Broke outta the slump!!!!

[bamabassman]

well,well,well gang.........it looks lie i FINALLY broke out of my big fish slump today.

as i said yesterday, i went o guntersville lake this morning. AND I CAUGHT SOME FISH!!! hahahaha, it was a blast i tell ya.

i launched at 5:30 am. just as the sun was starting to come out or at least i could see good. lol. the skies were overcast and there was about a 5-10 mph wind. water temp,83.4 degrees. now all signs pointed to buzzbaits, and spinnerbaits. threw the buzzer and spinner for over an hour...nuthin, and i mean NUTHIN. they weren't even busting at the dragon flies or anything.
so i decided to go to my ol faithfull zoom lizzard. missed a couple of dinks. i actually got em to the boat side and they slung off, lol. so i figured it was gonna be another typical bamabassman day on the water. then i got a keeper, 15 1/2 incher. nice...i thought it would go good in the fryer so i kept it.
the i gots another one. BETTER. 2 1/2 pounder. great i thought, one more and i gots supper for a night.
then i got a 3 pounder. i am thinking now what is happening here? is this the way it is supposed ot happen? get little ones then go to the little bit bigger ones only to go back to dinks again? oh well, put it in the well john.
ANOTHER 3 POUNDER! dang it boy, 2 suppers now.

ok, i am feeling good now. i have caught 3 keepers and 3 dinks that went back in the river. good morning for me. and it ain't but 10 am. cool. i send pics ot the gang i have a number for and think i am doing just fine.

that is when the bite fell off the earth. nothin for almost 2 hours i think. so i go up river towards the boat houses. switch to the ol chrome blue back 1/2 ounce rattle trap and start slinging.
all of a sudden........WHAM! i set it (or jerk outta fright,lol) and reel like crazy. cuz it is coming RIGHT AT ME! get that slack out john i yell to myself. then she turned to the back of the boat. now under the boat. then to the FRONT of the boat. i am fighting her as hard as i can. she finally tires out and i get her in the boat. BOTH of us are pretty exhausted. i look at this BIG ol fish. measures 21 inches ont eh golden rule. girth is 10 1/2 inches. i look for my scales.........DEY AIN'T IN THE RIG!!! how much does she weigh? i figured she was around 5-6. HUGE FOR OL BAMA! icing on da cake gang.

i call lisa...again,lol. she is on her way now. no way she is gonna let me catch all htese by myself, hahaha.

so when she gets in the rig. i take her to the SAME places i caught mine so she ca try em. meanwhile i am still chunking the same baits in the same spots as before. i get a dink. lisa says lets go into jones cove. so i say ok and we head out for jones.

wtl, youwill know this spot i am gonna tell about. remember the little cove at the eand to the left? where i said i saw the REALLY BIG SOW near the beaver dam? that is where we went.

we don't get so much as a nibble. so i ecided to throw something different. i tell lisa i am jst experminting (ya'll can ask and she will verify this word for word too, hehe). 3rd cast with a blue/red headed and black and blue skirt double willow leaf spinnerbait. she hits. i mean she is huge to me. doesn't really fight much. i am trembling as i reel her in. i lip her and SHE IS MINE!!!! lis atakes a picture with her camera and then my phone (which some of ya'll got, hahaha). i then measure on the golden rule. SHE IS PAST THE 22 MARK!! I FIGURE SHE IS AN 8 POUNDER!


nw ehre is where i am TOTATLY confused gang. i get home, and yes i kept her cuz lisa is gonna have it mounted for me for christmas if we got the money. i know i said i wanted to wait till i got a 10 pounder, but she insisted and we need ot cover some of these walls in the new house.

back to confused part. on the golden rule she measured over the 22 mark. i get home and use my tape measure and she is only 11 inches long and 11 1/2 inches in girth. now how much does she weigh? i put it ont eh bathroom scales and it weighed 7.2 pounds. so it ain't a 8 pounder after all. the other big fish weighed 5 on the scales and measured 21 inches long and 11 inches girth. so help me out ont he actual weight. thaks gang.
all in all, i had a WONDERFUL day on the water. and i know that ol zooker was with me this day. then he and lisa helped me with the luck to get the biggun.

daniel said ehr would post the pics of all the fish fo rme. thaks man, oyu're the greatest. and thaks anthony for posting the pic of my biggun on theother thread. ya'll know i was a happy boy today. nuthin but smiles. thanks gang!!!

[Krtismo]

Congrats! Sounds like a great time!

[Bender]

What a great day out there bama! I gotta get back over there and see if you will guide me.

[bcklash]

Christmas in August, we can hear the smile on your face.
Congrats on a great day and a very good report.

[keithdog]

Hey, now thats a great day on the water. You deserved it buddy. Congrats my friend. Be sure to post a pic of he mount when you get it.

