Don't forget that net.
Farm pond fishing with a buddy in college-we had two bait buckets, a trolling motor with battery, three tackle boxes, a large fish cooler, an even larger beer cooler, and somewhere between eight to ten rods, everything from ultra-lite brim-busters to 7' flipping sticks. We put all of this crap into a leaky 12' johnboat. My pal had a huge net: not any net, this thing was tremendous. I looked him square in the eye, and told him flatly we weren't taking this thing. It was just too much. And I assured him I could lip any bass we caught that day.
The cove next to the dam had flooded an old planted pine field, and I was throwing a white shad-rap between the pine rows and 12"-14" bass on almost every cast-nothing big but lots of fun.
A treble hook in the hand-nobody wants that, so when I got these fish to the boat, I would leave them in the water for a bit to calm down. So this time I'm holding the rod out to the side with about a 14" fish swimming in tight little circles. Out of nowhere a huge bass--somewhere between 14 or 15 pounds--materializes, flares gill plates the size of dustpans and swallows everything: bait, bass, everything.
She cut a path straight through the trees, winding herself up good right beneath the boat. The lake was clear, so we were able to admire her for a minute or two. In truth, I think she was the one watching us-particularly me, reaching down as far as I could into the water trying to lip it, trying in every way I could to sink the boat. As soon as I got close, she broke off like it was nothing, and disappeared just the same-a perfect set-up for my buddy to remind me how good of a thing it was we hadn't brought his net.
-Martin Englehardt
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