hammerdoc

At a private pond in Harris County, Georgia. The pond is stocked with largemouth bass as well as both standard bream and Georgia Giant hybrid bream.

Clay County lakes is a group of 3 lakes, an Upper, Middle and Lower. The middle lake had plenty of fishermen on it, so tried first the upper and then the lower lakes. Had the upper lake to ourselves, and nearly had the lower lake to ourselves.

A nice feature of Clay County Lakes is that they have depth-curve maps online (Accessed through the website) available for printout so you can plan your attack from home, and modify your attack once you're there. (No plan of attack ever survived contact with the enemy intact!)

Went down with my 4 year old daughter who is just learning to fish, hoping to catch her second fish.

I was in search of Bream. The person who put me onto this lake said there were some big ones here, especially in the lower lake.

Didn't go as smoothly as her first fishing trip on Lake Guntersville went. Spent most of the day fooling with lines, changing lures, etc.

We used surface lures, hard lures (floating and sinking), a popper, and some spinnerbaits used at varying depths. Tried the banks as well as deeper water up to about 21ft.

Tried her on worm-dunking and had the same problem I had as a young kid--the fishing equivalent of ADD. However, to be fair to her, she is just too young to sit still and watch a bobber for more than 13 seconds at a time.

In the end, got skunked as far as fish were concerned, but had a couple of really nice boat rides with my daughter. Counting this one as a success.

While visiting an old army buddy in Port St. Lucie, FL, we launched his boat from Jupiter point.

About 6 miles southeast of Jupiter, we anchored and spent the first day catching sharks. I kept 2, about 24" long each as that is all I wanted to keep and eat. However, I had never eaten shark before then--had I known how good they tasted, I'd have saved the 2 biggest, about 4 and 5 ft respectively!!!

On the second day we went 7 or 8 miles out, due east of Jupiter. There we floated and trolled and caught some nice mahi-mahi.* Mine was 4' 10" and my army buddy's was 5' 2".

*(Used the Hawai'ian name so some PETA-head doesn't start spammin' up the site 'cause he thinks we're eatin' Flipper!)

After a couple of months teaching my 3 1/2 year old daughter to throw a plastic worm across the pool, we travelled up to Lake Guntersville, AL, about 2 hours (about 1hr 20 min once I know where I'm going!).

Rented a boat, bought bait, etc. for her First fishing trip. She didn't want to get in the boat! Finally got her in the boat. Dropped anchor about 5 min from the dock in case she "freaks." Instead, she asked every 21.2 seconds to go back to shore!

Pulled up anchor and drove the boat 10 min, under the bridge and down the lake until the dock no longer in view. She settled right down and began to fish! In the end we caught her first fish up against an island about 10 min from where we put in.

The two fish caught were on leadheaded jigs (White) with blue plastic "waxworm-shaped" bait on the hook. Fished the shallows by the bank, some with steady retrieves, and some with jerks and pauses.

I caught one there too. Hers was bigger. :)

No great "wow" from strangers I'm sure, but a day I (and hopefully she) will never forget!