Originally published in 2010 Jan/Feb Outdoor Oklahoma Magazine. 

http://www.wildlifedepartment.com/outdooroklahoma.htm.

Keeping it Reel

- The best of the fishing season is not quite here yet, but that doesn’t mean your gear has to waste away in your garage

Due to the relatively mild winters here in Oklahoma (okay, and my fanatical fishing tendencies), my fishing season never really shuts down. Except for that couple of weeks when the pond ices over, I am always fishing. And even then, I have been known to go out and bounce a jig across the ice. But there are a few things I try to do before spring arrives and the fishing activity at my house kicks back into top gear. Some of it might even make sense.

Reel Maintenance

If you have kids, the most important reel in your collection is their closed face, push-button type spin-caster. Do not skimp on this reel. If you do not keep this well oiled and spooled with fresh line, your kids' frustration will quickly become your frustration and the fishing trip will come to a screeching halt.

You go to cast and "zhrrik!" Now there is a big wad of line that you have to untangle with the bait dangling at your feet, and through the barrage of "are you done yet," the fish are really jumping. A little plaque in my uncle's bathroom (of all places) reads, "Anger is one letter away from danger." Well, "angler" is also one letter away from "dangler."

Plus, this is the reel I always seem to end up using anyway when the kids get distracted and go to whacking each other with cattails.

Rod Tips

Avoid car doors. Broken rod halves can be stored for later use as cat toys, cat whackers, or for reaching stuff that has rolled under the fridge. For that matter, Elite BassMaster angler Mike Iaconelli even handed me a broken rod as a souvenir. I must have that look that says I have a jumble of broken rods in a five-gallon bucket in the corner of the garage.

Tackle

Every year or so, I buy a new little plastic tackle box (or just dump the contents of last year's box into the big "catch-all" tackle bag) to restock. On a rainy day when you cannot be fishing anyway, find a clear spot on your workbench. For me, this amounts to the top of the washer and dryer. I gather all of my tackle and carefully equip this little box with the absolute essentials.

Consider the species targeted and time of year. Choose hooks of various sizes, from tiny bait hooks for bluegill to large rubber worm hooks for bass. Remember an assortment of sinkers, replacement swivels and a few critical lures of several sizes and actions to cover the water column from top-to-bottom. With their wide wire gap, spinnerbaits won't fit in most lure slots, so I'll pick a couple, bury the hook tip safely in a rubber grub, and drop them into one of my cargo pockets, along with a fresh pack of my favorite rubber worms.

Then I repeat the process, creating boxes for more specific trips. One for my out-of-state treks, one for just taking the kids and their friends, another for walleye and so on. The remaining stuff in the bottom of the old tackle bag probably will never get used anyway. Eventually this becomes one unique clump. Maybe someday the modern art scene will appreciate my creativity.

Line

For reels with monofilament, I try to respool at least once a year. Through the year, I'll lose line to snags and retying, but I'm also constantly feeling the line for rough areas and, on each new trip, cutting off the bottom 10 feet or so. About every two years, the reels with other "super lines" are respooled, too, but the line is reused by placing the older, color-faded line on the interior of the spool. Now the never-used portion of line is ready for its turn. These “super lines” will have no memory of the tight inner spool coil.

Boat

I think it was Patrick McManus who once wrote: "The two happiest times of a man's life are when he gets his first boat and when he gets rid of it." The list for boat maintenance is staggering; just keeping the trailer lights working is a full time job. But I will share a couple of thoughts.

A universal motor flush tool that connects to a garden hose is handy. This lets me know that the outboard motor won't start in the yard, rather than at the ramp. If the boat is going to experience some down time (a-hem), I once read that you can keep the trailer tires from "pancaking" if you jack it up on cinder blocks to keep the weight off the tires. Oh, and an old tube sock with mothballs in a couple of locations does seem to keep the mice from snacking on life jackets.

Another boat ownership aspect that sometimes bites me is the registration. The yearly state registration expires on the bizarre date of June 30, unless you purchased it for a three-year period. Just long enough to ensure that you really forget to check it. So don’t fall into that category.

