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Post by Village Idiot on Oct 2, 2022 20:46:42 GMT -5
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Post by amanajoe on Oct 2, 2022 21:15:48 GMT -5
$150,000 cash and a bunch of prizes and sponsorship.
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Post by Marty on Oct 2, 2022 22:17:48 GMT -5
$150,000 cash and a bunch of prizes and sponsorship. I think their tournament days are over. |
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,921 
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Post by Dub on Oct 3, 2022 0:22:04 GMT -5
Bass fishing is like the pro golf tours. Top competitors receive millions of dollars. Here's an article from 2020 listing the ten highest-earners in pro bass fishing. www.fieldandstream.com/story/fishing/the-highest-earning-professional-bass-fishermen/Someone named Kevin VanDam is listed as the top earner at a total of $6,842,926. The tenth place earner didn't even clear three million. Talk about a loser. So winning a fishing contest may not be that important to you and me but it motivates some people. |
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Post by drlj on Oct 3, 2022 7:21:02 GMT -5
People will cheat at anything. There doesn’t have to be money or prizes involved.
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Tamarack
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Ancient Citizen
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Post by Tamarack on Oct 3, 2022 9:01:51 GMT -5
Seems to me that tournaments, with high-powered bass boats churning up the lakes, defeats the purpose of fishing, which Izaak Walton saw as a contemplative activity (although a multi-million dollar industry disagrees with me).
Kevin VanDam is a local boy. West Michigan Dutch. Lives between here and Kalamazoo. I don't know him.
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Post by dradtke on Oct 3, 2022 9:13:48 GMT -5
The only fishing contest I know of is a number of years back folks in Brainerd held an Al Lindner look-alike contest. Al came in second.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,921
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Post by Dub on Oct 3, 2022 10:32:57 GMT -5
Seems to me that tournaments, with high-powered bass boats churning up the lakes, defeats the purpose of fishing, which Izaak Walton saw as a contemplative activity (although a multi-million dollar industry disagrees with me). Kevin VanDam is a local boy. West Michigan Dutch. Lives between here and Kalamazoo. I don't know him. As I recall, this whole thing started with a man named Buck Perry. Perry was the inventor of the Spoonplug lures and the father of structure fishing. It was Perry who first realized that fish don’t just swim randomly around in a lake and that 90% of the water in a lake contains no fish. Fish have “home” areas and marked routes they use to move around feeding or resting. His Spoonplugs were designed to allow a fisherman to map the structure of a lake bottom before the advent of SONAR devices. Perry used small, slow boats and trolled his Spoonplugs to map a lake bottom. One of his tricks was to visit lakes that had become so unproductive that they were going to be drained, emptied of silt and debris, and refilled and restocked. Perry would fish the lake for a few days catching his limit of very large fish each day. Perry inspired others to approach sport fishing in a more scholarly fashion and soon high speed bass boats with SONAR and live wells were everywhere. DNRs started publishing contour maps of lake bottoms and lures became tools designed to effectively reach particular fish habitat, weeds, rocky ledges, sunken trees, etc. Suddenly, anyone willing to learn the science could catch fish. It wasn’t just sitting on the bank waiting for a nibble. The rest is history. |
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Post by james on Oct 3, 2022 11:52:59 GMT -5
Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse are still making enjoyable little fishing programmes. Here's a fairly recent one. No lead weights.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,921
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Post by Dub on Oct 3, 2022 12:54:56 GMT -5
Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse are still making enjoyable little fishing programmes. Here's a fairly recent one. No lead weights. Love it! My new (only) favorite fishing programme. |
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Post by james on Oct 3, 2022 13:36:41 GMT -5
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Post by dradtke on Oct 3, 2022 13:55:19 GMT -5
Perry inspired others to approach sport fishing in a more scholarly fashion and soon high speed bass boats with SONAR and live wells were everywhere. I knew a guy who once caught a fish so big he had to cut it in half to make it fit in his live well. |
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Post by millring on Oct 3, 2022 18:40:31 GMT -5
Perry inspired others to approach sport fishing in a more scholarly fashion and soon high speed bass boats with SONAR and live wells were everywhere. I knew a guy who once caught a fish so big he had to cut it in half to make it fit in his live well. Lengthwise or widthwise? |
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Post by Village Idiot on Oct 3, 2022 19:15:31 GMT -5
Perry inspired others to approach sport fishing in a more scholarly fashion and soon high speed bass boats with SONAR and live wells were everywhere. I knew a guy who once caught a fish so big he had to cut it in half to make it fit in his live well. Reminds me of the time that when I guy finally got his fish into the boat the lake was ten feet shallower. |
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Post by drlj on Oct 3, 2022 19:45:22 GMT -5
You guys ever fish with dynamite?
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Post by Village Idiot on Oct 3, 2022 20:25:35 GMT -5
No, but I know some rubes who have fished in a shallow river for catfish with a car battery.
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Post by david on Oct 3, 2022 21:07:15 GMT -5
VI,I am with you: Fishing, to me, was a pure recreational activity. Just doing it for the joy of it. It comes close to religion for me. Not that I am a good fisherman, it is just that there are some things that are pure, simple activities. I understand that there are tournaments, but cheating to win at fishing is an anathema to me. Perhaps it is because I fished alone or with friends, and I would not consider lying about my catch. Bullies, braggarts, and boastful winners, have changed the world. I do not like it. I hope we can return to a day when honesty, humility and grace will be an aspiration. |
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Dub
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I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
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Post by Dub on Oct 3, 2022 21:47:19 GMT -5
You guys ever fish with dynamite? No one in town could catch any fish except for one man. Curious, the game warden asked him how he did it. The man told the game warden that he would take him fishing the next day and show him how it’s done. Next day they went out and once they got to the middle of the lake the man took out a stick of dynamite, lit it, and threw it in the water. After the explosion fish started floating to the top of the water and the man took out a net and started picking up the fish. Horrified, the game warden told him that this was not just illegal but a demonstration of very bad sportsmanship. He continued to berate the guy for a while. Finally the man took out another stick of dynamite, lit it, then handed it to the game warden and asked, "Are you going to fish or just sit there and talk?" |
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