A New Yardstick Part II

Anyone can hit a body of water with light gear and size 8-4 flies and catch a ton of fish.  As A. D. Livingston states in his 1994 book Bass on the Fly:

‘To be sure, small lures will catch some bass of any sort, but I firmly believe that day in and day out you’ll catch more fish with size-2 and larger flies.”

I would love to be able to tell you how I, day in and day out, fish with my 5wt and catch 3lb to 5lb bass consistently.  I have, on occasion, caught some really good sized fish as described in the previous sentence.  But consistently?  Depends on your definition of  “consistently”, doesn’t it?

 Well here is my definition:

Consistency would be to frequently place in the top 50% of a tournament held on the body of water you just fished.

There is my definition and  your new yardstick.  Consider it a challenge from me to you.

How do you put it into practice? 

Tournament weight information is readily available thanks to the internet.  Even if your body of water doesn’t have clubs fishing it, you can use data from nearby similar lakes.  Find club websites for your area and they will inevitably have a “tournament results” page and you will find the competitors’ weights  for the bodies of water they fish.  Most clubs and trails will fish the same lakes, sometimes twice, each season.  So there is a high probability that you will be able to match time of year too.  The info will also show how many keepers caught and weighed in.

I know what you are asking me:  I am to weigh my catches? 

Damn straight.

 You can obviously estimate weights, but even seasoned bass fishermen either under or over guess their catches.  The scale doesn’t lie and one of your goals should be to accurately estimate your catch.  I use a Boga Grip but there are a lot of other options.  You should always measure the length your catch and any fish under the minimum legal length doesn’t get weighed because it doesn’t count.

Many people gauge others and themselves by their photos of large fish catches.  That’s not what I am talking about here.  What I am talking about is Lefty Kreh’s third stage in the progression of the fly fisherman:  to catch large fish consistently.

If you take up my challenge, you will find that the fire of your imagination will be stoked and you will experiment more.  You will grow as a fly fisherman and as a bass fisherman.

A New Yardstick Part I

Many warmwater fly fishermen are focused on fish per hour and don’t even realize it.

The actual measurement of fish per hour is used by those in resource management to evaluate a fishery.  Here in Florida, the best lakes have a 0.5 to 0.8 fish per hour catch rate (annual average).  By that yardstick, most of us are doing great, or so we think.  We tend to only remember our best days and we really don’t want to quantify our fishing days anyhow.

Just for comparison, let’s look at “professional” fisherman.  One of my favorite websites is Jim Porter's Guide to Bass Fishing.  Jim posted an article on fishing for bedding fish by professional bass fishermen and in that article he cited that “pro” anglers have a catch rate only slightly higher than the national average of the non-tournament angler at 0.19 bass per hour.  The data is old, but still useful in our discussion.

 

Why would “pro” bass fishermen have such a low, pathetic catch rate?

 We all know that TV fishing shows are heavily edited and spliced to give the impression of  great fishing days.  Even the 1 hour Bassmaster Elite fishing shows gives the impression of multiple catches by multiple anglers.  Then came Bass Live and we get to see the long the fishless droughts.  We even get to see the pro angler sight fishing a single large fish for hours.  Sometimes it works out, sometimes it results in only wasted time.

So the low catch rate among most bass anglers can be attributed, at least partially if not mostly, to targeting larger fish.  They aren’t using lures and techniques that bring many fish to hand and when they are, they will typically change techniques to stop catching smaller fish.   I know when I am catching a lot of one to two pound bass, I looking to change something.

Why do many warm water fly fishers  claim a successful day by catch rate?  I think it is because of two things:  1)  They consider themselves successful and are content ,  2) they don’t know there are larger fish to be caught ,or, 3) they don’t think they can catch the larger with a fly rod.  I do feel this leads ultimately to stagnation and disappointment.

Can the yardstick of  catch rate challenge us and keep our interest over many seasons?   I say “no”.  I am sure you know of someone who has left fly fishing and moved on to other hobbies.  And, at least for the ones that I know of, some of these folks were dedicated to the sport.

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