Confidence is King
 

Guys I've had a very tough and frustrating winter in regards to bass fishing. So much so that I just haven't fished much the last couple months. I felt lost every time I was on the water. That's rare for me and I've kinda felt lost in everyday life to be honest. It's weird but fishing just means that much to me. Im not so sure that's a good thing but, I'm just being honest.

I've just been waiting for the conditions to get better, and with all the rain I wasn't sure when the lakes would stabilize and position the fish where I know how to catch them. Well, I go out and have 2 great days in a row and now I feel like I can catch a 3lber in a bathtub. Confidence and/or lack there of is a very strange thing. I really feel like it's the most important factor to success on the water day in and day out over any other single factor.

What's your guys opinions and does it eat at any of you the way it does me?

i agree. its very difficult with all the changing weather and water levels. i think sometimes they just dont bite very well. my biggest frustration is when i read the tournament results and big bass was caught by a guy winding a squarebill...

T_Rig let me say this to you, the only thing in life that matters is faith, family and friends. I work in a high pressure environment with people that only want to eat your spleen and leave you for dead on the roadside. I live for breaking daylight on OH Lake, catching anything at any time. Every waking hour at work all I can think of is my next day off to fish. Having just turned 59 last week, I am seriously thinking about telling my employer to F off and get a part time job at Home Depot. I wish you the best.

Fishing is pretty much my life. There are days though when you wonder if you have lost it. You just keep fishing and you will get rewarded.


Regards

Thanks for a little perspective. I wish you the best to my friend.

Well first let me say I am thankful the Lord saved me and this world is not my home but while I am here this life sure is full of ups and downs....fishing is my up.

I feel your pain
 

I can relate.. I know I'm the new kid on the block in this group doesn't help that I'm a noob at boating and trying to learn how to baitcast and I'm fishing throwing everything I have in probably the worse fishing conditions expecting to at least get a nice strong bite only to get nothing but wind chills on lakes I've never been on never fished.


I'm a quick study, but I have always been very hard on myself the last 20 yrs... Failure is not an option kind of attitude. I see people on different groups posting their big fish and stringers full of crappie and I sitting here working backlashes and getting discouraged.


I own my truck/trailer.. The no fail attitude started 23 yrs ago when I first went into business for myself hauling oversized machinery and equipment along with military vehicles. I generally hate other truck drivers cause a lot are idiots. Stress is a 3 month wonder that is trying to pass you with only inches in a barricaded construction zone and I'm 10' or 11' wide and there is no room yet they will try and kill me to get around cause they don't want to slow down and just do the speed limit cause they are racing against the electronic clock.. Don't get me started with people on their cell phones... My favorite yelling comment is ... If I stuck that phone up your a** would it help focus on your driving ??? I've got about 50,000 miles left to get my million miles safe (no accidents no claim) and 2 yrs to get my 20 yrs with the same company I'm contracted with.. I bought a boat to decompress from my work.



I mentioned the above cause I should be working and I'm not... I should be fishing but I feel defeated and the season hasn't really begun. Of course being dead in the water floating down the Cumberland with a dead boat one day because the ignition wire plug decided ti unplug itself.. followed by next day live well over filling and over flow drain NOT working resulting in a half sunk boat in some hidden cove on OH... Talk about butt pucker factor reaching 90%... 100% would have been if I was completely underwater.



Texas, I understand all to well cause right now I need to get to work and I need to do other things around the house, but there is no drive...



I know this will pass and so will your funk... Have faith brother.



Want to hear something... My first bass, catfish or crappie (if or when I ever catch one) will have cost me aprox $18,000 so far this yr. That's 1 boat, taxes, warranties, all the stuff needed for a boat, all registrations and licenses, 3 rods and reels, and enough tackle to fish with for 3 yrs... of course I still kept all my old tackle and worms from 30 yrs ago ;)


And they say fishing is fun... fishing is relaxing... not to someone that is used to results for their investments.

