Don't Wait to Make Changes... the fish are there!

Originally Posted 5/31/15

​It turns out I'm not much of a blogger. I planned to stay engaged through this venue every two to three weeks but have failed miserably! I hope to do better and we invite you to join in or even write a guest entry.  
Bass Kandy Delights has kept us very busy so far this year. It has been fun! (not as fun as fishing but keeps me close to the action.) I'm looking forward to making time to fish more and at the same time, work hard to grow our business. We have been looking at other ways to market and sell our product. We have had recent success introducing our product to the west coast. A packaging solution is at the top of our list to help us move forward.  We have learned a lot but still have a ways to go.

I had an opportunity to fish with Shawn Kimbro, author, fisherman and friend Thursday evening. Acquaintance and fellow angler Joe Evans joined us. I have fished with Shawn before, read his books and have attended several of his presentations. Every time I have spent time around him I have taken something away that increases my chances to catch more and larger fish. Some of the information I already know but he reinforces and explains why it is important to focus and concentrate on certain tactics when the fishing is tough.
We were on a quantity fish that should have made it easy to catch on every cast.  Shawn was doing considerably better than I was but the fish were being selective. I paid close attention to what he was doing. We were both standing in the same boat, using a bait casting rod with braided line. Both were using a 6" BKD, his was white and mine was my favorite color silk chartreuse. Both were catching fish, one of us was not catching as many, but even more importantly one was catching a smaller class of fish.  In both cases, it was me. I finally switch to a white.
After casting the white and not really improving my results I grabbed a bottle of red Spike-it garlic die and dipped the tail of the white BKD in to it. This is HOTRODDING your bait.

Shawn had been fishing with a hotrodded BKD from the beginning. The next cast resulted in a much nicer Rockfish!  Excited, I didn't take much time to to think about what had happened but after several more casts without any fish, I was perplexed thinking I was just unlucky. Mr. Kimbro in the meantime, was still doing well!  He then asked me what size of jig head I was using. I was using a 1 ounce and he was using a 3/4 ounce. The out going tide was decent and I didn't think the one ounce jig head was too heavy. I changed any ways. 1/4 of an once different.
Immediately I began catching a better class of fish! Joe also changed to this set up. We all enjoyed the rest the evening until it was time to head to the barn. I only wished I had changed sooner.
Driving home I thought about what had happened. My take away was- don't keep doing the same thing thinking you will get different results.  It is possible the fish could "turn on" and whatever your using will work eventually.
Finding fish is the first step to catching fish. When you find fish you need to give your best effort to catch them and if they are finicky you need to try different things. Don't wait too long.  Pay attention to what makes a difference in each situation and apply a methodology to repeat what works each time you experience that situation. Soon it will be natural to how you fish and you will catch more and longer fish faster
The next morning I fished with Steve Fogle of Backyard Custom Rods and Repairs.  We fished with Phil Kerchner on his boat.  I paid attention to what was going on. We marked fish pretty steadily all morning but not nearly as thick as the night before.  We were not fishing the same area. I was fortunate to catch more fish and the largest fish. It doesn't happen often. It may have been luck, or the mojo left over from fishing with Shawn the night before. I know I learned some information and would like to think it made me a better fisherman.