[MississippiBoy]

Here's three pictures he sent me. These went from his phone, to my phone, to my email, to here, so they're not the best quality.

[MississippiBoy]

Originally Posted by bamabassman

....i then measure on the golden rule. SHE IS PAST THE 22 MARK!! I FIGURE SHE IS AN 8 POUNDER!

......back to confused part. on the golden rule she measured over the 22 mark. i get home and use my tape measure and she is only 11 inches long and 11 1/2 inches in girth. now how much does she weigh? i put it ont eh bathroom scales and it weighed 7.2 pounds.

I hope that fish didn't shrink from 22" down to 11"...that would be mighty suspicious.
But really, I think your measurements are off, John. Going by the calculator here, 22" long by 11.5" around only gives a little over 4.5 pounds, but that fish was waaaay bigger than that. We know that calculator isn't going to be perfectly accurate, but it should be in the ballpark.

[66KingFisher]

Thats a great story John,and I'm tickled to death that you had such an awesome day on the water.....You were past due.....Sure makes me want to do some fishin when I go back down to Florida this week, just so's you ain't the only one catchin hawgs this year...lol...Congrats buddy.

[BassFeverJohn]

WTG Bama. I always knew there had to be a reason you hung out around here... JK

[BigBassin144]

Way to go john!!! Glad to see you had a great day on The water!

Here's a bigger picture of the 7lber:



BB

[lilmule]

Nice,congrads

[Jrob78]

Nice fish Bama!! Way to go!

[brushhog]

Great Day Bama! I gotta guess by looking that your girth measurement is off somehow. Anyway, congrats on a great catch!

[Bassboss]

Thems some honkers bama!! Congrats for gittin outa the dink streek!

Good luck with the mount, we're gonna want pics a that too!!

[woody]

Congrats John.. You deserve it!


-Mark

[bamabassman]

thanks gang. i am REALLY happy aobut the day i had. i wanted to go today (call in sick,hehe), but i couldn't since i am gonna be off a few days next week. but it was perfect today, even better than sunday. overcast skies and a little less windy. i think i would've done pretty good.

now daniel, about the measurements. according to the GOLDEN rule in the boat,the BIG ONE measured over 22. the ruler only goes to 22. BUT when i got my TAPE measure it was only 11 1/2 inches long. the girth was 11 1/4 around. so what gives? the next biggun was 11 inches long and 10 1/2 inches in girth. so i was confused, and i got the fish (both) on the bathroom scales. biggun was 7.2 pounds. the next one was an even 5. i know the scales are correct. so i am confused as all get out. is the GOLDEN rule different?

[MississippiBoy]

Man, you need a new tape measure or something. You meaured it at almost TWO feet on the ruler, then the tape meaure had it at just under ONE foot? I thought you just hit a "1" on your keyboard, instead of a "2", making a typo...11" instead of 21". But there's no way a 5 pound bass and a 7 (or 8, whatever) pounder are 11" and 11.5" long.
Look at it this way...I have pretty big hands, so when I open my hand as far as it will stretch, from the tip of my thumb to the tip of my little finger is about 10.5". I imagine yours will be somewhat close to the same size. Try that with your fish and see what you come up with.

[bamabassman]

ok............ya'll are gonna get a REAL big laugh out of this one. i looked at the tape measure jsut a while ago. it IS 22 and 1/8 inches long. for some reason i looked it wrong. the girth is still 11 inches. seems i need ot put on my GOOD glasses when i measure things.. oyu know the tapes that start over at the top and show the total underneath it? well i got one of those and that is what i was using. i used ANOTEHR tape this time. boy do i feel like a dumbarse, hahaha. so now what is the calculated weight daniel? 22 1/8 inches long and 11 inches in girth. my bathroom scales can't be right either at theis point. it probably weighs around 6 or so huh? BWAAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
or maybe i was so excited still i couldn't see anything right? or i just trying to tell myself the fish ain't real? i dunno. maybe it is cuz i am BAMABASSMAN and only used to catching dinks. sorry folks for the misunderstanding. the other big one was 21 inches long and 10 inches in girth. it is filleted now. and in the freezer along with the others i brought home.
one more question fo ya. does a fish shrink (for real now) and lose weight on the trip home? i have a 1 hour drive form the lake and the fish all died on the way cause the areator wasn't on when i came home. just wondering.

[carolina-rig-01]

Originally Posted by bamabassman

does a fish shrink (for real now) and lose weight on the trip home? i have a 1 hour drive form the lake and the fish all died on the way cause the areator wasn't on when i came home. just wondering.

A fish can lose a little weight or length in a livewell from going into shock. But we are talking about ounces not pounds. I have had fish shrink up to a quarter of an inch in the livewell on me and lose a little weight between the first time I weigh them and then when I weigh them later in the day when I am culling.

