
A. Have the right equipment.
B. Do the thing you were taught, the way you were taught.
C. Drop your boat closer to your hole or have extra gas somewhere close.

Thank you for reading I hope you enjoyed our folly's, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week.

Bass Family Fishing Report

Bass Family Fishing Report

This blog is to document mine and my family's fishing adventures, rants and raves.

I have thought of doing this for a while but after the EPIC weekend my dad, son and I just experienced I decided it was time. This is an outlet to share our experiences while on the water or docks, fishing and just basically having fun. It may turn into more adventures not centered around fishing, or even water, but we will see what happens.

I hope this is entertaining and useful, at the very least I hope it keeps your attention. Please feel free to share your thoughts and comments.

Ok so this winter we scheduled a guided fishing trip with one of Truman Lake's premier Crappie and Catfish guides Jeff Faulkenberry of "Faulkenberry's endless season guide service".

Back story:

I have been fishing for as long as I can remember. With my father in the Navy we had the opportunity to fish all over the United States.

I basically quit fishing around the time I turned 16 and did not even pick up a rod until about my early 30's (when Kmart when out of business....the first time :) ).

I had decided that I would go all out and pick up a bunch of fishing gear and give that summer one chance to prove to me that is was worth my time again.

In May of 2003 my brother and I decided we were going to use some of this gear I purchased but not just anywhere we wanted to go somewhere that we KNEW we could catch fish. So we stopped at a local bait shop to get worms (Forty woods bait shop) and asks the guys working in there where we could go that would virtually guarantee we would catch fish. After much discussion is was decided that Truman Lake was the place we needed to go. Now Truman Lake is about an hour and a half from Kansas City but we had all weekend, so off we went. We had his oldest daughter and my oldest son with us and we had been driving for about a hour when we he turned to me and said "hey man it's getting late, let's head home and try to find this place tomorrow". I responded with something like "let's give it another 15 minutes, we knew this was a long drive, but if nothing in 15 minutes then we turn around sound cool?" he agree and almost 15 minutes later exactly (9:45pm) we pulled up to the boat ramp at the Truman State Park. We parked right on the boat ramp so the kids could sleep and we could fish unhindered by the babies (don't judge me :)). With nothing but 2 $20 fishing poles, some hooks and worms we caught 6 fish in 45 minutes. It was amazing. Needless to say we were HOOKED. <see what I did there... hooked?.... oh I kill me>.

We started fishing every time we had the chance. Checking every spot in KC down to Truman Lake. I would call my father, who, at the time lived in Dallas TX. and tell him about the great fishing and expressing how much I wish we had a boat.

On Christmas Eve 2004 my dad pulled up in front of my house with this mess of a boat (no offense but it needed a lot of work) but it was my new 16ft. aluminum bass boat and I was in love with it. The boat had belonged to one of my uncles who had given it to another of my uncles, who then gave it to my dad and now he was passing it to me. He said "Merry Christmas son, it only comes with one rule... you can never sell this boat, it's been in the family since it rolled off the assembly line and it must stay in the family" obviously I agreed and thus began my love affair with boat fishing. The following summer I tinkered with that darn thing every time I had a chance. A new wire here, a new live well there and so on. Last year (2015) we had to replace the motor and I cannot tell you how nice it is to have a motor that starts with the flick on the ignition (vs. having to crank it for 10 minutes and praying the whole time it will start :) ).

Our trip:

So with a new boat motor and the taste of fried fish on our minds, we headed to the 2016 progressive boat show in KC where we knew we would meet up with Jeff Faulkenberry.

I am a member of several local (and not so local) fishing groups on F.B. and I knew about Jeff's reputation. When we finally met him it was like meet a celebrity, for me. I had watched all of his videos and read every post he had posted trying to gleam ever bit of info I could to become a crappie tournament worthy competitor. But when we started to talk he was just an average guy like all the rest of us, he just happened to be doing for a living what we all were doing for fun. My son put it best when he said "man Jeff is just a really chill guy" and I couldn't agree more. What he meant is that Jeff does not get frustrated and tell you put his stuff down and let him handle his own gear, we were just out fishing with one of our friend (who just happened to have WAY more knowledge and experience than we did). So we scheduled the trip for April 10th and went our way.

We showed up at the State park to camp on Friday the 8th, the weather reports had all been, at least fairly good up to now and we were excited. Then... ohhhhh then..... no sooner did we get our tent up than we received a freeze advisor for that very night. Luckily my dad had the presence of mind to bring a couple of space heaters so we thought we would be fine. At 10pm we weren't all that certain anymore.

My air mattress was MUCH larger than I had thought it was and took up more than half the tent which left just enough room for my dad's cot and no room for sleeping arrangement for my son. Now I have purposely left my son's name out of this because I fear he may be embarrassed if his friends read this, but at around 11 to 1 am my son came into the tent and took me up on my offer to sleep on my air mattress next to me. I woke up ever 2 hours FREEZING and in pain from the way I had to sleep because there was very little room for the 2 of us. Finally I just snuggled up to my sons back and tried to sleep and stay warm the best I could. This would be a trip I will never forget as my son is almost 18 and is a little old to cuddle with this daddy anymore ... but I will miss that....

The rest of the weekend was fairly nice, how could it not be when we had slept in sub freezing temperatures the first night. The wind on Saturday was pretty bad and we played around fishing for a few hours with dad catching one decent catfish and me catching a .... something that was to small to keep. So Sunday morning came and we headed to Bucksaw marina to meet up with Jeff.

The first few hours were difficult and the crappie just would not bite. We were on top of schools of fish and they just wouldn't bite. We could tell that Jeff was getting a bit frustrated but as a true pro he never lost it and explained that the cold front from Friday night and the winds had really affected the crappie. So at approximately 11 to 11:30 we began Catfishing. Holy CRAP the fishing was amazing no less than 15 minutes went by without a new fish in the live well. In just under 4 hours we landed 17 catfish. now to some of you that might seem like much but to us this was an amazing situation. I have NEVER caught so many fish in such a short time. None of them were the behemoths we have seen randomly post on FB but everyone of them were "eaters". I learned a few things I want to share as I close out this story:

1. There are fish down there. There are time when it seems like there is nothing below the boat because you aren't catching anything but they are there, just be patient and if nothing else switch to catfish (hahahaha)
2. BOAT stand for Break Out Another Thousand (hahahaha)
3. An extreme cold front will really affect the fish bite.
4. Shad are the best possible bait for Blue cats period.
5. Learn to READ your fish finder. The lake is FULL of fish and your F.F. will tell you if you are in the right spot.
6. Never leave fish that are biting to find fish; Never stay in a spot too long if you aren't getting the bites.
7. Enjoy your time with your family while you can.

I am hoping to take a few friends out with Jeff later this summer but until then keep tight lines and warms hands.