Johnsfolly

I have always loved Rapala fillet knives. I even had one with a burl wood handle. They had been lost in various moves or sold over the years. I now have a no name knife that I use for fish, meat and butchering game. A couple of runs through the cermaic sticks and its ready to go another round. Pete I have been interested in the Bubba blades, but haven't pulled the trigger on one.

Such a funny man. Oh and he played baseball 😉

I have tried that bait. Didn't have much luck but don't think that there were many carp where I fished it.

Especially if you plan on chasing them across the pond😉. I still just toss out some corn and fish corn or worms. Not too sophisticated at the Folly household.

Jeff Sophisticated carpers don't say bait balls. - they say boilies They don't use sling shots - they use catapults They wont' chum with corn the day before they go fishing - they will feed the swim .😅😉

I have done this recipe with marinated rib eye from the Asian market. Decided to do it with a venison back strap. I made a marinade with Korean BBQ sauce, a little soy and fish sauce. Added the thinly sliced venison and minced garlic and ginger. Marinaded about 20 hours. Cooked on high heat until browned then added the green onions and cooked for another five mins. Not as good as the beef but really tasty😁.

I don't recall if this was the same study that we discussed a few years ago. I have the same concerns now as I did them. It's cool that they can live so long. However if there is limited or no recruitment of juveniles in the population it is destined to collapse over time. Makes me wonder what is going on and why there are no juveniles surviving. Are the embryos not hatching, not enough or the right food for fry survival and growth, bad water conditions...

I definitely understand the burnout. I've been fortunate to be able to tack on a couple of days onto my business trips and have caught most of my new species doing that over the last two years. I will do the same this year. Tadpole madtoms have been kicking my butt and I want some pay back. So that was not a hard carry over. I consider them as a swamp species along with swamp and glassy darters that I did not land in 2024 🙄. I will also be travelling to OK a fair amount this year for work and likely will do a couple of side trips into AR. I know that I have lost at least a couple of red fish bites and again I want payback.

Seems like we wanted to join in on the fun. We only got 6 inches or so thus far. That might as well be 2 feet since these guys rarely get more than one or two inches at any one time. The snow removal here has a lot to be desired 😉. We closed except for folks that needed to be in the labs to keep things going. I was in there this morning but came home at noon. I can work from home so I better get back to it.

I'd say that was a successful year 😁

Congrats! That a nice mix of firsts😉!

We will have to make those. Livie and Sue are big King Hawaiian rolls fans.

Hey Marty - Are Knappers all a bit Flaky 😆😉!

1) I have to complete (to me) a major milestone and once that is done (hopefully by end of Mar), I will relax a bit and enjoy more just simple fishing trips in 2025. I do have some specific targets. 2) Over the last few years there has been an influx of exotic tropicals being caught in NC, NJ, and NY - I want to catch one in 2025. 2) Catch a redfish or new kingfish species 3) Catch a couple more swamp lifers 4) Still a glutton for punishment and will try and catch a new bullhead or madtom species in 2025 5) Catch a lifer shark, ray or skate preferably from the beach

Nice job Daryk! They all look like white crappie to me as well. I usually count the dorsal spines to id since the barring can be subjective on some fish (e.g., breeding males). Whites typically have 5 to 6 dorsal spines and blacks have 8 or more.

@Quillback We fished a sunfish honeyhole yesterday and my first 2025 fish was a bluegill 😁. I also caught a yellow perch which was the first one that I caught since 2021. We tried for carp but that spot was wide open to the 20 to 25 mph winds that hit us in the face. We didn't stay too long. Livie did catch another bluegill there but no carp or bullheads.

Wanted to post a holiday meme to help folks bring in the New Year😉.

No a problem Phil. Thanks for giving us a platform to be able to share with this group😉.

Thanks Jeff. Good luck on you next trip. We have been having warm (mid 50's low 60's) weather and it's going to drop into the 30's after Weds afternoon. I am hoping to get my first 2025 fish tomorrow. Likely to be a local sunfish, bullhead or carp.

I hope so Marty!

