Almost Too Much Of A Good Thing...

[KCRIVERRAT]

Al, if you're questioning the numbers caught from a typical angler who in your estimate fishes a five-mile stretch hard versus an angler such as your self who catches 300 plus fish in a 30 mile stretch over 2 and a half days on the river runnin' and gunnin' (when in the heck did you ever have a paddle in your hand bud?) Whew... where was I heading? Oh yea...

[fishinwrench]

(when in the heck did you ever have a paddle in your hand bud?)

When he was measuring the fish

Al is the Chuck Norris of smallmouth fishing. He doesn't have to paddle, the river knows where he wants to go...and it had better not f#^& up !

[Outside Bend]

Woah woah woah wait...I guess I hadn't read Al's initial post...

You guys have your panties in a wrinkle over what works out to a little over ten fish per mile? That's not exactly fishing in a barrel...

God forbid you ever see what happens when 500 volts of DC are pulsed through an Ozark smallmouth stream.

[Trav]

My brother and I had simular float seven years ago on the James and had better results by the mile. Also, pulled 30 smallies from the mouth of Crane Creek in twenty minutes between the two of us. These results are not surprising to me.

Floated Niangua in 05 and counting trout and bass we were averaging 20 fish a mile...

Al....I take counts just like you....

I sure do miss float trips.....

[Al Agnew]

See, that's kinda what I find interesting about the fish counting and record keeping. It gives you a better comparison for different trips to different waters. Sure, you don't have to do it. I knew a guy once who was so much of a stickler about it that he kept one of those mechanical counters tied to his belt and clicked it every time he caught a fish. I really fried his brain when I told him he oughta be keeping separate counts of smallmouth, largemouth, and spotted bass, and that he'd need three clickers to do that.

Instead, I just keep the count in my head. I've done it long enough that it can be automatic, but it isn't infallible, which is why I said that my count may be a few fish off either way. And that doesn't matter, I just want to know with a LITTLE more accuracy what kind of catch rate it was and how it compares to other trips.

On the one hand, I'd guess that many, if not most, anglers underestimate the number of fish they catch in a day (if they are catching decent numbers). On the other hand, what seems like a super good day is often dependent upon the type of stream you're fishing. I've had days on wading size creeks where I caught more than 60 bass in a 1.5 mile stretch of stream in about three hours. That's more than 30 bass per mile and 20 per hour. But when you wade, you tend to concentrate more on small areas, and catch more of the fish that are in those areas if the stars are aligned and you're holding your mouth right. I've also had 100 fish days on floats of less than ten miles that took about ten hours, where it seemed like the fishing was good but not spectacular, because that stream was bigger and almost every foot of it was good habitat, so it seemed like I should be catching a fish on every cast and I was casting constantly. On the creek in question, the fishing seems especially hot because you spend a lot of time paddling through super shallow water and dragging the canoe over the riffles, so when you ARE actually casting you seem to be catching fish at a much faster rate than you actually are averaged out over the whole day.

As an aside, that's also why I tend to cover a lot of water on creeks like this. If I only floated half the length I did, there wouldn't be enough actual good fishing water to sustain the length of time I wanted to float. Sure, I could then slow down and really concentrate on the good water with a different fishing style...which just isn't the way I like to fish and also probably wouldn't result in catching more fish out of each hole under the conditions I encountered. Besides, believe it or not, I don't fish just to see how many I can catch, I fish for lots of reasons, but one of the biggest reasons is that I get the absolute most enjoyment in seeing smallmouth attack a lure. Big ones, little ones, it doesn't matter. I just want that little (and sometimes big) adrenaline rush when one of those tigers explodes on a topwater or lances into a spinnerbait just under the surface. I get a lot less of a kick out of seeing the line twitch and feeling the mushy feeling when one sucks in a tube on the bottom. I can do that in the wintertime, when it all becomes a challenge to find the fish and to find some big ones. In the summer, I want to experience the smallmouth at its best.

