It’s almost like the anticipation of Christmas or your birthday when you are heading out fishing with new lures in your bag. Even if the fishing has been slow lately, I still get excited about trying out the new lures. It’s like when you buy a scratch off ticket or lottery ticket. There’s a high probability that you won’t hit the jackpot or pick all of the winning numbers, but somehow I still get giddy and excited in anticipation. That’s the same feeling I get with casting out a new lure. “This lure is going to catch the big one.”

And then nothing, no bites, not hits, no nothing. But unlike a losing lottery ticket, I can attribute the bad fishing to time of day,pressure fronts or perhaps the retrieve. I’m never disappointed in not getting action with a new lure. Perhaps tomorrow the lure will work. At least I have a new lure. Now time to get another new lure and try it out. Fishermen don’t quit. We keep buying and buying and buying new lures and bait until we hit the jackpot. Is there a Fishermens Anonymous like there is a Gamblers Anonymous? I might have a problem.

This past Saturday was an excellent day of fishing in Indiana where I live. Within an hour, I caught about two dozen bluegill, a nice white bass and about a 3-pound largemouth bass on Morse Reservoir in Noblesville, IN. The only problem, I only had an hour to fish. A front was moving through, it was nice and cloudy, it was perfect conditions for fishing. And apparently perfect conditions for a neighborhood yard sale of which I tended over for most of the day. In the end, the fishing was much more productive in the hour I had compared to the 6 hours spent at the yard sale.

It’s times like these when I wish I had a time machine or at the very least a time freezer. Sunday may have been a good day, the front had moved through and there was light rain but I was on the road visiting family. Don’t get me wrong, I love my family and I love visiting them and I don’t want to start any family wars. But if I had a time freezer, I could freeze time, visit the family, come back and unfreeze time to see if Sunday was a good day of fishing. If not, there’s always football.

Perhaps I should schedule my life around the weather and pressure fronts. If it’s cloudy, a front is moving through, or it’s lightly raining; then that is fishing time. When it’s sunny and clear skies with high pressure, that’s family road trip time. Or perhaps I could always clone myself. While one of me does everything but fishing, the other does only fishing. The only problem with that I could see is that I get jealous of the fishing me. Oh well, there’s always tomorrow or right now. Happy fishing and tight lines.

On my fishing bench in my garage I’ve got tackle, fly tying supplies, different spools of fishing lines, nets, fishing gear, assorted tackle boxes, disembodied soft plastic lizards and worms my daughter got a hold of, a bunch of fishing books and my Grandfather’s old wooden lures. My fishing bench is a nice visual timeline of the old days of fishing to the modern “can never have enough gear” days of today. While I’m not about to throw out all my cool gear, I do sometimes wonder how it was back then.

Back then, a man just needed a fishing rod and reel and some lures. It didn’t matter what brand or how many bearings his reel had (I’m guessing anywhere from one to none at all). He didn’t polarized sunglasses or a state-of-the-art fish system to track the barometric pressure, the fish, the topography and probably his car keys if he looses them. Nope. A fisherman just needed his rod and reel and some lures. And the lures were just simple wood carved pieces painted with hooks attached. They’re really quite beautiful lures and judging by the wear on them, I’d say they were also very popular with the fishes. But when you think of it, fishing really hasn’t changed that dramatically, it’s just become more commercialized. We still use a rod and a reel and we still use the style of lures they used back then like crankbaits and top waters, but the lure selection has increased dramatically and the choice in rods and reels has done the same.

The other day, my son had a piece of bamboo and wanted to make a fishing pole out of it. So I got some monofilament and tied it to the end of the stick and tied on a Wooly Bugger fly. We took it down to the lake and he tossed it out and pulled it back to shore. We didn’t catch anything but I’m sure eventually a little bluegill would have bit it and we would have had success with the most simplest of tools. An old cane pole and a Folgers coffee can full of worms, do I miss those times? Not really. But every once in a while, it’s kind of nice to think about and perhaps step down to. I think the reason so many people go fishing is because of the peace and quiet and how relaxing it is. Beneath all the shiny new gear and technology is really a simple sport that has brought joy to fishermen for centuries. So they next time, you’re cursing at your tangled line on your carbon-graphite, 300-bearing reel; take a deep breathe and appreciate the fact that you’re fishing. You can always get a better reel, but you can’t get a better past-time than fishing. Enjoy it and happy fishing.

I could explain how low and high pressure works and how it relates to cold and warm fronts and what a stationary front is and the rotation of the Earth and the Coriolis force but I won’t bore you. You don’t want to be a meteorologist, you just want to fish. So I’ll explain in fishermen terms when the best time to fish and where the fish are during different weather.

