:::henry daddy doodie:::

a good day was had by...

:::soaking the hig:::

i went fishing with hig today, and we did well... notice that his clothes are wet. that's right, after he set the hook his pole was jerked from his hands. he hesitated for a bit watching his pole sink, and dove in, phone and all. handed the pole to me, and i held the pole till we got him back in the boat, and he reeled him the rest of the way.

:::a great day on the water:::

a couple of months ago i took the 4 kids fishing... thanks to hig for the pics!

:::arrietta outings:::

we have been running over to lake arrietta and found some deep brush piles and shell beds with some good fish on them, most of them fattening up to get ready to spawn.

best on the water quote, "wow girls, do you know how much fun this is for your dad!" june responds in a cheery voice, "But not for us!"

:::arietta fishin':::

just may have figured a little something out on lake arietta - uncle david caught an 8lber (sadly no camera), there were a couple 6's and several in the 4 range...

bob and i with a few of the fish...

:::goodbye old friends:::

A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

As virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
"The breath goes now," and some say, "No,"

So let us melt, and make no noise,
No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move;
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the laity our love.

:::pre-fishing outperform:::

when cannon and i got to toho to pre-fish for the tournament this weekend the water was LOW... all the land on the left that you see was 1 foot under water the last time we were there, only two weeks ago... all of our "spots" were too shallow, so we had to try to find fish somewhere else...

we found some fish, and i really wish i hadn't found this one till the tournament... as it stood the bite was a bit off, and i caught only 11 pounds worth of fish that day... good enough to be in the top 30 or so of 100, but not good enough to win anything...

:::aiden's fishing tournament:::

aiden and i went to a thursday night fishing tournament, her first ever... for awhile she was fishing, but then she found the camera... and that was that...

the photographer laughing at mommy's phone message:

self portrait:

the last fisherman standing (on our boat anyway):

a view from the rod locker (it got "chilly" so aiden found an open compartment):

:::kissimmee gator:::

lake kissimmee gator... its that time of year, this gator came straight to the boat and turned about 20ft from the boat to move away...

:::pink and revitalized:::

its amazing what the changed color of a fishing pole will do for aiden's fishing... look to the bottom right of the picture to see aiden's freshly repainted fishing pole...

this morning before church aiden and i wandered down to the lake where the water lettuce has blown in to the south end of the lake... the bass wait there to feed on the freshly hatched shad... aiden and i found ourselves rooting for our imitation frog to make it across the water lettuce... sadly our fish are not very good at catching a frog, they were unsuccessful far more than they were successful... but aiden did catch a 3 1/2 to 4 lber... heres the proof...

:::henry, roughing it on toho:::

wow, the life of a not-so-nearly two year old... laying back in the shade and enjoying the ride...

:::who wants a flats boat?:::

well i shouldn't own it so if you know anybody who wants it let me know...

:::big day on the south chain:::

cannon already posted these pictures at his blog, but hey, im proud of these fish too... so here we go again...

i got a 7lber and cannon got a couple of 5lbers, and we sure thought we were big stuff until the next morning turned out to be a cold one (the bass feed before a cold front)...

:::the girls fish - the girl's fish:::

the girls caught some small fish on some small shrimp on our small camping trip over to mosquito lagoon...

:::xtreme prediction:::

for the last two years cannon and i have been fishing in a tournament that runs on thursday nights on local lakes between the time changes... they are great fun and we have gotten progressively more competitive...

this year we are going to participate in a fishing series that is a little different format... the tournaments will be on the weekend, safe light to 3pm, 5 fish between the two of us, and at the end of the year, there will be a classic on the south chain of winter haven (one of our local lakes)...

it should be fun, and we will win the classic... apparently the grand prize is a $40k bass boat, so that'll be nice to have...

at this point it looks like our main sponsor is "big fish outfitters"... hopefully, he wont find out how bad we really are as fisherman, and revoke our sponsorship... if any other sucker wants to get some cheap promotion from the future xtreme bass series 2007 winners, let me know...

they say the new website is coming soon... this one is not the most impressive...

:::the camping fishing:::

this is the way the fishing went on the camping trip... a front was in and the bite was slow, unless you wanted to catch stingray or crab... michael led the stingray competition with 2... congrats to michael..

p.s. cannon (in fairness) caught his limit of trout during the one window of "bite", and a keeper red later... michael and i each caught a rat red... we caught some catfish... most interesting, michael snapped off on a fish and about half an our later we spotted his cork bouncing along i snagged the line and had a brief fight with his lost fish...

:::aiden @ arietta:::

a sunday afternoon run to auburndale produced aidens first bass of 2007... florida in january at dusk = short sleeves...

:::lyle's first red:::

lyle's first redfish came at a high cost: we beached hard on the way into the ramp at cockroach bay, the game warden gave us a strict going over regarding the fish, and my man lyle, un-used to the pre-historic vehicles that required you to turn off the lights, assisted us to a dead battery that required something of a wait for a jump... but it was a good day all the same and... i caught a ton of baitfish for the first time...

:::shady contours:::

this is for all you shady lake aficionados who have always been wondering why no one ever did a bathymetric (unscientific) chart of shady lake... well, last year i had the boat in there for an afternoon, and took some notes...

:::early bass '85 - '89:::

some bass from another era... as you can see, growing up on a florida phosphate pit has its benefits in terms of producing some large fish, i do wish that i had kept a camera to document all of them...

from 12 to 14: 8lber in lake areitta, on a silver/black auger-tail worm, sadly not released; a 7lber on a gold bang-a-lure; a 7lber on a grape worm, notice the wet pants, i jumped in to land this one when the line snapped and got soaked before school. the vertical striped pants i grabbed in a rush didnt go well with the plaid, nor did the wet underwear i forgot to change...

at 15 yrs old: 11lber on a green and silver rattletrap bumping on the rockbed; and a 9lber on who knows what...

at 16 yrs old: apparently my memory is less clear at 16 because i have no idea what these were caught on, but its a good bet it was dragging a worm...