When You Know A Fish Is Going To Jump

[moguy1973]

I just pull a Bill Dance and yank it up out of the water more for a bigger jump. LOL

[cnr]

Love the jump. I think I would almost rather lose an acrobatic fish than land a deep fighter. I figure once I've hooked a fish and got a few good jumps out of it, it's almost as good as landing it…the fish has done me a favor of an easy release. Most of us seem to remember those fights more than any other. The bulge of the water as the fish breaks the surface, head shaking and casting droplets of water that glisten in the sunlight. Cartwheeling, side splashing, tail walking across the pool. Mmmmm…. I think I need a moment here. Too many memories.

Man I need to fish more!!!

[Tim Smith]

I drop rod and reel in slack line. Dropping rod pushes them down faster. If you keep your rod down you can generally keep them from jumping. Control speed of reel and feel the fish. If fighting hard, give some slack. If not fighting reel in.

This one.

As exciting as it is to see big fish jump, it's more exciting to land them. The only ways a fish is going to get off a good hook set is to either break the equipment (not likely if your gear is in good shape) or create slack in the line, which is highly likely during a jump. I lost enough good fish to acrobatics to decide I'd rather land them than get excited about watching them get away. You can't always stop them from jumping, but the less they do it, the better your chances. When I feel them rushing toward the surface I drop the rod tip low and put on a little extra pressure try to persuade them to make another choice.

I do agree a jumping fish is pretty awesome to watch...

...for me it just doesn't outweigh the negative of having your lure spit back at you.

[Wayne SW/MO]

If I don't want to risk losing one I put the rod tip under the water and pull their head down. It works everytime if the timing is right. I think it depends on the lure also. They get a lot of leverage from a crankbait, especially a long one, but nothing from a jig or plastic normally.

[Al Agnew]

Others have covered pieces of my thoughts on it, but it really depends upon two things...whether I REALLY want to bring the fish to hand (really big one, or maybe one that I really want to get a good look at and a picture of for other reasons, like those redeye bass I was catching out in Arizona), and what kind of lure/fly it's hooked on.

The jump is often the most likely time for you to lose the fish. It's shaking its head and getting all kinds of different angles between you and the hook stuck in its mouth, those head shakes are actually more powerful than they would be underwater because without the water to provide some resistance, its head is moving faster, and its body can also come down on the line and break it more easily than in the water. So if it's a big bass hooked on a lure with some weight, it's little different from snagging that lure on a limb and being able to jiggle it off...the fish can jiggle it. If it's a bass or trout hooked on a fly, there's no weight to the fly, so jiggling doesn't dislodge it so easily. So with bass on lures, the first thing I do is try to keep it from jumping or "pull it down" from the jump by dropping the rod tip all the way into the water and putting on a little extra pressure. If the fish does manage to jump, I try to keep the line really tight to minimize the jiggling.

With big bass or trout on flies, if I remember, I "bow to the fish"...dropping the rod tip toward the fish to give the line a bit of...not slack, but barely tight...so that its body weight doesn't come down on the line and break it or pull the fly out. I want to keep the fly just barely snug in its mouth during the leap.

Of course, with most fish it's just not all that important to me to actually land them. The thing I get the most enjoyment out of average to small size fish is getting them to bite, and seeing or at least feeling that electric moment when they take the lure and you first feel them on the line and you're wondering how big they are and how well you have them hooked. After that, the "battle" is routine, and as somebody else said, I figure they're doing me a favor if they get unhooked themselves instead of waiting for me to do it. So I let them jump to their heart's content.

[Feathers and Fins]

<---------- Old Tarpon Angler if I see the line coming up force of habit is to Bow