It was mid July '09 and my friend Gary asked me if I'd like to fish a lake near his home. The day was a Sunday and we'd meet around 3:30 pm and drift fish soft shell crabs. Things looked really promising for us. We would have four poles drifting from his boat in about 20 feet of water. The first hour went by and we talked of what we had been doing at work and for fun. But no fish. I had expected to be loosing more bait, but the crabs were out lasting our casts. I remarked we might not be able to use up all the bait at this rate. Another hour pasted and we had to motor back into the deep water. The breeze was slight but moved our drift south parallel with the shore. We spoke of Spiritual life an what we might plan for the future. But no fish. I tried to lure some pike with a few different spoons. The casting lasted a short time and I went back to the crawdads. It was my job to figure out the correct fishing depth. Then finally a hit, and one pan fish was ours for supper. We motored back out to deep water and by now it was 6:00. Our conversation slowed as we were running out of topics, but our patients paid off. Another large blue gill and then another, but my count was still at zero. 

I rigged up a chartreuse spoon in front of my bait and tossed it ahead of our drift. I let it fall to the bottom, about 15 feet to the weeds below. Then as we drifted over it, I let more line out until the length of the drift about 30 feet or so. I wanted to be sure it was just above the weeds. Before long I could feel hits with every cast, but no fish. The next time I was sure I had a fish biting, I let more line out and then... "fish on". It was a nice size Perch. Again my tactic was right on and it revealed a 12 inch Large Mouth Bass. Then for a third time, before we ran out of drift, I landed a good size Rock Bass.

What fun! And a good fish dinner was had. Thanks to my friend.