Johnsfolly

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.

@N9BOW Eric what a great trip. Thanks for the report. Those peacocks make our Miami peacocks look like babies😉! I could imagine just dropping down some cut baits for any number of predatory or catfish species while having dinner😉😁. Or also spending some time in some small trib creek catching tetras or other micros.

Actually possibly three. Two others that may have been helicopters.

Not to derail this thread, but I do have a short rough day report from Sat. I fished the Shark river inlet in Belmar NJ. I was hoping to catch a lifer winter skate. There was an incoming tide and I could not effectively hold bottom in the main channel even with 6 to 7 oz of weight. My baits ended up closer to the jetty rocks and would get picked clean by small fish. I landed one fish, a small cunner for four hours of fishing and a 6 hour drive. Still you can't catch your targets sitting on the sofa😉.

@Daryk Campbell Sr Thanks for the reports. It was good to live a little vicariously through them for those of us that don't have a fishery like that near us or a bunch of friends that could make a trip like this happen if we did. I do hope to evenutally get back for one of these fests soon. You guys defintely needed some fried oyster mushrooms in the mix, I know a guy...😉😁

In the way back machine when I fished the Current 4 or 6 times a year, Iwould aggressively fish floating Rapalas. I often did best when they would deflect off of rocks on the bottom. If I didn't retie frequently I would often cast them off my line🙄. If they didn't sail off into the woods and actually landed in the water, I could often just wait for the bait to float downstream to me where I could net it and retie😉. In my youth, I have been known to climb up one of those bluff walls to retrieve a bait or two😂.

@Daryk Campbell Sr great report and congrats for a beautiful brown trout! Good job @Terrierman! Food looked great. Hope that the rest of the weekend goes well with lots of fish and laughs😉.

Did a quick venison and broccoli stir fry. Pretty simple, thin sliced venison, broccoli, onion, minced garlic, minced ginger, in a sauce with soy, fish sauce, cornstarch and sambal chili.

Thanks!. I did get to a Ray C concert in Dania FL. He was funny and the music was fantastic!

A better photo would be if this guy had the reel on top of the rod😉

I saw this meme and thought about posting here. Thanks Daryk!

Don't forget to make room in order to bring rods and jigs😉😁

If I don't make as many travel trips next year, It would be great to fish the White river again and eat with you guys. Have fun and post photos for those of us that have to live vicariously through your posts😏

Conrats @Ham on a great accomplishment! A lot of hard work and a little luck contributed to this achievement.

@Devan S. I will likely go after the freshwater trout on another occasion. I still want a Guadalupe bass and one or more of the darters in the Hill country.

Doesn't look like I will get a sauger or skipjack this year. Maybe next year. I only caught one lifer darter instead of two but was on some new species including swamp, shield and banded darters. I like darters too much to not have a goal to catch one or more each year. I didn't get a lifer bullhead or madtom. Saw several tadpole madtoms this year but no bites. I might get out one more time or two this year for tadpoles depending upon the weather. It's likely that I will reset and try again next year. I was hoping that I could catch a swamp darter to get my second swamp species this year. I was also thinking that the oriental weatherfish would count towards a swamp species, but I decided that it didn't qualify. I did meet the goal of 19 lifers for the year. My trip to TX added a few more fish for the list. Texas Cichlid (#20) Nile Tilapia (#21) Sand Weakfish (Sand Trout #22) Hardhead Catfish (#23) Molly Miller Blenny (#24) Golden Topminnow (#25) Western Starhead Topminnow (#26)