FINALLY FISHING - AND A FIRST-TIME EVENT!

Still recovering and going to therapy after our auto accident and neck surgery, but the fishing guiding must go on!  Although I am getting a later start in the season than usual, it is proving to be a bumper crop of good-size largemouth bass. Most of my trips have been this month, but I believe April is going to be a good month for some big toads too.

As you know, the majority of my guide fishing is done with live bait ... wild or domestic shiners, running around 6-7 inches in length.  That is the natural forage for the Florida strain of largemouth bass, along with bluegill, shad, minnows, crappie, shellcracker, frogs, and just about anything else that they can fit into their bucket mouth!  The wild shiners are very difficult for the suppliers to procure this month because they also are bedding in such shallow water that their boats can't get to them.  So that is when I resort to using domestic shiners.  They are not nearly as active, but are much hardier and sometimes you can use them for more than one fish, if they are not damaged much.

Today I had something happen that I've never had happen before.  There have been other times when a bass would start chasing one shiner, and then give up on that one and go for one of the others.  But today I had a bass eat one shiner and before the customer set the hook, that bass ate another shiner of my other customer.  They both set their hook and they both hooked it!

 

Double Hook-Up

 Both of these guys have fished with me for several years, but they are having a banner time this year and, because of that, there was no squabble over who caught this one.  See below as to how well their trip is going this year ... this was over the last three days, and they still have one or two more days coming up!