a fishing story - today at dover

[Wyndigo]

I decided to go fishing this afternoon, got to the park around 3pm, got everything setup, kicked back in my chair and waited a few minutes, had my largest (for freshwater) rig set out and aimed kinda northeast, I noticed the line twitching a few times, so I picked it up and waited, felt a bump and set the hook, felt like a nice one on, reeled it in and noticed there wasnt much of a fight, got close enough to see and it was... a freaking plastic cup full of mud
:mad: :rolleyes: lol at first I just grumbled and cursed under my breath then I had to laugh.
Now to the good news, I caught a total of 9 today, 8 were small, the 9th was the biggest channel cat I have ever caught, somewhere between 8 and 9 pounds and I caught it on ultralite tackle with 8 lb test line, what a fight! :D
sadly I had no camera there with me, so no pics, but on a good note, that fish is still out there, I released it to fight another day :) I left the park with a smile on my face and am planning my next visit in the next few days.
Ya'll take care

Alan

[big country]

was you at dover park alan?


thanx for putting him back so i can catch him next time back over there.... what was ya using fer bait????;)

[gofish]

way to go! sounds like a good day. you wouldnt have been sitting in a lawnchair up here for long........... unless you like being a popsicle lol.

[Wyndigo]

John: yep I was there at dover till 6 pm and I was using the usual, premo :) odd thing was, alot of them I snagged, one in the tail and a few on their stomachs, makes ya think they are bigger lol it took me a few minutes to decide to let it go but it felt great to do so, knowing it would be there to hang into again (for me or someone else :))

Gofish: where is here? errr I'll look on your profile lol soon enough I'll be in a place like that, Upper Michigan, spent last winter there and planning on going back later this year, I'll miss the warm weather and having a fishing hole less than 3 miles away but it will be worth going up there :)

Alan

[rockinmichigan]

When are you planning on coming to Michigan? If you ever come to SE Michigan look me up, I'll show you a couple fishing holes in my neck of the woods.

[Wyndigo]

rockinmichigan: if everything goes as planned I'll be up there in october or november, a little place called Atlanta, its close to Alpena and yep they have some cold weather up there lol, I remember shoveling snow last winter and the temp was like 9 degrees and it was supposed to be like 8 degrees last night, it was around 40 here this morning, perfect for catfish :D

Alan aka Wyndigo

[gofish]

wyndigo east central illinois. about 35 miles due east of champaign almost on the indiana border.

[Wyndigo]

wow small world! I have friends in and have visited champaign in the past
hope it gets warm quick so you can get out to fish :)

Alan

[Stump Bumper]

Wyndigo, great story! A bigger one than you caught probably tricked you by hooking you up with that cup of mud....LOL....Sounds like you had a good day. Me and John will be scratching our heads for a while trying to figure out exactly where you were fishing at. I think I know which side of the lake you were on, just not the exact spot. Any idea's Big Country? We'll talkto ya'll later....Ray

[Wyndigo]

Stump Bumper: I was on the west side of the park, next to the last feeder where BigCountry fishes, lol I should have had my sister take a picture of me holding that dang cup! :rolleyes: would have been good for a laugh anyways LOL
looks like I wont be fishing for a week now though, out of bait & money which will make my girlfriend happy
ya'll take care

Wyndigo

[rockinmichigan]

Wyndigo, good fishing up that way. Spent a few days up in Hillman, MI which is about a half hour from Alpena, a few years ago, at this lake called Grass Lake. Caught a ton of largemouths, crappie, bluegills, bullhead, yellow perch, and the only northern caught on the trip was 24 1/2", just barely above the minimum length in Michigan. There's bigger then that I gather, my buddy had another northern snap his line, and caught one some years ago that was about 40".

[Wyndigo]

I know exactly where Hillman is :) have been there a few times shopping at the hardware store and the little grocery store across the street from it, glad to know theres good fishing up that way :D I know theres plenty of deer if I ever get back into hunting, had quite a few that my girlfriends mom fed every day, one was a 6 or 8 point buck and they also have turkeys visit as well.
Kinda makes me want to start practicing with my bow again.

