By Brian Waldman
One sinker, one hook, and one worm. Kind of reminds me of a George Thorogood song. In actuality, it has been my 'Modus Operandi' the last couple evenings. It's easy to get wrapped up in all marketing, glitz and glamour that can be bass fishing, but catching fish can really be as simple as the opening sentence to this post. I've snuck out for an hour or two each of the last few afternoons with nothing more than a one bag of soft plastics, a couple hooks and sinkers thrown inside, all tucked in my back pocket along with a pair of long nose pliers. About as simple an operation as you could ask for, and I have been rewarded with 36 more bass for the effort (or lack there-of).
These have been bank trips, and what I've found is that a simple presentation that allows you to slow down and explore your waters a bit more can be a rewarding experience. Most of these fish are really coming off just a handful of spots, some obvious and some not. But being on the bank and only carrying one bait to fish with has allowed for a more thorough understanding of just how simple fishing can be. The old F+L+P=S formula revisited. Two small rock points guarding the entrance of a beach, a line of riprap bolstering the base of a launch ramp and a nice drop-off bordering the edge of a spawning flat have produced all the action. When you don't have 150 horses at your beckon call, or a button under your foot controlling 74 pounds of thrust, ready to instantly whisk you down the bank to the next good piece of cover, you get the opportunity to slow down and learn intimate things about your water that the bass already know.
Hank Parker once made the statement that 80% of all the lures we carry are 'defensive', meaning we only carry them 'just in case'. This reminded me of the Pareto Principle, or the Rule of 80-20. It has become a managerial and business buzz-word, but has found applications in many other scenarios. Also known as 'the law of the vital few', it basically states that 80% of all outputs or results can be generated by or with only 20% of the resource(s) or effort. Simple examples include 80% of a companies sales generated by just 20% of its top sales people; Wearing 20% of your clothes 80% of the time; Or even spending 80% of your time with just 20% of your friends and acquaintances. These numbers are not fixed rigidly at 80:20, as you could argue 75:25 or 90:10. The primary principle being a minimal amount of resources/effort generating a large majority of all results.
So how does this apply to fishing? As Hank stated, in reality, we all probably use many fewer lures than we actually carry or own, all just 'because'. If you want to talk tackle management, analyze your lure usage this season or last. How many actual baits did you use versus how many you carried with you on a trip? When I learned of this principle many years ago, I actually sat down with my records and did a Pareto analysis. A buddy and I fished a local jackpot tourney every week on the same lake, along with a couple weekend tourneys every month. Over a period of 4 years we cashed 56 checks for nearly $9,000 dollars on just this one lake. So I documented what every keeper we caught over those 4 years was caught on. Then I 'threw out' all the fish caught that didn't directly result in a check. After entering all this data in a spreadsheet and graphing the results, it turned out that 80% of all the money we won could be accounted for with just 4 baits. If we dropped down and picked up 5th bait, that moved the percentage up to 90%. When all was said and done, we could have literally carried just 5 baits in a paper sack to every tourney over the years and done nearly as well.
Which gets us back full circle to one sinker, one hook and one worm. Take some time and analyze your fishing records and see if you don't catch a majority of your bass on a minority of your baits. Consider simplifying your approach and your tackle, and see if you don't catch as many fish without all the 'baggage' and decision-making that comes with carrying a giant “tackle management” system.
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