I understand where you are coming from Flatline. I have a similar outlook in that failure is not an option. I'm not wired like most people. I dont just go out and enjoy a day on the lake. I do enjoy a beautiful sunrise and sunset, but other than that it's about catching fish. If I'm not catching fish then I'm not having a good time and it stresses me out. I take a lot of people fishing and I feel like I have failed them if I can't get them around fish. Now I'm not out there cursing or breaking rods or anything like that but I do take bass fishing very serious.

Was talking to a buddy last week about confidence in fishing , if I don't catch something every time out I start wondering if I actually know what I'm doing , I've had the best streak of my life the last month and a half but has done nothing for my confidence , went out yesterday for 4 hours, had to claw and scrap for three dinks , there's a tournament tomorrow at my local lake but I just don't want to join a tournament and get skunked , nit sure what that would do for my confidence

One of my issues is I've caught 7 fish over 5 lbs so far this year but 5 of them came off the bank in the exact same area , my brain is telling me its pure luck lol

My confidence comes when I figure out a solid pattern. If you see my boat running all over the lake, that means I'm catching them. I love running a pattern more than anything. It's what I live for. For example let's say this time of year I'm running short pockets or the back of big pockets with a buzzbait or a crank bait. It doesn't take me long to cover a pocket and it doesn't take me long to find the next one. Nothing in between matters to me. Every now and then I'll stop on something else very specific just to see if I can find another pattern. Don't be too hard on yourself because 4 hours isn't really that long to figure something out if your lost.

You are using buzzbaits this time of the year?

I remember you saying you like to cover water looking for aggressive fish, I probably need to adopt that approach, I think I spend too much time trying to finesse them , it catches fish but limits the quantity , so far this year I've caught one fish on a lipless crank and one on a spinner bait , everything else has come on shakeyheads, ned rigs and swimbaits , really thinking about going to Dale Hollow this weekend and forcing myself to use jerkbaits and crank baits

And I'm throwing crankbaits, spinners and jigs working down one side and up the other and I can't even get nibble. Then again I spend half the time fumbling with the damn reel.


TR, This winter has been rough... its been warm, then cold... everything is flooded and lake and river levels have been crazy. Of course the fish patterns are going to be unpredictable. You can't beat yourself up over something you don't have any control over.


I have people telling me they want me to take them out fishing on the new boat when they come to town... How am I going to show them a good time when I can't even find a lake I like that is producing anything. Personally I'm not going to worry about it. If I can't catch a bass.. I'll go catfishing. I will figure this out.

I'm throwing a buzzbait anytime the water is over 50 degrees if the conditions are right. Last week the largemouth were killing a buzzbait on Dale Hollow around buck bushes. I'm getting ready to head up there now and I plan on throwing one all day if the water is still up in the bushes and they will eat it. I fished Dale Hollow Thursday and Friday last week and almost every largemouth I caught was on a spinnerbait or buzzbait. The water was 54-56 degrees.

Started from the bottom now we here! Anyone on here under 40 may understand where that first line comes from. Man I tell you, going into last week I was as down as I could be. But now after 2 days on Dale Hollow last week and another day today; I feel like Kevin Van Dam. I absolutely crushed them on DH again today. The largemouth are in the backs of creeks and pockets on wood and in bushes. Every fish I caught today came on a spinnerbait and a buzzbait. Can't wait to get back out there again tomorrow. I think some of these fish are spawning in the bushes because I had a few roll on my buzzbait and never eat it today and they never gave a second chance. And they are very very fat. Me and a couple buddies had a tournament today and I had 21lb 15ounces for the win and 4lb 15ounces for big fish. I don't have any pictures but I do have witnesses. I told the guy that was holding my bag while I was weighing them with a scale to let me take pictures before he let them go but I guess he forgot or was upset that his 18lbs didn't win.

Going to the Hollow in the morning for SM...going to bring some BB and SB JIC. First Fish Trip this year Yea!!

