My fishing journey :)

Background, growing up I’d go fishing with a bobber and worm. Had fun, sometimes thought it was boring. But I immediately stopped fishing when I started having traumatic experiences either grabbing bluegills or hooking them through the eye.

Fast forward many years later, I’m 24 now and last year I moved near a big fishing lake in Kentucky. I started being obsessed with firststatefishing videos on YouTube, so I decided, hell I’m going to go to Walmart and buy a rod and some lures. I decided to buy a $60 abu Garcia “never give up” spinner rod and some rooster tails and head out to the lake.

Lots of trial and error learning those rooster tails regarding the various sizes they come in and colors (white was my go to). I started catching multiple bluegill and crappie and realized I needed to get some pliers (damn you treble hooks). Every now and then I had some traumatic hook sets, even all three hooks deep in the lips, but I learned and I wasn’t afraid anymore to man handle fish and those hooks. I’d go fishing for hours and catch nothing, then I’d go for 2 hours early in the morning or before sunset and I’d catch at least 6 bluegill. Very much relying on luck.

One day, around noon, I went out not expecting to catch anything. Launched a rooster tail out and when I reeled in I hooked a larger fish, and when I saw it come to the surface I realized it was my first largemouth bass! By no means was this a big one, but definitely my PB. I was shaking so bad I couldn’t stand still. Lipped grip it with my thumb and removed the hook. Ever since then I’ve been a rooster tail king, it’s all I ever used and my friends made fun of me for it haha. I knew I had to let the rooster tails go when I started snagging them very often on rocks and weeds. It got so bad to the point where I snagged my rooster tail on a previous rooster tail I lost a week ago and somehow pulled it up out of the water.

Fast forward this month, I was walking in the aisle in Walmart and grabbed an assortment of different lures, mostly crankbaits and ratLtraps. I spotted this small ozarktrail jerkbait (pictured above) and threw that in my cart. When I went to the lake next I tried those crankbaits and ratLtraps but I was having no luck and my patience was wearing thin. After changing lures every 5 casts, I decided to throw the jerkbait on, square bill shallow/blue-white. Once I had my first bite on it, I realized, ok this might actually do something. I suddenly caught 3 crappie within 15-20mins, faster rate than I ever had with rooster tails. After a day or two of using this jerkbait I learned to be a little fast with my jerks. I caught more fish on it the faster I was with it (like a heart beat, two jerks per second). This gave me much more catches than one jerk every couple seconds.

One early morning I went out to the lake and I caught 6 crappie within an hour, then I had to go to work. I realized I had the potential to reach my personal record for most fish caught in a day (8), so I decided to go back out that evening. And sure enough, I was pulling them up like it was nothing. More crappie, and some smaller bass totaling to 13 in a day! I was on cloud 9.

However, I was having some serious issues with those treble hooks and handling the fish. Even though I was confident to unhook them with pliers and try to avoid their spikes, I still got poked pretty good a couple times when the hooks were in weird. Sometimes the fish wouldn’t even be hooked in the mouth, but in the back/side or even worse… the gills. I realized I was slowly starting to not enjoy hooking the fish all throughout its body and the trouble I was having removing them so I went ahead and flattens every barb. Sure enough, the fish I was now catching had an easier time escaping, but I was still catching many fish. Today I caught my biggest bass (pb for the jerkbait) and realized it was a good decision to flatten those barbs. Call me a sissy, but I have a fish handling claw coming in the mail tomorrow, I figure overall it will be safer for both me and the fish. When it warms up more this summer I’m looking forward to exploring top water baits/frogs, any recommendations will be appreciated!