And while I'm at it, don't forget to check your fishing license. This critical component of a fishing trip has delayed more than a couple of trips, as friends have had to make emergency treks to license dealers. For convenience, fishing licenses can also be purchased online at wildlifedepartment.com, and if you buy a combination license, that will save you from having to pay for the legacy permit twice. Starting July 1, 2009, the cost of fishing and hunting licenses started including the cost of the Fishing and Hunting Legacy permit that was once required as a separate purchase. However, if you purchase an annual hunting license and fishing license separately, you’ll pay the legacy fee twice. A combination license will save money on both! A few years ago, my parents bought me the lifetime fishing license, and anglers also have the option of purchasing a five-year fishing license. Check it all out at wildlifedepartment.com.

Check the Bait Fridge

There have been some strange odors in the garage and…whew! Those nightcrawlers have been in there too long! Enough said.

Additionally, don't forget to hit the long-nosed pliers with a little WD-40. This tool must be kept working for a number of anglers’ tasks. Oh, and replace those polarized sunglasses that you sat on. Having that extra little bit of vision into that mysterious underwater world can make or break a fishing trip.

Finally, make sure that there are no pressing work projects and that your "honey do" list is significantly shortened. When you do get that window of opportunity to hit one of Oklahoma’s 1,120 square miles of lakes and ponds or 78,500 miles of rivers and streams, you want to be able to relax, focus, and just fish.

Bass Thumb, the Finer Points.

Each species of fish brings a unique experience and I do my best to recognize and appreciate it.  Pike ferocity. Steelhead powerful runs. Pumpkinseed color. White bass spunk.  Largemouth bass thumb.

“Bass Thumb” occurs when landing a bass by hand appropriately.  Bass thumb is not an accident, like say, “Bullhead Palm Puncture”, but is not intentional either. It should not be the goal; however, it is a great indicator of success.  It is the essential culmination of a complex chain of events known as bass fishing.    

First, just to be able to see a bass, a staggering amount of factors has to fall in place for me.  If I ever make the mistake of thinking about it too much, I’ll never make it out of the driveway.  Head swimming with a barrage of details, I just stand there with fishing pole and tackle box in hand, staring at the boat.  For example, just finding the time to get on the water is difficult.   The weather, water temperature, clarity, dissolved oxygen, and vegetation type and quantity can all affect fish behavior negatively.  Then there are mechanical aspects which can affect my behavior negatively.  The truck and boat motors must start and be maneuvered to likely locations.  The reel has to cast.  The line needs to shoot unimpeded through the rod guides. The cast should be accurate. Close enough to attract attention but not spook.  The retrieve: a perfect speed.  Sometime steady, others, sporadic.  Then, if the lure of the right size, color, smell, and movement is presented tantalizingly enough AND the fish happens to be in the right mood… and I set the hook… and the knot holds…

This is what I have been waiting for.  This is what has kept me up at night and why I’ve worked so hard. All the meticulous planning has just paid off.  My favorite stringed instrument is playing a tense but wonderful medley.  It is an epic fight; theoretically, one of us could die.  I am tethered to a wild animal from an underwater world.  We have battled… and I won.  I ease it up to the boat and…

Now what?  Fish don’t exactly have handles. 

We have landing tools mostly for our protection but, perhaps merely subconsciously, this distance creates a disjointed, unsatisfactory experience.  Like petting your dog with a snow shovel.

A net is the classical solution.  Lead the fish’s head into the bag and scoop it up. A net says, “I’ll fight up to a point, then I’ll spring this trap on you.”  For me, a net has always been something to forget.  Or when I do remember, it is more to trip over in the boat, has a bowling ball-sized hole in it, or I end up spending 25 minutes trying to remove embedded treble hooks afterward.  I might even have to remove some hooks from the net. 

Then there are various grabbers, some with built-in scales.  Perfect for dropping overboard.  A gaff is too medieval.   A sling (or cradle?) has great potential for releasing giant pike and muskies unharmed, but it requires a second fisherman…to put down his hole… while fishing on water… inhabited with giant pike and muskies.