But anyway, back to numbers...

Ten fish per mile is good but not terrific, is what Trav pointed out, and I agree with him. Look at it this way. For the last decade or more, I've averaged about 50 fish per day on full day floats on Ozark streams. Most of the floats are somewhere between 7 and 10 miles. So say an average of 50 fish in 8 miles, which is a little over 6 fish per mile. That's average. So 10 fish per mile, while considerably better, is not over the top great. And since I have plenty of days where I caught far fewer than 50 fish, I had to be also having quite a few days when I caught far more than 50 in order to get that average, so there were plenty of other days when I probably approached 10 fish per mile.

The really exceptional part of this trip was not the numbers, it was the number of big fish. I consider anything over 17 inches to be an exceptional fish for an Ozark stream, and every inch bigger than that to be exponentially MORE exceptional. Back when I did keep records for the MDC biologists, which was mostly to compare the fishing from one stretch of river to another and from one year to the next, I found that there was a "usual" progression of decline in numbers with increase in size on the rather heavily pressured streams I was fishing. It would go something roughly like, for every inch of increase in size, you'd catch half as many fish, starting at about the 12 inch mark. So, of those 300 (to keep it simple) fish I caught on this trip, about half (150) would be around or over 12 inches (actually, a little less than half were). Of that 150, about half (75) would be over 13 inches. Around 40 or so of those would be over 14. 20 of those would be over 15. 10 over 16. 5 over 17. 2 or 3 over 18, 1 or 2 over 19, and if you were lucky, maybe one over 20. While I didn't keep track of all the fish between 12 and 17, I ended up with 13 over 17 inches, which is a lot better than what my experience on "average" small but floatable Ozark streams would suggest. And then there were the other big fish I saw, hooked, lost. That's what I really found exceptional about this trip as far as the fishing was concerned. As far as the total experience of being out in almost complete solitude on a beautiful little stream in great weather, well, that's priceless, and would have made it a great trip if I had forgotten my fishing rods.

[fishinwrench]

I just want that little (and sometimes big) adrenaline rush when one of those tigers explodes on a topwater or lances into a spinnerbait just under the surface. I get a lot less of a kick out of seeing the line twitch and feeling the mushy feeling when one sucks in a tube on the bottom. I can do that in the wintertime, when it all becomes a challenge to find the fish and to find some big ones. In the summer, I want to experience the smallmouth at its best.

Excellent point, that answers a question I had in my mind about your choice of fishing style.

[Greg]

I have to admit I count too. I'm not really sure why? I'm not trying to impress anyone (and I'm sure Al wasn't either. But I just like to know exactly how good (or poor) a day I've had on the water.

Greg

[Chief Grey Bear]

So a good day or bad day fishing is dependant upon the number of fish caught? I mean that is fine if that is what it means to you. And I am guilty of using the term "I had a good day today" too but, to me there is more to the outing than the number of fish I caught.

I guess what I am trying to say is when I read Greg's post, it struck me as it depends on how many fish he caught if he had a good day or not. But then I can also read that another way and he may very well have meant that he had a great day out but, the fishing was poor.

"....Honey......where is my drink?........"

[eric1978]

So a good day or bad day fishing is dependant upon the number of fish caught? I mean that is fine if that is what it means to you. And I am guilty of using the term "I had a good day today" too but, to me there is more to the outing than the number of fish I caught.

I guess what I am trying to say is when I read Greg's post, it struck me as it depends on how many fish he caught if he had a good day or not. But then I can also read that another way and he may very well have meant that he had a great day out but, the fishing was poor.

"....Honey......where is my drink?........"

I enjoy the trips when I catch lots of fish more than the trips I don't. I can have a good time without it, but it's always better when the fishing is good. It's not really numbers I care about, but my goal is always at least one fish over 15 inches, and if I don't catch one, I consider the trip a failure. That doesn't mean I'd rather be working.

[Chief Grey Bear]

That is certainly an interesting analogy.