Not to rain on your parade but from the calculator I found on this website if your fish was 22.25" long and 11" in girth it weighed in the neighborhood of 4.5lbs. Probably a little bigger than 4.5lbs but not sure how much bigger. Nice fish either way.

Here is the calculator I found : http://www.myoan.net/fishing/weight_calc.html

[bamabassman]

REALLY KORY?!? ONLY 4 AND A HALF POUNDS? MY BATHROOM SCALES SAY 7.2. com'on now....tell me that ain't right. it has to be biger cuz the picture of me holding the 2 weighed that much. i have lost my boat scales so i didn't get to weigh it right then. that is why i asked cause it was over an hour before i got home. now i feel just aweful. i would've fillet it and had it fer supper if that is all it weighs.

[carolina-rig-01]

John, please don't take this the wrong way and get upset. It is always a touchy subject when someone catches a good fish and has to ask others how much it weighs, and it's even harder because all we have to go on is how it looks in a picture. First of all it's a nice fish, nothing will change that. I hope I didn't offend you with what that calculator said that fish weighs, I almost didn't even make that post because I was worried it would come across like I was trying to take something away from the amazing day you had on the water and I would never want that. Now if you are asking my opinion, I will say this. First of all if bathroom scales is all you had to weigh it with then cudos to you for doing it, I never would have thought of that (and cudos to Lisa for allowing it lol). However bathroom scales probably aren't the most precise way to tell how much that big girl weighed, and a lot of bathroom scales will show a few pounds even with nothing on them, this is used as an offset so that you can calibrate these scales to match the scales at a Dr.'s office. So it's possible that your scales are reading a little heavy in the first place (if this is the case then at least you have an excuse to use when you weigh yourself on these scales lol). I have never liked using a fish calculator, they just give you a very rough estimate of how much a fish weighs but they are rarely correct. If I had to make a guess at how much that fish weighs by looking at the picture my honest guess would be somewhere in the 5lb range give or take a pound or so. But in a pic it's hard to tell, we have all seen pictures of 8lb fish that looked like 4lbers in the picture as well as 4lb fish that looked like 8lbers in the picture. In my opinion if you want to go by the fish calculator then go for it, but if you want to call it a 7lber then nobody can prove you wrong. Great fish either way and I know how long you have been due for one of those magical days on the water and congratulations for a day that you will remember for a long time.

[nofearengineer]

Hey John, let me add a couple of things.

First, by looking at your photo, I find it hard to believe that fish could be anything smaller than 6lbs. However, your numbers are what they are, for better or for worse. I wasn't there when you measured them, so I have to take you at your word on that. If you feel like the fish is only 4.5 lbs, well, then it's still a heck of a nice fish and you'll get your trophy next time, right?

Second...about your bathroom scales. Like Kory says, they are made for measuring people, not fish. I would be very surprised if they are accurate when weighing relatively small things like fish. However, if you want some peace of mind, there is a decent way to use them in the range they are most accurate at.

Weigh yourself first, then grab the fish and weigh yourself. That way, the scales only tell you the difference between your weight, and are thus more likely to give you a weight that is free from any offset.

Again, still a nice fish, John. And the smile shouldn't be any different for a smaller weight reading.

[bamabassman]

kory.......IN NO WAY AM I MAD AT YOU BUDDY! how can i get mad at you man? hahahaha. i just can't believe that it only "calculated" at 4.5 lbs. that's all. now as for the bathroom scales, they are accruate i think cause the doctor scales weighed me the same as the bathroom scales. i really think that it was a 7 pounder in the fact that it is so big. i have caught 2 4 plus pounders and have a pic next to my profile of these fish. this one in the freezer is much bigger. i showed it to lisa's dad and sent a pic form my cell to my brother, brother in law and a few others (most of the folks here i have a number for.haha. most of the family thinks it is around 7. ALL of the family wants me to mount it, so lisa is gonna do that for me. it will be my birthday,anniversary and christmas present all rolled into one gift. besides said lisa, we gotta put SOME kind of animal on the wall in our new house, lol. she would rather have a fish than a deer she said. (but there WILL be a buc head there one day too,hehe.

but PLEASE believe me when i say i am in NO WAY upset at YOU . never will be over something like this. this is why i asked the questions.


the weather is getting right again for some bass busting days on guntersvile. so i am gonna be TRYING to go more often now. gotta stock up the freezer anyway for the winter. nuthin like eating fish on a snowed in day,lol. reminds me of what is coming in the spring ya know. gotta get a few things fixed on the cajun too. bilge went out on me, 1 trolling battery is out. so i gotta get those things fixed in a hurry. lol.

[bamabassman]

bryce. that is the EXACT way we weighed the fish. and i ain't mad or upset really.

[BassFeverJohn]

This could all be solved by a $20 scale from wal-mart.

Just saying.

BTW, I don't care how much it weighed, that bass kicks butt!