I won't be fishing today to end out the year. I hope to get out tomorrow to start the 2025 year with some caught fish. Figured now would be a good time to post an end of the year round up for myself and my family. Most will be bullet points to keep it short but will mix in photos for those that like that kind of thing (like I do😉). If you don't know me and my family very well, we fish a lot, travel a lot to fish, and try to catch as many different species as possible. The other thing to know about me is that I track a lot of fishing information, e.g., type of fish caught, number caught, date caught, locations, and baits used. Makes it pretty easy to write up a post like this one. One other point is when I talk about fishing outings, I do treat moving to a different watershed as separate outings. This year I made 71 fishing outings and caught 712 fish which is not a lot compared to other OAF members. Fished in and caught fish in 13 states, including MD, FL, UT (new state), PA, NJ, DE, NC, KS, MO, IN (on a KY recipricating license for the OH river), WV, CO (new state) and TX. I caught 105 different species this year and 26 were new species. My daughter Livie made 44 fishing outings and caught 430 fish (when she agreed to fish with Dad). Fished in and caught fish in 8 states, including MD, FL, PA, NJ, DE, NC, IN (new state), and WV. She caught 82 different species this year and 33 were new species. Back in Feb she caught her 171st species and end the year at a total species list of 203 species. Her 200th fish species was a eyetail bowfin from NJ that she had to pull out of this little spot. Livie's 201st species was an oriental weatherfish caught later that night also in NJ (I also caught one as well) Photos of some of the more memorable trips. Midas cichlid in the canal and Livie and I both caught them. Parrots in the park overhead. Key deer buck from No-name Key Livie cured here needlefish curse with a redfin needlefish from Key West. I could not catch one, and only caught Atlantic needlefish from that pier in Key West. Also in the keys Livie and I caught mangrove gambusia, a species that I did not know about until we had help with its id. Livie's male. Fished one of our favorite reef fish spots in South Pointe park Miami. It's literally a fish bowl as you can see by the number of Sgt majors in this photo. Livie's puddingwife wrasse was remarkable and one of the targets for this trip. Sue caught a possible princess parrotfish, but have not fully confirmed its species. We fished the intercoastal and Dania pier and had targets of a couple filefish species, bandtail puffers and a variety of snapper and grunts. We all caught crested gobies in the IC waterway. We all caught bandtail puffers from the pier. Sue with a planehead filefish. I lost a nice scrawled filefish, but I'm not bitter 😒. I was in Utah for business in March which was a big change over the FL trip. My first UT fish was a white bass that I caught with a 1/16 oz chartreuse head and 2.5 inch pearl grub. Back in Maryland and after a couple of breakoffs, Livie and I figured out how to hook and land cownose rays. We made a couple of trips to PA. We love sculpin and did the three hours one way drive to catch a bunch of slimy sculpin (new lifers for both of us). We also were both successful catching Chesapeake logperch on a night fishing trip just over the PA border. One of the big targets for me this year was finally catching a ribbonfish. We have tried to catch them in VA and even in DE this year. Finally I made the decision after seeing lots of online reports to go to NC for them. I even booked a charter for them. The night before our charter we ended up catching a bunch on 1/4 oz swimbaits from the Jeannette's pier in Nagshead. We caught a lot more (40 between us) the next day n the charter. A swell from a tropical storm out by Bermuda created a swell that shut down other fishing opportunities for us on that trip. We did a family reunion trip to Kansas City to spend time with grandkids and our kids at Great Wolf Lodge. I fished a little but only caught species that I have caught before. I could not find a Johnny darter though I fished several targeted locations. One the way home we stopped in WV to small creek that I fished a few years ago. Well the creek was a vanishing creek due to the drought but when microfishing you never know what will be in a small drainage. Livie caught her first western blacknose dace from that pool. We also caught green sunfish, creek chub and southern redbelly dace there as well. We went back a few times to NJ to try for freshwater and saltwater lifers. In the pinelands of NJ we both caught lifer banded sunfish. In the fall I piggy backed some fishing onto two business conferences, one in Denver CO and the other in Austin TX. In CO I fished the mountains and warmwater creeks. Did catch a lifer brook stickleback on this trip! In TX if fished the hill country around Austin and also the saltwater off Galveston. In Galveston I fished this jetty and caught a lifer Molly Miller blenny - one of my targets for that trip. In Austin I had hopes for Guadalupe bass. I thought that I saw a few but only caught small largemouth bass. I didn't expect bluff holes in TX like those in MD and AR but there they were. Also the creek had Texas Cichlids which were another target for me. Unfortunately I can't post it all in one post, but I figured that this would be a good round-up of our year in 2024. I can't wait to see what we OAF'ers all can catch in 2025. Don't forget to post photos 😉😁

Where does Valdemort rank in the Pantheon of great cinematic villains🤔?

Elk barbacoa burrito. Made from a neck roast from my BIL elk.

Was able to access those photos. I have wanted to catch a red tail cat since I was a kid.