Wyndigo

[rockinmichigan]

There's plenty to do up there. Hiking, trapping, fishing, hunting, you name it. Saw a ton of deer when I was there too, one morning we had to go to town to pick up a few things, got back to the campsite and the people that were camping next to us were saying that they and other people saw a bear cub, I wanna say a black bear, nearby. Ya know when you see a cub, the mother ain't far behind. :rolleyes:

[Wyndigo]

Once I get back up there I probably wont have alot of free time to fish and so on, will be looking for work there because I'm planning on staying and eventually getting married to my girlfriend :) I can hike on her moms property (17 acres) did that last year in the snow, now that was a major change lol
Yep you gotta watch out for bears up there, they have one that likes to come into the yard and "Open" the bird feeder and eat the seed, luckily I never saw any while out walking, I'm VERY happy about that lol
Ya'll take care

Wyndigo

[gofish]

wyndigo cold doesnt bother me much.i work out in it every day its just not time to break out the lawnchair quite yet though...lol. about 18 years ago my ex and i got trapped by a blackbear on a long dock in tomahawk wisconsin. we were fishing at night on the dock in the summer for cats and started hearing a grunting sound. got the flashlight out and shined it towards shore and there she was. i started yelling at it and put the lawnchairs and everything between the bear and us.the bear kept coming so i threw the chicken liver to it and told my exwife to start swimming to the other shore(about 50 feet away) i swim like a fish if i have to but im scared to death of the water so i stayed on the dock. it ate all the chicken liver and started coming closer so i started throwing everything i could get my hands on at it.then my ex father inlaw finally heard the commotion and fired a round from his gun and the bear took off. thats as close as ive been to a wild one and that was too close for me. we used to carry a 44 magnum when we were small game hunting in wisc. just for the bear we had a den right on my property and kept a close eye out for them.

[Wyndigo]

hey Gofish, thats too close for comfort for me for bears to be, I believe that the bear may of had a hard time catching me, would have been a "slick" trail to follow lol just glad you got out of the situation safely.
Now about that cold weather, I did fine last winter except my hands were always cold, even with 2 pairs of gloves and hot packs in them, gotta find a way to deal with that.

Wyndigo

[gofish]

i guess im blessed i dont normally wear gloves even if im ice fishing.

[rockinmichigan]

That was the closest I've come to seeing a live bear in the wild. Did see a dead cub on the road quite a few years ago heading up to northern L.P. of Michigan, but never had an encounter of the bear kind.

[Wyndigo]

Gofish: I didnt have the problem with my hands till I lost alot of weight, my feet stay warm even in tennis shoes while walking in the snow, but my hands got so cold that they ached, but I found a pair of gloves online that may help, I Hope :confused:

Rockinmichigan: I never did see any bears while there but that was during the winter and personally, I dont wanna see any upclose lol :)
Now the deer, I love seeing them everywhere, long as they dont run out in front of me while driving, that would make me nervous

Wyndigo

[rockinmichigan]

Wyndigo, I wouldn't mind seeing a bear in the wild, just as long as he was on the other side of the lake from me, or closer if I was hunting for them. About deer, I just saw a whole bunch of them the other day across the street from my house. Tried counting them, but they were jumping around so much in the tall brush in the field it was hard to count. There was at least seven of them, I know that, maybe as many as 9. They eventually crossed the road and forced a few cars to stop, luckily the cars were watching them too otherwise you would've had a BIG ol' mess.

[Wyndigo]

Rockinmichigan, last year while I was there in michigan, we'd drive to alpena to go shopping and on the way home it wasnt unusual to see anywhere from 2 to 20 deer at different locations, my girlfriend probably got tired of me saying "oh mannnn look at the deer!" lol
Its cool that you can see them across from your own yard, I miss that too, all I can see here is the neighbors houses or their yards and out back is an open field that was once an orange grove, soon to be more houses :mad:
I guess that seeing a bear from a distance wouldnt be too bad, long as it kept that distance :) otherwise I'd get abit jumpy lol

Wyndigo

[rockinmichigan]

Wyndigo, the weird thing about seeing all those deer the other day is that usually around here, since these couple small towns in SE Michigan have built up some you usually only see deer one or two at a time, maybe at most three at a time. To see anywhere from 7-9 deer at one spot was really cool.