Fishing Ledgers
I'm thinking about firing up a fishing ledger for my boat, to help track what's working and what's not....so I can try to figure out why. I was wondering how many others keep some kind of ledger? If you do, what do you document?
I used to keep one in my boat in a notebook. There are probably apps that help with this now, but I haven't used them. I would track the day's weather conditions, note each fish catch: size, water depth, water clarity, key geographic features (point, grass, bridge, etc), lure, lure color, action/retrieve speed. In retrospect, I would have done well to also stop at the end of the day and make notes of things that absolutely didn't work for that season/conditions. Some key things I learned from this: I hardly ever caught a largemouth that wasn't in the shade on Lake Norman, except around the spawn & shallow crankbaits on long tapering points caught far more fish than I would have guessed throughout the year.
Thanks Jason - I'm pretty sure I'm going to take a run at keeping one of these. I don't have a very good track record with this after trying and failing to do something similar with all the backpacking and mountain climbing I do. However, a fishing ledger seems a little easier cuz I would just be logging details (when, where, weather, how many and using what), instead of trying to describe what I'm seeing/doing. We'll see. I like the idea of logging what didn't work. A person can learn just as much from that as they would with what worked. Thanks again.
I'm going to be doing the same thing this year. I'll take day to day notes and when I get home, put them all in a spreadsheet on the computer. I also like the idea of what didn't work. Whether it was the wrong pattern, wrong time of year, or just the wrong lure. It would be a learning tool as well.
