PerchEye - Yeah man, it’s like you “owe them” the information or something. Worse yet, when they just drive off like that it’s as if they’re saying, “What the crap do you know?”
If we could get the behavioral etiquette into fishing that we have in golf, we might have something!
All we can do is teach our kids to do it the right way, I guess.
Thats way I never fish weekends or never will fish weekends! Its sure nice workin a compressed work week don’t have to bother with the weekend crowds[;)]
I took my daughter fishing last week at one of the community ponds and drilled a hole in the 1 inch ice. I caught 5 trout in 15 minutes, and that attracted the only other fisherman on the water. He came over and asked what I was using, so i told him, and I felt there was more than enough room on the dock. He went about 15 feet away and stepped on my fish on his way. He then proceeded to pound a hole in the ice with the handle of his fishing pole. It was too thick, so I offered the use of my auger. He picked it up graciously and started pounding it in the ice the same way he was with his fishing pole. I am pretty sure, he ruined my auger blades.
I dont mind telling others what I am using to be succesful, but how does everone feel about letting people use your equiptment?
If I ever loan my hand auger to a fellow angler, if I have any doubts about their experience with one I explain to them to not tap it on the ice, and why, before I ever hand it to them.
In my experience usually your “secret spots” are also someone elses “secret spots”. When you are fishing in your favorite hole and someone drills a hole close to you, usually it’s because they also know that it is a good spot.
If someone drilled a hole four feet behind my ice tent, they would be in the “Pee zone”, and they wouldn’t be very happy when I started whizzing in their holes.
I don’t think it’s too big of a deal, they are just fish, there are plenty of them, and everybody wants to catch some.
-Hookjaw-
I’m fairy certain (about 99.99% certain) that it’s not the close proximity of the drilling noise that will bother the fish. If you have ever been scuba diving or snorkeling, you will understand this.
Sound travels much differently in water than it does in air. In water, the sound travels faster and further. Divers hear prop noise all the time and beginners always think the boat is about to run over them. When they surface to see where it is, the usually see it ten to twenty times further away than they thought while hearing it under water.
The fish under your hole would hear the sound from an auger drilling a couple hundred feet away. That’s just the nature of sound waves in a liquid.
I’ve caught fish (perch and trout) while somebody was drilling a new hole within 50 feet of my location, so I truly don’t believe that the sound is a real factor in a bite shut down. But I’ve been wrong before.
I will generally observe a distance of 30 to 50 feet to the nearest fisherman or lady when I first set up on the ice unless invited to set up closer after asking how they are doing. After I’m set up and in my tent, I generally don’t get excited about others setting up close as long as their auger isn’t splashing water on my tent as it drills.[;)]
Life is just too short to get all worked up over the little things that come my way, and the older I get it seems that more and more things fall into the little category.
But that’s just me.