# Gotta Post the Bad too - TR 12/28



## southpaw (Feb 25, 2009)

Well I guess if I'm going to post the successful TRs, I also need to post the not so successful TRs too.

Headed out last week in search of some reds, thinking they may be feeding before that little front that blew through. Headed out into this pea soup.










What you can see in this picture is thick fog and what is probably pretty unsafe running conditions. What you can't see is my boat lit up in lights and all sorts of strobing LEDs of various colors to help me not get run over.

I pulled up to a secluded shallow little flat to wade a bit and wait for the fog to burn off. Gotta love wet wading in December










Starting to burn off a bit










Through the fog I saw a little flag wavin










Just a little turd

The fog eventually burned off so I headed back into the marsh. This is where I need to stop and apologize.

If you were fishing a particular marsh in WGB this day in a tan or yellow poling skiff (ripn' lips maybe?)* I am very sorry*. I sit really low to the water and I didn't see you were in that back lake until I turned around an island and saw you poling back in that cove. I didn't want to blow it out by turning around and staying on my motor so I shut down and started drifting with the intention of poling through an opening into another back lake to the North of us once I got done re-rigging. I looked your way once I started poling and it looked like you were working away from me so I started towards said opening. I was focused on the water around me and by the time I realized you were heading my way it was a little late. So I am sincerely sorry for both encroaching on you and then cutting off your track. I had my head up my arse and should've paid more attention to where you were headed.

Back to the report. Everything went down hill from there, perhaps instant karma for my inconsiderate boating etiquette. The water had great color to it, the wind wasn't too bad and I had lots of shots at a bunch of nice fat upper slot fish, but I couldn't put securing my push pole, picking up my rod and making an accurate cast together. The first two fish I flubbed the cast horribly. The casts were just ugly so I took a second to cast and try to diagnose what I was doing wrong. Turns out when I was at the end of my back cast I was rolling my wrist outwards. I hurt my shoulder a few weeks ago being an idiot and I guess the little loss of range of motion was making me twist my wrist to comfortably cast. I was probably doing it when I casted at that first fish, but it was such a short cast that I didn't notice. A few small tweaks and I was back in business. However, I still sucked. One of those days I guess. I was having issues with everything I was doing. I wish I could come up with a good excuse but it was all me sucking. Idk if it was bc I hadn't been out in awhile or bc I had just been penned up during the Christmas holidays with my in-laws or what, but I was all jacked up and excited and kept making dumb mistakes I don't usually make. This led to frustration which led to more mistakes. I even fell off of my boat, and I never fall off my boat, but for some reason I decided standing on the far back corner of my 13' x 40" microskiff was a good idea. Then to cap it all off, I ran out of gas about 300 yards from the boat ramp. Luckily at this point the wind was at my back and I was able to pole/ drift back to the ramp.

Overall, it was a not so great day on the water, but I learned a lot from what all that I was doing wrong and have a renewed inspiration to start practicing casting at home again. I guess some days I just suck, but it could've been worse right?


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## Meadowlark (Jul 19, 2008)

There are no bad days on the water...some just more difficult than others. I always learn more from the more difficult days than the easy ones.


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## southpaw (Feb 25, 2009)

Funny thing is, it's not that conditions were difficult, it was me making things difficult on myself. There's was some cloud cover here and there, but for the most part it was sunny. The water clarity was the best I've seen in that marsh and the wind was barely blowing for the first few hours. That may be the first trip I had all year where the wind was blowing less than 15 mph. Conditions were really kinda perfect for fly fishing and maybe that's what got me all worked up and excited. At any rate though, Meadowlark, you're correct. I've been psychoanalyzing every detail of that trip since I got back and have been dissecting everything I did wrong and how I can fix it for next trip. Always something to be learned.


