Monster Bass!

Late July. My brother and I are fishing with one of his friends at another lake in the area. We started out the day on the south shore of the lake by a small causeway. We were all out on the end of a jetty fishing for bass. We would catch small bass, maybe six to nine inches, at irregular intervals. After a while of this we decided to move to another spot across the highway. So we drove over to our new spot across the lake. We climbed out of the car and the first thing we saw was a big sign with four pictures on it, and a heading that read: Fish in This Area. The sign told us that we could catch bluegills, crappies, bass, and channel catfish. We set up shop on a nearby bench and started fishing.

We all were using worms and bobbers and we were catching bluegills left and right. It was a lot of fun, but one can only catch so many bluegills before it's time to find another quarry, and I bet we had already caught 100 bluegills. Time to move on. After we packed up the car, we drove to a dock on the north shore of the lake. There were already some people on the dock so we walked a little ways up the shore and started casting off the rocks. An hour later we moved to the other side of the small bay to a small ledge with a log in the water five feet below. We all voiced our feelings that this was the right spot.

We caught several medium sized bass over the next several hours, and my brother continued to reel in bluegills from under the dead log in the water. Then, as I was reeling in something jerked on my line. I had a lot of snags that day and I was cautiously optimistic that this was more then a snag. The drag on my reel was going out like crazy. Just when i was about to call it a snag and give up the surface of the water ten feet in front of me erupted. A monster bass as on my line and he was fighting with all of his strength. As soon as he hit the water again he took off towards the log. "He's going to get under the log," yelled my brother's friend. He jumped into the water up to his knees and grabbed onto my line. Pulling the bass into the shallows was no easy task, it was thrashing and fighting the whole way. Finally the bass was on shore. We measured the bass, 23 inches!!! Alright but now to keep it alive long enough to get it home. My car was all the way on the other side of the bay. Bass in hand I took off down the road.

When I got to my car i popped the trunk and grabbed the cooler. There were still bottles of water and cans of pop in it, but sacrifices had to be made. I pulled all of the stuff out of the cooler, leaving the ice, I put the bass it it and emptied the rest of our water into the cooler. I drove over to where they were waiting, and we filled the cooler the rest of the way with lake water. I called anyone who I thought would know what to do. Everyone told me I had to keep it alive as long as i could. After getting the same advice from two different sources we decided to go into town and buy some ice to put on the fish.

After getting ice we had to take my brother's friend home. His mom took so many pictures that I lost count of time. Finally we got home where my mom was waiting to take my picture some more. Following the advice of the people I talked to I wrapped the fish in a wet towel and put it into my freezer where it will sit until i get enough money to get it mounted.

That fishing trip was the highlight of my summer. I had so much fun. Fisher man for life!