Protective gloves at least get us close to direct contact.  But I don’t like to fish with gloves on.  This sets up a tense situation where I end up wrestling to put on a glove one-handed, tugging at the sides with my teeth, all the while, pirouetting and twirling to keep the line tight.  I don’t need that kind of stress.

This brings us back to the most satisfying landing tool: bare hand.  The question that remains is where to pick up a fish.  This greatly depends on the species.

The tail at least looks like a handle.  However, subduing the tail first means that the other end, which may have teeth or spines, is free to come back at you.  Trying to grab a fish in the middle, often in a rush, is a slippery slope.   You may find that there is very little to hang on to.  Or, the sharp dorsal or pectoral spines may find and hang on to you.  Gill coverings are often used but this is a great way to damage sensitive gills and some gill coverings have sharp edges.  As a fishing buddy once said, “Just because there is an opening, doesn’t mean that you should stick your thumb in it.” 

The mouth of a largemouth bass is one of those exceptions.

“Lip everything” used to be my philosophy, growing up with Oklahoma farm ponds.  Mostly I was lipping bass and bluegill.  Lipping a bluegill with its miniature mouth seemed like I should have my pinky out. I cleansed myself by occasionally having my thumb crunched by 5 pound channel catfish, which I thought prepared me for fishing the real world. Then I began to travel and experience new toothy species.  I learned the hard way with pike, walleye, and bowfin that lipping these fish, even with my protective glove (at the time, duct tape wrapped around the thumb of an Isotoner), was not without its hazards.  It was like extreme, full contact fishing.  I used to believe that a successful fishing trip occurred when I returned bleeding.  Grin and bare it.  Then bandage it.

Many years later, I have reached a point where I do not have to have an open wound after a fishing trip.  However, a slight disfigurement sure would be nice.  I have come to appreciate some of the finer things, like those tiny pointy teeth on a bass lower lip.

I know what I am supposed to do:  leave the bass in the water while removing the hook.   However, it is vastly more satisfying when, just for a minute, you reach down and pick that big ol’ bass out of the water.    If the mouth is closed, the bass will maintain its sleek and aerodynamic appearance, but pry the jaw apart just slightly, insert thumb and lift.  The lower lip serves as an unlikely lever of sorts and amazingly, with some sort of origami-like unfolding, the mouth expands as large as a paper grocery bag.

Immediately, there is a slight pricking of pain in the thumb. This lets you know, if you did not already, that you have arrived. Fortunately, the majority of the weight of the bass rests on a knuckle or two of your first two fingers tucked safely under the jaw. Plus, a bass lip is a relatively wide ledge for even weight distribution along the surface of the thumb. 

Dripping wet, glistening in the setting sun.  Glorious greens and blacks.   Feel its heft.  Nothing else is lifted for the sheer pleasure that it feels heavy.  While momentarily distracted by girth calculations, the thumb is a palette being sculpted, chiseled in a few uneasy seconds by hundreds of perforating little teeth. 

The result is not unlike your thumb having a close encounter with an extremely fine cheese grater.  You are left with a bristle of hundreds of partially detached skin pieces.  For the next few days, each time you use that opposable appendage, each tiny flap of skin creates a tingly reminder of time much better spent.  Simple, routine activities such as brushing teeth, picking up a cup of coffee, or signing your name, may trigger the sweet pang of your bass thumb. 

A warped pleasure for sure, for the most part, this transitory scar usually goes unnoticed.  Most just do not go around examining other’s thumbs.  However, if during the course of a successful fishing trip, like my recent Texas private lake experience my thumb becomes a shredded pulpy mess, for the next couple of days I become “The Fonz”.  “Ayyy”, I say with the classic “thumbs up” gesture to no one in particular.  My masochistic souvenir keeps me grinning while I am back in the office.  Suddenly an abrasive character, I put my thumb out there for the world to see, so much so that it looks like I have taken up hitchhiking.  Or I am constantly reviewing movies favorably.  This is when I want to be fingerprinted.  This is the thumb I want to be remembered by.  “This looks like the work of ‘Bass Thumb McDoogle’”, the inspector might say. 