What color buzzbait? I think I only have a black one but I do have spinner baits , headed up there tomorrow morning but fishing out of Byrdstown

Notorious, the smallmouth were chewing good today. I didn't even hardly fish for Them to much today and caught 10-12 and only a couple were under 3lbs. I was catching them on main lake points leading into creeks and pockets and I was also catching them on that big main lake flat covers the entire bank just east of holly creek. The key on that flat was to fish in the ditches where the ditch runs up to the bank. Every smallmouth I caught today came on a 3.8" keitech in rainbow shad color on a half ounce swimbait head.

The largemouth did a complete 360 today. I spent most of my day trying to figure the largemouth out but I just couldn't make the right adjustments from yesterday. I was catching a lot of my largemouth yesterday in buck bushes and the water fell about 6" overnight and I think that was enough to make Them evacuate the bushes. I would fish for 1.5-2 hours trying to find largemouth with very little success and then I would go smallmouth fishing for about 30 minutes and catch a few. I did that all day. I wish now I would have just stuck with the smallmouth all day. Good luck out there.

Do you guys know anything about Mitchel creek marina area of the lake? looks like its only 75 minutes from me and looks like there are a lot of small creeks


I'm debating whether to put in there or Sunset marina

Mitchell creek has some great spawning habitat in the back. I haven't been in there this spring. I've focused mainly midlake just up from Mitchell creek. It's a pretty big creek in that you could fish in there all day and never cover it all. Almost all of my experience in there is in the back 3rd of the creek. I'm gonna spend a day in there next time I go. That area of the lake produces a lot of nice smallmouth and especially that creek. I've never been as far up as Sunset so I have no experience up there.

Thank you for the advice

Fishing was tough on the Hollow, however I anticipated that with Texas saying the water was falling...with the continued drop in water SM have moved out further. No LM caught, the SM I caught were on wood and super light bites with the largest 3lb ...never felt her, they all came before 1000 on a bitisy bug...threw swim baits for about an hour and was only getting hits so I changed to the jig. Talked to a guy in a Red/White Skeeter from Gallatin...who confirmed they are on wood and super tough bite who caught 15# in hours last week. Put in at Horse Creek..SWT 55, Indian Creek 55.6, Green bouy is gone, Red Bouy is gone, Long Branch 56.3, Lick creek 56.5, Mitchell Creek mouth 57.6, across from Galton Hollow 57.6. Pdiddy and I stopped fishing at 1330 and cruzed back home. Same ol story a day...week late for the best fishing the hollow has produced in years.



Money shot with PDiddy giving SM a Kiss.

Dang I hate that Notorious. Did you fish that big flat that I was talking about? It's been loaded with SM for at least a couple weeks. Most bass boats I've seen have been fishing way out on the edge of that flat and deep water, but I've focused my time in the ditches but close to the bank and have done very well there. If for some reason your not completely understanding what I'm describing just give me a call if you still have my number and plan on going back. I was really hoping you would get on that flat and have a stellar day.

Nice fish Alpha!

Sorry Schleprock I just realized you asked what color buzzbait. I was throwing a 3/8th ounce black war eagle buzzbait. I almost always throw a buzzbait with a black blade. I always remove the skirt and add a swimbait or a frog. I've been using a 3.8" swimbait in a bluegill color at DH.

No problem, went to Mitchel Creek today , had a tough time , couldn't get a pattern going , at 2pm I was shut out and was tempted to leave , noticed that the water temps hit over 60 so I just committed to a spinner bait and started hitting every piece of wood I could find , ended up with 6 fish, all 4 largemouth were decent size between 15-18" , one 13" spot and a 12" SM

Really crazy, by 5pm the water temp was 64 degrees in the creeks

I would have had to wait in line...I was watching it...but took the same pattern and replicated it in other spots. Just old and tired and was having fun being on the water. Almost went to the fingers channels, hit the Turkey Foot and busted one. In Knoxville next Friday, Back on the hollow the next two weekends...if your up there..hollar at me and we will talk.Walleye will be on the banks at night...time to stock the freezer!