While fishing for crappie in a (private) oxbow lake off the Pearl River in South Mississippi a few days ago I hooked and landed a 9 lb 15 oz bowfin. What a struggle for about 15 minutes! It hit a small inline spinner in front of a 1/16 oz jig and a chartreuse Bobby Garland plastic. The rod was a 6 ft 6 in Ugly Stik ultralight with a Sahara 1000 reel and 4 lb Vicious line. My net was too small and it was a challenge to get my hand in a gill to land it. These fish are considered rough fish, but I don’t see how any game fish could have battled any harder.
That is why I always let them go. They do not give up.
Nice fish, that had to be quite a surprise on light gear!
Jackruff wrote:
While fishing for crappie in a (private) oxbow lake off the Pearl River in South Mississippi a few days ago I hooked and landed a 9 lb 15 oz bowfin. What a struggle for about 15 minutes! It hit a small inline spinner in front of a 1/16 oz jig and a chartreuse Bobby Garland plastic. The rod was a 6 ft 6 in Ugly Stik ultralight with a Sahara 1000 reel and 4 lb Vicious line. My net was too small and it was a challenge to get my hand in a gill to land it. These fish are considered rough fish, but I don’t see how any game fish could have battled any harder.
While fishing for crappie in a (private) oxbow lak... (
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That must have been 10# of extreme fun!
They will tear up your fishing tackle, don't put your fingers in their mouth, teeth are sharp. Fun to catch, will fight till the end.
bknecht wrote:
That must have been 10# of extreme fun!
It certainly was. The lake has a good population of two-pound crappie and for a second I thought I’d hooked one of those, but soon knew it was something else, probably a channel catfish (they will hit artificial baits.). The several strong runs the bowfin made confirmed the quality of the little Shimano’s drag.
Sport
Loc: Sacramento county north. California
Jackruff wrote:
While fishing for crappie in a (private) oxbow lake off the Pearl River in South Mississippi a few days ago I hooked and landed a 9 lb 15 oz bowfin. What a struggle for about 15 minutes! It hit a small inline spinner in front of a 1/16 oz jig and a chartreuse Bobby Garland plastic. The rod was a 6 ft 6 in Ugly Stik ultralight with a Sahara 1000 reel and 4 lb Vicious line. My net was too small and it was a challenge to get my hand in a gill to land it. These fish are considered rough fish, but I don’t see how any game fish could have battled any harder.
While fishing for crappie in a (private) oxbow lak... (
show quote)
Ten#r on ultra light is pretty incredible. Good job Jack. That's awsome.
Thanks. I had another lighter rod in the boat with an even smaller reel loaded with 2 lb test line. I doubt there would have been a favorable outcome if I had been using that rig!
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