I get no greater satisfaction from an injury from any other outdoor activity.  There is nothing pleasant about ringing ears from skeet shooting, hiking blisters, swimming sunburn, biking scraped elbows, or rolled ankles in basketball.  Bass Thumb is different.  It allows a type of “closure” in a brief turbulent relationship.  Closure without puncture.   This is one of the reasons bass fishing is so popular. 

A day of fishing will be over all too quickly.   If I catch a bass, that “Man vs. Nature” battle, may only last a couple of minutes.  When it is over, I will slip the bass back in the water and watch the ripples subside… leaving me, hopefully, with one lasting impression.

©2006 Andy Whitcomb

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Going Green

 At the risk of sounding like I am jumping on the latest eco-fad bandwagon, I am pro-green… sunfish.

Not that I am anti-bluegill, but the green sunfish, Lepomis cyanellus, is an over-looked, underappreciated sport fish.  Always cooperative, always hungry, this thick sunfish will smash lures bluegill shy away from.  It may not be the largest sunfish, but it does have one of the largest mouths.

One can even accomplish a version of “bass thumb” from an afternoon of lipping green sunfish with a thumb. Oddly, when I mention that I have a “green thumb” at dinner parties, someone suddenly switches topics and starts questioning me about soil amendments.  

The only finger one might insert in the mouth of an average bluegill is a pinky… and that’s just really weird.  According to my calculations, a bluegill would have to be 3 feet long and weigh around 27 pounds before you could lift one by thumb.   

When hooked, a bluegill uses its dish shape and turns 90 degrees to the line angle. With resistance maximized, it turns in tight, vibrating circles. It’s all he’s got.  The result is some vaudevillian hand trembling finale.

Green sunfish still won’t make your reel scream, but they are a hoot on a fly rod and you can feel a determined head-shake as they power this way and that.  No need to “match the hatch” like with finicky trout; green sunfish have more of a “match this!” attitude.  There have been numerous occasions when I’ve had to work to find something in the tackle box they would not hit.

And don’t forget the colors.  That fringe of yellow/orange on the fins contrasting with the dark olive body and the blue striped operculum… almost as exotic as a peacock bass.   I’ve always thought bluegill were misnamed and disappointingly pale in color, except during spawn.

Another quality of green sunfish that I admire is that they are survivors. 

“But that tiny pond on the top of the hill has never been stocked.” 

Uh-huh.  Now, step aside because I’m going to go catch a spunky pint-sized green sunfish.

During heavy rain events, they power upstream in the tiniest trickle through fields, up hills, eventually landing in some unconquered water hole.  Once there, they are capable of withstanding extreme conditions in turbidity, temperature, and dissolved oxygen to rival even the freakish bullhead. 

You don’t really set out to create green sunfish habitat; it will find you.  As ponds age, they become more and more shallow as erosion carries soil particles downstream.  In its golden years, a small pond may only be able to support green sunfish. Until your bank account can accommodate bulldozer rental, just enjoy this dwindling gem of a fishing hole.  Green sunfish are almost always biting.  And, even if your kids let the bobber run a little too long, there is ample space for hook removal.

But, you probably will never see a recommended stocking rate for green sunfish.  Largemouth bass are usually the goal in stocking programs and because green sunfish have such large mouths, they compete directly with young bass for prey items.  Bluegills, with their tiny, geez-I-hope-I-can-get-the-hook-out mouths, are limited to smaller prey items and thus are a good compliment to most stocking recipes.  And if you aren’t exactly sure of your sunfish identification skills, be advised that a little green sunfish can go a long ways. Like making a sandwich and thinking you are adding a dollop of mayo when it is actually horseradish.

Bluegill politely “kiss” insects off the pond surface on warm summer evenings; green sunfish give big uncomfortably sloppy strange Aunt smacks.  The green sunfish is an admirably feisty fish, with the fundamental feature of a mouth large enough to provide a good, slightly thumb-scarring handle. If there were no bass, we’d all be watching “Green Sunfish Masters” on Saturday mornings.