The Spoonpluggers Forum

New to website but not to Spoonplugging. Learned about it back in mid 70s from Fishing Facts mag, intrigued by anything written by Buck Perry. Bought the green book and was hooked. Grew up in east Nebraska with not much fishing water close by. Bought a 13 ft aluminum boat with 10hp motor, old style flasher. Moved young family to South central Texas in 1980. Was excited about a big flatlander just 12 miles from home with good water color and not too deep. Struggled at first with trolling spoonplugs, couldn’t get proper running depths. Wrote a letter to Buck when ordering more spoonplugs. He wrote back in a letter pounded out on that old typewriter patiently explaining to me that the braided line I was using was not suited for trolling and suggested the No-Bo. That helped and got the lures running properly. This Yankee transplant made a lot of mistakes early on. No-one I talked to had heard of Buck or Spoonplugging and none were willing to give it a go. I did fish on occasion with friends in their big comfortable bass-boats but was frustrated with their methods and aversion to trolling. When I wanted to spoonplug, I was on my own. After a couple years and hundreds of hours on that big flatlander with very little to show in catches, I finally gave up and threw in the towel. Except for a couple offshore saltwater charter excursions, I gave up fishing for the next 25 years. Then about two years ago I rediscovered fishing in a way. Couple trips to a good friend’s resort on Leech lake and fishing last summer here in Texas on his ranch pond (caught over 100 LM 2-3 ½ lbs out of that ‘tank” as they call them here). Going through shoulder surgery in December and still in a long rehab, I was searching the house for the old green book, but never found it or the old letter from Buck I know is folded inside it. I did come across the Home Study guide I’d bought years ago and went through all 9 volumes again, still priceless information! Watched way too many fishing TV shows on the Dish, would get annoyed with all the mis-info and product hyping and that’s when I found this website. At last, real fishing knowledge, freely shared by people who seem to care about keeping it going. Here’s where I have a problem. As I approach retirement and seriously consider getting back into real fishing, I’m thinking about getting another boat and Spoonplugging again. Mentioned it in passing to the wife and got “the look”, you know what I mean.
If I do take the plunge again, I feel like there were some lessons learned from my mistakes:
1. Don’t try to go it alone, hook up with a certified instructor in your area, join the official spoonpluggers group and locate nearby spoonpluggers in your area. They seem to be more than willing to share their knowledge and are a very unselfish bunch of people.
2. Use the right equipment – trolling effectively requires the proper tools for the job.
3. Buy a boat and motor suited for the water you’re going to be fishing, my long ago sold first rig was too small for the bigger waters I tried to fish here. It’s a matter of boat control versus safety, gotta be smart.
4. Depth and Speed controls are primary, color and action and all the other stuff are just aids.
5. Don’t get stuck on just one body of water, move around a little bit and try different things.

Hello Koz, Welcome to the forum. Glad to have you. Your right about the friendly sharing of knowledge on this site. I hope you can get your boat. I've had the wrong boat for over a year but I couldn't afford a new one so I made the best of it. I just ordered a new jon boat and I know it will help me continue to improve. Get the Green Book as soon as you can so you can carry it around with you and get some reading in whenever you get a chance. If your ever in Southern California, give me a call and we can go out Spoonplugging together.
You should try to get a copy of John Bales DVD'S when you get a chance. He is a Certified Spoonplugging Instructor and is one of the main leaders, now that Mr. Perry has passed. Also, you should join the NSOA at www.nsoa.info when you get a chance. It's less than $50 and it helps support the Newsletters, etc. Finally, I don't know if you have a copy of Don Dickson's tapes, but he has old stuff that is very helpful. Take care for now and glad your getting back into it. Kevin McClure

Welcome! As Kevin pointed out, John's DVDs are great aid to include in the learning material in the books. It's all in the books but I'm a visual learner and seeing the fish finder, at the same time as the boat trail laid out on the map, and the rod tip all in a single shot really showed me the procedure of mapping out a structure. These DVDs really helped me to visualize what I should be doing.

Hi KOZ And welcome. I grew up in Erath CO. swimming in tanks. Please put a name on the big flatlander? Bob

Bob - name of the Texas flatlander is Lake Somerville located about 12 miles north of where I live in Brenham and around 30 miles west of College Station Tx. Pretty wide open and subject to the breezes we get down here, was often too much for the small boat I used to own. Size is 11,500 acres with 85 miles of shoreline, decent water color back when I fished it but I've heard they now have alot of hydrilla and hyacinth which may have cleared the water somewhat. Max depth is down by dam around 25' in old creekbeds. I often had trouble locating the creek beds with my flasher (siltation?) Impounded in 1967 and was a hot LM lake for awhile, lots of yearlings, shallow cover etc. But as the years past it got alot tougher for most fishermen. Lake has LM, white bass, crappies, hybrid stripers, and some good sized catfish. Been at least 25 years since I've been on it.
I did get down to Lake Fayetville south of here a couple times, pretty good population of LM, Florida strain with alot of 10+ pounders. Power plant cooling lake that's a little smaller and has better protection from the wind when it blows.
Note - I've been fooling around with posted link by the Site Admin to the Navionics website. Both these lakes are mapped with 1 foot detail, very interesting.

Kevin and Consigliere : Thanks for the welcome. For the time being until I get the use of my left arm back in about 3 months just thinking about the boat deal. It will certainly be a used one, probably a jon boat around 14-16" with a 25-40 hp motor, tiller steering of course. I'll be ordering another copy of the Green book this week. John Bales videos seem to be getting positive response from everyone. Are the older Don Dickson recordings on DVD or videotapes, not sure I even have a VCR anymore? I will also eventually get signed up with the National Spoonplugger group as it seems a good way to find out if there are fellow SP nearby.
Consiglere - seem to recall you're in Canada, Montreal? (I lived there for about 4 years back in the 90's)

Also anyone know what happened to ol Doug Bush? Haven't seen anything lately posted by him, too bad as he has a sharp pen and makes me laugh.