2015, My fishing year in review.

[Ham]

I was lucky enough to get to to fish 73 times.

I got to fish in 4 states.

I got to fish in salt water for the first time in a long time Thanks to Cody, Les, and Richard. I used the yak, canoe, Bass Cat, I was a guest in other folks boats, and made a few wade trips too.

My last trip of the year was on 12/22 with Little Red Fisherman. We had an amazing day on the water. Right before the monsoon flooded everything in the area.

I caught 3160 fish for the year. Some were monster and some were minnows. They all counted as 1 fish per.

I got to fish with 18 different people through out the year. Some of which I had never fished with before, some of which I hadn't seen in a decade, some I don't see near often enough, and some I wish I lived next door to. I hope the folks I fished with know that I enjoyed it very much  and hope we can fish together again in 2016.

[Mitch f]

I never counted, but I'm guessing one day per month average. Never enough for me!?

[Ham]

I would need an aggressive combination of cognitive therapy and psychotropic agents IF I was going to be limited to 1 day of fishing per month.

I really don't think I would ever want to fish more than 250 days a year.

 

[jtram]

Thats a detailed year end report. One day i would like to log my trips, but im lazy. Sounds like a great year!

Once a month would be a sad sad way to live. At a very minimum I have to go once a week, and thats rough. 2-3 trips/week generally does the job.

[MOPanfisher]

Well my year was somewhat abbreviated, a good trip at end of March resulted in a limit of walleye then an enforced sabbatical of sorts from all things fun for 6 months.  Finally got back into a few short trips resulting in several crappie, and a big hybrid.  Some nice crappie were beginning to come my way until the holiday deluge.  Now it's gonna be a while before I can take advantage of the lakes and rivers.

[jdmidwest]

Jan. and Feb. started with trips to fish for trout in Catch and Release areas and put and take ponds. 

Spring time brought goofy weather and lots of water.  Panfish did well on lakes, rivers were too big to fish locally.  Several planned trips were spent drinking beer watching muddy water rise or rain.  Kayaks only spent one weekend on the Spring River and one weekend floating the Current/Jacks Fork.  Something else kept them off the water all summer.  We had one good jet boat trip on the 11 pt for a few days, then got rained out.

August brought a turn of events for me.  Lake and river fishing in Tennessee was the trip every weekend.  Weather was fair most weekends.  We travelled to fish Center Hill Lake and tailwater.  The lake was uneventful, cold front messed up fishing.  Tailwater trout fishing was pretty good, we were catching good numbers of small trout less than 10 inches. 

I think I spent every weekend and most vacation days from Aug thru Sept on TN waters with some great trips.  Oct. had a few good weekends till the last one, which was the cancer diagnoses.  From that point on, it was focus on getting the cancer out and recovery.  Surgery was Thanksgiving.  Cancer Free declaration on Dec. 9.  My life has returned to almost normal this week with return to work for the first time in 5 weeks.  Arm has healed and I am able to cast again.   I don't feel like pushing my luck and trying to wade mud and muck, wagging dekes and a layout boat right now, so the rest of duck season will be spent fishing instead.

New Years Eve was the first step in planning the new year and I made a few calls.  All rivers and lakes are pretty well blown out now, so fishing is on hold this weekend.  As soon as they clear, it will be trout in the Ozarks, Sauger at Pickwick, and Smallies on the TN River.  Maybe a trout excursion to Chattanooga.  Maybe a new bass boat by summer.  This little cancer scare has taught me that life can be shorter than we plan.

[Ham]

Happy New Year JD! I hope you stay healthy and have a lot of great trips this year. 

[MOPanfisher]

Amen JD, glad thing are looking up.