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## Ripin' Lips (Jul 3, 2012)

I wish I could have been back in the marsh but I haven't picked up a long rod since black Friday! We all have those days. Thanksgiving afternoon my BIL and I headed out. He caught a fish in the first 5 minutes and then I spent the next 2.5 hrs flubbing every cast and spooking every fish I saw. If 2cool has taught me anything, you should have cleared leather and fired a warning shot across his bow to let them know that is YOUR WATER! haha just kidding. Its only going to get worse. It seems like the shallow water sight fishers are multiplying like rabbits these days. With a limited amount of water its bound to happen sooner than later and with more frequency.


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## karstopo (Jun 29, 2009)

Not easy is it stalking reds up shallow solo from a small craft. What could possibly go wrong in the time from paddling/pushing into position to being ready to fire the shot? Let's make it a little tougher by having some pile of loose line around and maybe a sharp hook. And do it all in double time because the clock is ticking. Then if this all somehow miraculously goes well you now have to fire a precision shot at a moving target with a manually operated lever. 

Piece of cake. 

I got all of the above done pretty well Tuesday afternoon, at least on a couple of good fish in about a foot of water, but still screwed things up. Got the eat, got that great run where line is going out in a hurry, got a turn or two, and then nothing. I tried to blame the barb being bent down but on second inspection, it looked pretty good to me. The truth is that I can't set the hook half the time worth a flip. 

If this stuff was easy all the time, I doubt I would be as much into it as I am.


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## Whipray (Mar 12, 2007)

If your "bad" days include actually catching fish, you're a lucky man. I've driven 7 hours round trip to fish one day, and not caught a thing more times than I care to admit.


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## southpaw (Feb 25, 2009)

Ripin' Lips said:


> If 2cool has taught me anything, you should have cleared leather and fired a warning shot across his bow to let them know that is YOUR WATER! haha just kidding. Its only going to get worse. It seems like the shallow water sight fishers are multiplying like rabbits these days. With a limited amount of water its bound to happen sooner than later and with more frequency.


Haha yeah if I had what seems like the average 2cooler mindset I would've posted about how I couldn't believe that someone had the audacity to fish my backlake. In all honestly I don't think our boats ever got closer that about 150-200 yards from each other and we were both poling but there was plenty of water out there with no one fishing it so I felt bad for even getting that close. I would've poled up to the guys and personally apologized to them but I didn't want to make the situation worse than it already was.

It is crazy about how many more people seem to be up in the shallows now. It's part of why I like to run the little microskiff I do bc it helps me get places most boats can't. I don't mind sharing the water with people though, especially people who are poling or on a trolling motor and not blowing out the place on their motor.



> Not easy is it stalking reds up shallow solo from a small craft. What could possibly go wrong in the time from paddling/pushing into position to being ready to fire the shot? Let's make it a little tougher by having some pile of loose line around and maybe a sharp hook. And do it all in double time because the clock is ticking. Then if this all somehow miraculously goes well you now have to fire a precision shot at a moving target with a manually operated lever.
> 
> Piece of cake.
> 
> ...


Sounds like you too know the struggle all too well. It's funny when you break it down like you did, how many moving parts there really are to it and even when you get everything right and you get the eat, so many things can still go wrong. I still have to work on a lot of things and that's absolutely why I keep going back.



> I've driven 7 hours round trip to fish one day, and not caught a thing more times than I care to admit.


Done this many times as well. I guess the frustrating thing about this time was how many chances I blew. The ball was in my court and I just screwed the pooch.


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## Ish (Oct 30, 2008)

thanks for the invite...sorry i couldn't make it.


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## southpaw (Feb 25, 2009)

Ish said:


> thanks for the invite...sorry i couldn't make it.


No problem, maybe next time...

Got the bruce anchor in and used it on that trip though. That thing is a beast. Thanks for the direction on that.


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## Ish (Oct 30, 2008)

southpaw said:


> No problem, maybe next time...
> 
> Got the bruce anchor in and used it on that trip though. That thing is a beast. Thanks for the direction on that.


and no foto of it?

FAIL!

you's welcome. you's gonna love it.

it's prolly my favorite piece of kit. i may actually like it more than any of my fly reels or fishing poles.


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