The psychology of fishing

By Barry St. Clair

Roderick Haig-Brown was a well known and prolific 20th century writer from England who wrote a variety of books on many subjects regarding the outdoors. His two favorite topics were fishing and conservation issues involving fish habitat.

His idealism and psychology resulted from being the product of an environment and social family background that allowed him to develop high ethical standards involving attitudes towards sport fishing.

Haig-Brown grew up on a famous trout river in England among ethical mentors and that formed a basis for his lifelong devotion to conservation and fishing. It is entirely possible that his philosophy, which can be summed up by his statement that “Perhaps fishing is only an excuse to be near water…” applies to all of us who are drawn to rivers, lakes and ponds.

Haig-Brown developed the understanding that the greatest attraction for anglers is not how many fish we catch, but the opportunity to be in a pleasant, peaceful outdoor location interacting with nature.

We must take the time to pause and admire the scenery he believed. Suck in a few deep breaths and thank the Creator for an opportunity to forget the daily grind and enjoy the pleasure of spending a relaxing day on the water. This mindset is the only way to obtain the satisfaction that angling can truly provide and is the sport’s ultimate appeal. Because let’s face it, some days the fish just won’t bite and it takes a proper psychological approach to make those kind of days enjoyable.

A case in point: I had the pleasure of spending a day recently on Cedar Creek Reservoir with a gentleman and his son. Our goal was to catch hybrid striped bass. The lake has an excellent population of these hard fighting fish and about 70 percent of the trips I take during the year to try and catch them are successful.

This trip resulted from a request from an outdoor magazine I do some business with that rewards its subscribers through a monthly lottery by providing free fishing or hunting trips. A name is pulled from the magazine’s data base and the lucky person gets to go on a guided trip. It is a nice marketing technique.

I was asked to provide a free trip for a father and son from Houston, and like an idiot said yes. The reason I used the word idiot is the laws of fishing immediately moved the likelihood of my 70 percent success rate on catching hybrids to the 30 percent bracket of not catching any.

Late summer is typically a more difficult time of the year to find concentrated populations of hybrids as they have a tendency to scatter and suspend in deep water. This of course adds to the challenge and if they are in one of their finicky modes, tough to catch. It takes a proper psychological attitude to cope with these factors and yet those of us who take great delight in catching hybrids refuse to let negative possibilities limit our attempts to catch them.

After several days of heavy thunderstorms, the appointed day started perfectly. A light breeze was blowing out of the southeast and puffy, non-threatening clouds dotted the morning sky. My fishermen showed up at the dock on time and we were off for a day of piscatorial pleasure.

The plan called for using live shad to entice the hybrids because those forage fish are their favorite food. The only way to catch them is with a cast net and sometimes that can be quite a challenge.

I was pleasantly surprised to quickly find enough bait in favorite cove and we were set to find some fish. There is no substitute for experience when it comes to locating places where hybrids are known to frequent. Even though hybrids are an open water species, they do relate to certain types of structure much like largemouth bass. The ends of main lake points close to deep water creek channels, submerged islands and prominent drop-offs are all prime places to find them.

Since bait was not a problem, I was psyched about finding some hungry hybrids for my fishing partners. We roared off to one of my most consistently productive spots with high hopes. I use my fish finder to locate hybrids like a quail hunter uses a pointer. Get in the right area and finding fish is usually a sure thing. As I drove slowly across a point that has been a top producer, the screen on the fish finder lit up with the echo returns of large fish. They were there!

I tossed a marker buoy on the spot, got up wind, dropped the anchor and drifted back over them. My partners helped me bait up six rods and dropped the lively shad to just above the level where the suspended fish were holding, about 24 feet deep. Any second, I expected the rod tips to slam into the water’s surface. We waited and waited. Nothing happened. It was a perfect set-up. The only problem was the fish refused to cooperate.

This scenario was repeated multiple times throughout the rest of our time together as we moved from location to location. Find the fish; offer them their favorite food and no action. I was becoming a basket case. The only saving grace of the day was the blue catfish were biting and my fishing companions caught a dozen and a half of them.

And so it went. At the end of the day, I apologized for the lack of hybrids, but my companions were extremely gracious and thanked me profusely for showing them a good time. They told me they were happy to just be able to enjoy a day outdoors on the water together, and it was not a problem the intended species did not cooperate.

Haig-Brown was right; it’s the psychology of the situation that makes fishing a remarkable pleasure.

Barry St. Clair is a guest columnist for the Athens Daily Review. His columns appear weekly.