I had a lengthy text conversation with one of my fishing buddies recently. He’s the one who seems to average about 10 fish every time he goes fishing.
I, on the other hand, average around two.
So naturally, I listen very carefully when he starts talking about fishing.
He has told me about a couple of plastic worms that he uses. In fact, he has made some personal modifications to one of them. He’s even told me exactly what he has done and has given me a couple to try.
I’ve caught most of my fish on “his” worm.
That should probably tell you something.
I’ve been fishing since I was a little kid. My dad would take me to my granddad’s pond, where we fished for catfish. Our fishing technique was pretty advanced back then. We put some bait on a hook, attached a bobber to the line, and threw it in the water.
When the bobber went under, I pulled on the line.
And if everything went according to plan, I caught a catfish.
Pretty complicated stuff.
I didn’t start fishing for bass until I was an adult. The company I worked for had an annual fishing tournament on Good Friday, and I was fortunate enough to fish with several different people who had their own boats.
Eventually, I had the opportunity to buy my own boat. I purchased a 16-foot fish-and-ski with a 90-horsepower motor. I kept that boat for several years until the cost of maintaining it started becoming more than I wanted to spend. Eventually, I sold it.
During the years I owned that boat, I probably made 50 or 60 fishing trips.
And I didn’t catch many fish.
Looking back, I’m pretty sure I know why.
I mainly used crankbaits. I never really used plastic worms because I had no idea how to properly fish one.
I remember one of our Good Friday tournaments before I bought my boat. I was fishing with a coworker who actually lived on the lake where the tournament was being held. I watched what he was doing, used the same plastic worm he was using and proceeded to catch absolutely nothing.
He won the tournament.
Apparently, the worm wasn’t the problem.
The idiot holding the fishing rod was.
Fast-forward to 2018.
I drove about six hours to a friend’s house and purchased her kayak. She needed the money, and I needed a kayak. It seemed like a pretty good arrangement.
At first, I only fished occasionally, and I didn’t have much luck catching anything. I was still stuck on a couple of crankbaits simply because I had caught a few fish on them.
Then I was talking to my wife’s cousin’s husband, and he started telling me about some different things I could try. One of them was, you guessed it, a plastic worm.
He told me what he was using and how he was using it.
The next time I went fishing, I caught a fish on a plastic worm.
So, naturally, I did what any intelligent fisherman would do.
I kept using that same worm.
And I caught several more fish.
Unfortunately, toward the end of that fishing season, I broke my foot. For the next 18 months, I spent most of my time sitting in a recliner and wasn’t able to do any fishing.
But once I was able to get back on the water, things started changing.
Last year, it is safe to say that I caught more fish in that one year than I had caught in my entire life. I was getting out at least once a week when the weather permitted, and I started experimenting with different colors and types of plastic worms.
Apparently, the fish didn’t get the memo that I wasn’t supposed to be good at this.
I’ve started keeping a record of how many fish I catch and how much they weigh. I just wish I had started doing that last year.
As of today, I’ve caught 31 bass weighing a total of 38 pounds.
That’s an average of just over 1.2 pounds per fish.
Of course, my fishing buddy would probably look at those numbers and wonder if I’m fishing in a bathtub.
But I’m making progress.
The funny thing is that people, myself included, tend to put way too much emphasis on catching fish.
Don’t get me wrong. I love catching a fish. There is still something pretty exciting about feeling that tug on the line, setting the hook and watching a big bass come to the surface.
And yes, I would love to catch a five-pound bass.
I’d probably tell everybody about it.
I’d probably tell people who don’t even fish about it.
But catching fish isn’t really the reason I go.
The real reason is the solitude.
There is something about sitting in a kayak in the middle of a creek or river with nobody else around for what seems like miles. No traffic. No phone calls. No television. No lawnmowers. Just me, the water and whatever wildlife happens to show up.
Sometimes I catch fish.
Sometimes I don’t.
Sometimes I spend several hours throwing a worm into the same general area and wondering if the fish are laughing at me.
But I’m still out there.
And that’s what matters.
Last night, I spent several hours getting my fishing gear ready. I put new line on my reels and added a five-foot fluorocarbon leader to each one, just like my fishing buddy does.
Now we’ll see if all this new line and fancy leader material actually increases my chances of catching fish.
Of course, there’s still one variable I haven’t been able to replace.
The guy holding the fishing rod.
I guess we’ll see how he does.
