Time on the water is key to competitive angling success.
Sport fish are no different than any other wildlife, in that for the most part, they are governed by their biology. This point is important to us as anglers because it tells us one key thing, that the behaviour of the target species you are after can be predicted. To achieve the primary goal of ‘finding the fish’ one needs to start somewhere and there’s no better place to start than with some good-old science. At the very least, a knowledgeable angler armed with even the most basic information can begin deciphering fish tendencies, habits, and patterns on a given body of water.
Many will agree that there is nothing more satisfying for an angler than hooking into a fish that they ‘knew’ would be there. There are however a good number of non-angler people, and surprisingly a few anglers as well, that are of the opinion that sport fishing is an exercise generally dependant on the concept of luck. While there is no denying that an element of so-called luck is involved, the consistent and routinely successful anglers didn’t get to be just that by random chance.
To help illustrate the skill versus luck aspect, the example I often give is anyone who is beyond a novice angler has come to have certain ‘favourite spots’ and also has decidedly preferred techniques and lures. This is more than likely due to having some angling success and contrasting those experiences with the not so successful ones and coming to a conclusion as to what will and won’t work. This is also known as putting time on the water which is an invaluable skill to develop in this sport.
The lucky angler will count on their formula working to achieve success. When it doesn’t, they shrug their shoulders and blame is attributed to variety of well-known fishing excuses like ‘they weren’t biting today’ or ‘the fish weren’t there’ and such. In comparison, the skilled angler will have a variety of formulas in their arsenal to try in a continuous effort to unlock the mystery of finding the fish and getting them to bite on any given day. The expression ‘they are always biting somewhere’ is never more evident than during a competitive event where there are always those few who manage to find ‘em even though fishing was tough for the majority of the field.
In the world of competitive fishing, there are numerous different styles and methods of competition. Less competitive events have no clearly defined target species and require less fish caught to win. Generally speaking, the closest thing in this sport to a game of chance is the ever popular biggest fish ice derby. Drop your line into your assigned or selected hole and hope for the best. Even then, there is still some skill involved as an angler needs to be able to present a suitable offering, have the equipment/tackle to be able to get fish topside, and then the knowhow to successfully fight a fish that has the potential to win an event.
Open water shore or boat derby competitions involve the same idea where the goal is to catch that one big fish. The level of skill required to be able to compete begins to go up considerably at events classified as tournaments. These events target specific species and have bag limits of generally four or five fish per angler/team. Tournaments also have very specific rules to adhere to such as boundaries, hours of competition, slot sizes, and live bait or artificials only stipulations.
To be successful at this level, an angler needs to go into the competition with some kind of game plan or program. There is a markedly big difference between being able to catch dozens of walleye at dusk on a lake in stable conditions with no one else out there, compared to competing for those same fish against one hundred and twenty-four other teams during office hours and in any weather that mother nature chooses to dole out on the day of the event. A good angler can ‘go in blind’ and have a great tournament day, especially if it’s on a waterway that they have plenty of experience on, but evidence that a top finishing angler or team are truly patterning fish is once a tournament goes into the two, three, or even the four day range. Even more difficult yet, are the feats of those in the upper echelon of competitive anglers that are able to string a series of top performances at tournaments over the course of a season and over the course of a career.
Names that regularly appear in the upper portion of tournament standings from the club level, to regional trails, to national scope professional tours have one thing in common: they have the ability to find their own fish. This means that the top sticks do not rely entirely on community spots, dock talk, fishing memories, or a follow the leader mentality. They take into consideration any factors that they deem are relevant for that specific body of water and time of year and then test their theory on the water. Every bit of information gleaned is then applied towards the puzzle of finding the right fish to win. Within a relatively short amount of time, top tournament anglers can eliminate chunks of real estate on a map and focus their efforts on higher percentage water and narrow down strategies and techniques. By spending some practice time pre-fishing on a body of water, these anglers have proven to be the best amongst their competitors at analyzing and dissecting a multitude of variables to formulate a game plan and then go out and successfully execute during a competition.
I’ve had many people look at me in bewilderment over the years when I say that I am hitting the water to ‘practice’ for a tournament. They wonder how one can practice for a fishing event when their impression is that all that is required is to drop a baited hook into the water and wait. I then get into explaining how a successful angler needs to take into consideration an almost infinite list of factors including forage base, spawning cycles, habitat preference, and seasonal migrations to name just a few. Current weather patterns, baitfish/insect cycles and population, water levels, type of waterbody, water temperature and clarity, bottom composition that your quarry are relating to, angling pressure, wind direction, and the list goes on and on. These are not to mention the endless equipment, tackle, boat control, and tournament strategy factors to take into account and fine-tune in time for tournament morning takeoff.
The principle is sound, to be a consistently successful angler you need to put the time in on the water and learn from it. Nonetheless, doing everything theoretically right still won’t guarantee that you will get into a huge school or hook into a big one. Realistically even the best anglers in the world are always learning, honing their skills, and applying new concepts and strategies because they too get stumped some days. What you are doing by approaching sport fishing in this way, however, is leaving a lot less of your shot at success to chance and instead maximizing your odds of ‘finding the fish’.
Eric Labaupa is the creator and editor of the website Kickerfish.ca. Check it out to find out more about all things competitive fishing in Central Canada.
