He's not that big! ok maybe he is!

     Tonight's little journey is one of is one of lots of luck and patience and help from good friends.  This story starts we 4 guys all going fishing after work.  If you remember from the last post I work third shift so when I get off work its prime time for fishing.  Back to my story.  This story is about my friend and fishing buddy Larry.  He is one lucky bastard and has a heart the size of Texas.

     Let me tell you about this lake a little.  It’s not a big lake 5 acre lake maybe.  It sits inside a city park.  Which means that as you guessed it is a heavily fished lake.  Luckily the fish still seem to be a plentiful.  The lake on one side of it has a big fountain on it and is on 24 hours a day.  There is plenty of rip rap and stuff to fish in and around.  I might not have pulled anything big out of this lake but I will tell you this it is one fun lake to fish you can almost guarantee you will catch something every time you go.  For this blog we are going to call this Fountain Lake. 

     The 4 of us all arrive at the lake by 7am poles in hand ready to catch our monster fish for the day.  Now when I say monster at the lake we were at that means a 2 pound bass.  The lake that we fish a lot of might not have a lot of big bass but has enough 1-2 pounders to make it a fun day of fishing.  We start fishing and we quickly realize that this wasn't going to be one of our good days in the first 30 minutes I lost two crankbaits one of the other guys lost a couple crankbaits one being a twenty dollar crankbait.  Don't get me started on expensive lures.  By 8am Larry and I each caught one little one pound bass.  The morning wasn't going as planned we are all losing more and more lures by this point instead of catching fish. The clock moves on and I pull in another little bass nothing to brag about. The clock nears 9am and we all decide to make our way back to the cars.  Two of the guys still hadn't caught anything and we were all getting tired.

     Two of us say our good byes and head to the cars a put our gear away and stand there chit chatting for a few minutes when all of a sudden yells for us.  I turn to him and reply "what” he tells me "I need the net out of my truck".  The two of us start walking back to him he tell us "I have a huge fish I need my net"  which I reply "he can’t be that big" and as the words are coming out of my mouth the tail of the fish smacks the surface of the water.  "Ok, maybe he is".  I grab his keys and run back to the truck to grab the net.  The three of us stand there watching this fight for about 20 minutes then it happened we got to see the fish in the water.  He’s not just big but he is HUGE.  Larry has sweat running down his face we are all excited.  None of us have ever seen a fish this big besides at places like bass pro, Cabela’s or wild life aquariums. Let alone actually catching one.  He is fighting and fighting the fish constantly trying to wear this fish out. The fight goes on for another 10 minutes, at this point one of the guys let’s call him Frank,  is standing on a huge rock bent over with the net in the water trying to reach him. This is when we realize that this behemoth of a fish was hooked near the base of its tail not actually hooked in his mouth as we first thought.  I’m standing behind Frank holding him from falling in the water.  Larry is at this point just holding the reel steady and walking backward to get the fish closer.  With every step Larry takes the fish thrashes and fights more but loses with its every move.  The fish is now in sight and in range the guy on the rock reaches down and puts the net around the head of fish.  As the net surrounds the head of this fish we all hear a lout SNAP.  Frank jerks his head away just in time to the line on Larry's reel whizzed past his head.  I grab Frank and start pulling him back towards the shore while he has the net in both his hands trying not to lose the fish.  The net starts ripping, Larry throws the rod down and rushes over and grabs the tail of the fish that was barely out of the water and starts helping pull the fish ashore.  The fish by this point has completely destroyed the net.  Now besides excitement and we are all feeling we all have a look of confusion on our face.  None of us know what kind of fish this is.  We knew it wasn’t a catfish and it wasn’t a bass. I quickly snap a picture on my phone and send it to one of my other friends still confused what it is.  He informs us it is a Grass Carp.  This grass carp was a 4 foot plus 42 pound grass carp.  It was caught on a little 2 inch crankbait. That crankbait has now since been retired after that day and sits atop his computer as a reminder of the biggest fish he has ever caught.

I hope everyone has enjoyed.  As a friendly reminder while out fishing remember the old saying "leave no trace".  If you make a mess or have trash please take it with you.  The environment will thank you.  Maybe even reward you with a new personal best catch!!  Have a great day and FISH ON!!!!!