Thursday, May 24, 2007

Day on the lake...

I got to sneak off today and go fishing for a little while. There was only 2 other boats on the lake so I was not having to share a section of the lake with anyone. Someone was camped out on the point so I decided to fish the Northern bank as the wind was out of the South. I saw several fish that were in 10' to 14' of water but couldn't tell what species they were. I have asked for my Aqua Vue camera back so I will be able to learn a little more about the bottom of the lake. The grass was growing out to about 6' of water. The water was stained, which is unusual for that lake.

I came home and filled out my fishing log page for the day and changed lures and got everything set to go fishing with lures for stained water instead of clear water conditions.

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Added a Fishing Tips and Tricks Index Page...

This morning, I added a Fishing Tips and Tricks Index Page. I will take the Fishing Tips and Tricks Message Board entries and make them into articles and then link them on the Front Page for you to read and also put them on the Fishing Tips and Tricks Index Page so we have an archive of Fishing Tips and Tricks.

You will see a link to the Fishing Tips and Tricks Index page on the left hand column of links 4th link from the top.

If you have any tips or tricks, please feel free to post them in the Fishing Tips and Tricks Forum on the Message Board.

Saturday, May 12, 2007

Fishing Log pages just added to the site...

I just added Fishing Log pages that we can print off and use to keep records of our fishing trips.

I have found that keeping logs of my fishing trips has helped me in the following years because I can look up the time of the year and see the fishing trips that had similar conditions to what the day is that I am going fishing. This gives me a head start on what worked and what didn't work in the previous years.

It also helps me to pattern the bass on a lake. I can look back and see when the bass moved away from the banks after spawning, spots they moved too and how deep they were. When the Carolina Rig was the most effective, when the jerk baits or the jigs were the best baits.

In the winter time, the bass congregate in "wintering holes". There can be 100 bass in a spot not much bigger than your bass boat. You will find the bass each year in about the same place. So, if you have a GPS unit and mark the waypoint, next year you will already know where to start looking for the bass.

Dean and I went fishing with Chuck Justice on February 20th a few years ago. We caught so many bass that I was ready to go home after 8 hours of fishing. We caught bass from a pound up to bass that weighed more than 6 pounds all day long. You never know what size bass you might catch when they are in their wintering holes.

Let me know if you have any suggestions on the Fishing Log pages or anything else as this is "our" fishing web site. I designed it in hopes of making all of us better anglers.

Greg

Finally, a beautiful day...

Finally, after what seems like weeks of rain, we finally have a pretty day. But, of course, it is a blue bird sky day with not a cloud in sight. This makes fishing tough, especially in lakes that has clear water where the Bass can see very well.

The Bass should be finished with spawning now and the big females should be ready to eat. The bad thing about post spawn fishing is that the Bass are probably going to be scattered all over the lake.

I am planning on going fishing on Sunday and Monday if nothing comes up.

With the price of gas going up, most of us are going to have to start fishing lakes closer to home. I usually fish McGee Creek and Lake Fork several times a year, but I don't think I will fish them this year. I might go fish McGee Creek with Chuck Justice once or twice, but I am going to concentrate my fishing on lakes around Tulsa.

Since the fishing will be changing frequently during the next month or so, I will have to start fishing logs on the lakes that I fish this year so that I will have a good idea of how and what to fish next year.

If you keep a fishing log when you go fishing, you can look at it next year to give you a better understanding of how to fish and with what lures to use.

I will do a fishing log page that you can print off for each day you go fishing. I just put them in a 3 ring binder, divided by lakes.

I have created a message board for putting tips and tricks that you have learned during your fishing endeavor. I will move them over to a page that we will call "Tips and Tricks". This way we will be able to see all the tips and tricks on one page.

Greg

Monday, May 7, 2007

Today was a flood...

It stormed yesterday and night last night with it still storming this morning. My front and back yard were flooded with the water rushing through the culvert to the other side of the road.

I went and got a cotter pin and put it on the driver's side wheel and put a bunch of grease in the bearing buddy. I will need to get another tube of grease to finish up greasing both wheels.

It is supposed to rain all this week with maybe a pretty day on Saturday. All the rain will probably make the lakes muddy and raise the pool level. I am not sure what temperature the rain was to know if it would warm or cool the lake temperatures.

Tonight will be another night of cleaning reels and respooling them with new line.

Greg

Sunday, May 6, 2007

Beautiful day followed by severe thunderstorms...

Today was a beautiful day. I got the wheel bearing checked on the boat trailer and checked for leaking wheel cylinders while I had the tires off. The ground was really damp and I had to use concrete slabs about 1' x 1' to keep the jack from sinking into the ground.

The fire extinguisher was still on the full mark and the motor started up without any hesitation.

I came in an got cleaned up and started taking reels apart to clean them, oil and grease them before I put new line on them. They are saying that Saturday may be a pretty day, if the wind isn't blowing hard, you will probably find me on the lake.

I am thinking of starting a "Tips" section in the message board for anglers to post little "tips" they have discovered to make things easier on them.

Greg

Saturday, May 5, 2007

Didn't realize just how dirty my reels were...

I cleaned my spinning reels tonight and couldn't believe the difference in them after I got them cleaned, lubed and put back together. I tore one of the Calais's down and cleaned it and it is a lot smoother now. So, I can see that I am going to have to go through all the reels and clean them and lube them up.

When I put new line on a reel, I always tape a piece of paper onto the rod near the reel end that says what line, what strength and what day I put the line on the reel. It sure makes it a lot easier to know if I need to respool a reel or not.

On some mono or fluorocarbon coated lines, it is hard to tell if the line is aged or not. The braided lines are easy to tell if they have some age on them as they fade.

One other thing that I do to my rods when I respool the reel is to take a cotton q-tip and run it around all the eyes on the rod. This will show any places that are not smooth and could damage the fishing line going through it.

Greg

The start of a new year of fishing...

Here it is May 5th, 2007 and we are getting ready for a new year of fishing in Oklahoma. I started a newsletter for OklahomaBassFishing.com the other day and starting a blog today.

I see OklahomaBassFishing.com building even more this year. The site has grown far more than I ever expected it too.

I have a few people that have asked if they could write articles for the site and I am going to give them a try at it.

Be sure and sign up for the newsletter and let's get 2007 off to a bang with some real monsters this year.

Greg