Fwamp Sishing

Swamp fishing. Not everyone has done it. Yet, for those that enjoy fishing in the first place, and no, bow fishing is not really fishing, it's more like.. well, it's more like SHOOTING fish, you really need to try swamp fishing . It's like fishing in a creek that is like a lake. And it's not easy til you know what you are doing. Then it is easy because you know what you are doing. See, the key here is to know what you are doing. If you don't, then you're just flogging the cat, so to speak.

Lakes are easy to fish, but unless they are big lakes, then they are somewhat small and limiting. Since I don't have a big boat (but I know how to row it, if you know what I mean) I prefer the smaller lakes. They're pretty easy. Just hit the edges of the grass, submerged trees, or drop offs. Show extreme patience when using rubber worms or top water plugs and never, ever be afraid to just chuck a good crankbait out there to see what happens.

Rivers and creeks are more difficult, for me anyway. I don't know if it's the moving water or what, but the dynamics are such that I catch a lot less fish on them. But I am always way, way farther from the truck when it starts to rain like a cow pissing on a flat rock. So there is that.

Anyway, the swamp will have a creek like element to it, in addition to the wide expanses of shallow water. I had middling luck fishing the less obstructed creek-like part, but nothing that set the world on fire. Til one day, when I was following a guy in a nice fiberglass bass boat. And why he put that nice, expensive boat in that little meandering speck of a creek is beyond me. But there he was, bigger'n Dallas.

Since I couldn't get around him, I was forced to fish behind him. He was pulling some in, but not that many. Seemed to me that there should be more little fishies in there. It was just too good looking water to only be producing a few. So I got me out a yellow-green grub with a black stripe, on a black jig head with a red eye. And a small spinner. Then I just drifted, letting ol' boat boy slowly but surely pull away from me.

Since I was drifting, I had the time to cast around each cypress tree, and it's knees, six, seven or even eight times. Which caused me to learn that the Dorcheat must feed pretty good if you're a fish. 'Cause them bass would not chase anything. But if you put it in front of their nose, which you would eventually do if you cast six, seven or even eight times around the same tree, they'd hit it just out of meaness. That was a breakthrough.

Then, because I have a tendency towards mediocracy or below, I laid a bad cast out there. Instead of laying it alongside the cypress tree, I thunked it right smack into the middle of the trunk. It dropped straight down, falling like a dead bug. And a bass hit it hard before it even got wet good. "Hmmmm", thinks I, "Was that a fluke, or was it just good strategy? Let us see."

And that's how I found that by making the fish think food was falling from the tree, I got more, and more agressive hits. Life is good when you are swamp fishing in Northwest Louisiana. It's a sportsman's paradise, you know.

Alone

The smokey streaks in the sky was rain
Beat down hard on the window pane
Window pane is the easy kind
Sometimes it feels like your heart has died
Dead or else it's closed up tight
Ain't gonna split no hairs tonight
Don't look back. You can't go home
Just that way when you left alone

The lights ahead are another town
The miles get lost and turned around
Tossed around and all mixed up
All that's sure is your coffee cup
Coffe cup that's a trusted friend
Been with you through thick and thin
Thick and thin. Dusk and dawn
Just that way when you left alone

Little girl was the crying kind
That's what helped make up your mind
A man with this much left to see
Is a man with too much energy
She called you names, she called your bluff
She called the cops when you got too rough
You never really liked her tone
And that's why you took off alone

The sun rise up over sugar cane
Long, hard road but you're glad you came
No such thing as too far south
Except for when the road runs out
Smellin' like it'll rain tonight
But that don't call for compromise
A compromise ain't wrote in stone
Just that way when you left alone

Gimme a nickle. Gimme a dime
Gimme a heart I might call mine
Might call mine if some damn fool
Don't point out lies I've passed as truth
If it's truth you feel that must be told
It still won't keep away the cold
A cold that chills you to the bone
Cold, hard fact: You left alone

Don't look back. You can't go home
Just that way when you left alone

Ed
Pascagoula, Mississippi

Starting off slow then tapering off, out
Ramblin' Ed