Warm fronts go with low pressure. The air is warm and moist and rising producing clouds. Cold fronts go with high pressure. The air is dry and cold producing clear, sunny skies. When a warm front is passing, the pressure drops and the fish start feeding because they know a possible storm system is approaching and they want to eat up before the lightning spooks them and the impending winds which will whip up the water making it more difficult to see baitfish. So fish on the surface or right below it when you hear that a warm front is moving in.

When a cold front is passing, the pressure rises, the clouds disappear and the fish run for cover and the deep waters. They also tend not to feed as aggressively. The fishing probably won’t be that good, but if you’re going to fish, try crank baits and jigs to go down deep. It’s also best to avoid clear lakes during cold fronts and go for the murky water lakes for any chance at catching a lot of fish.

The last front is the stationary front. A stationary front is the area between two different fronts. Neither is strong enough to push the other out of the way, so an area between the two weak fronts is the stationary front. The stationary front tends to share characteristics of both a warm and a cold front. It could be cloudy or it could be sunny. The air pressure in a stationary front is constant and unchanging. While this pressure could be high or low, fish tend to acclimate to it and begin acting like normal and eating normal. They won’t go on a feeding frenzy but they also won’t go dormant.

So to rate fronts, when you see a warm front is approaching your area, it’s probably a good time to catch some crazy feeding fish on the surface or right below. During a stationary front, the fishing can be anywhere from ok to great like during a warm front. When a cold front approaches, the fish tend to stop feeding and go to darker waters either under cover and brush or down deep. This usually is not the best time to fish. But then again, it’s never really a bad time to fish, just a bad time for catching fish.

While I love fishing topwaters and dry flies, sometimes the fish aren’t there. When there are no clouds out and the sun is shining bright, the fish tend to go to deeper waters, bottom cover and off the ledges. This is a good time to get out the crankbaits. Crankbaits allow you to fish the deep depths down to about 20 feet depending on the lip of the crankbait. Crankbaits are also popular because they mimic the bait fish the big fish go after.

The first step in crankbait fishing is to choose the right color and the right depth. Take a look at the bait fish that are swimming around or ask a fellow fisherman and pick a crankbait based on the color of the baitfish. For murkier waters, it’s sometimes good to go with a brighter color crankbait like orange, yellow or white. Using a medium-action rod toss the crankbaits up to the shore lines, along cover, down drop offs and around any deep cover like rocks, trees and brush. Crank baits work better when you retrieve them in areas where there aren’t many weeds. They tend to snag on weeds but can be bounced off the bottom because the hooks hover higher than the lip of the crankbait. Also by varying up your retrieve, you can dial in your speed and figure out how the fish are hitting. Sometimes depending on fronts and barometric pressure, the fish are moving slower and won’t go after a fast moving bait. Other times when a front is moving on and the barometric pressure is fluctuating, fish tend to go on a feeding frenzy and will go after the fast running crankbaits.

The biggest part of fishing crankbaits, as is anything involving fishing, is to learn the waters, the baitfish and ask the local fisherman what works best for them. You can learn a lot by simply taking a little time before tossing your line out to study the waters and the spots where the fish seem to congregate. Good luck and happy fishing.

Some of my favorite rods to fish with are my ultra-light rod and my 5 weightt fly rod. With the ultra-light rod, a little Rooster Tail usually gets some action. When you want to catch fish, go after the little ones. Run a rooster tail along the banks and the cover where the “bait fish” congregate. You might not catch a trophy but you’ll catch plenty of pan fish. Just get yourself a decent ultra-light rod and reel with about 4 pound line on it and plenty of Rooster Tails, grub spinners and other ultra-light lures and go have some fun.

And if you love top water action, nothing beats a fly rod and a dry fly. It doesn’t much matter what type of dry fly as long as it’s fuzzy and floats, pan fish will go after it unlike the picky trout. A decent 4 or 5 weight fly rod with floating line will work but if you want to have some fun grab yourself a 2 or 3-weight fly rod and reel. With a small weight fly rod, those tiny pan fishes will feel like big bass. Wooly buggers, streamers and other wet flies also work really well for catching pan fish.

The ultimate reward of ultra-light fishing is when you do hook into the occasional small mouth or other large fish. So if you’re feeling out of luck on the water or you just want that smell of fish on your hands, grab your ultra-light rod and reel or your fly rod and have some fun. Because in the end, fishing is all about having fun.