[yakattackabass]

Well, I finally made it to the lake at 10 AM Sunday. When I left the dock, a shore fisherman showed me a 4ish pound bass and a 2 ft pickerel a guy who was anchored just off the dock had just caught on what they thought was a chartreuse spinnerbait (he had given them to him). Needless to say, I tied one on and tried my luck. Nothing. I headed up the lake and wasn't getting bit at all when I ran across a man and his two sons with a john boat and a dead trolling motor battery (he only had a trolling motor). He asked if I could tow him in and I said I was sorry but that would cut severely into my fishing time. But after watching him and his sons paddle in circles trying to get somewhere I decided to help him. I felt bad turning them down, I wasn't catching anything anyway and I also figured it might be a sign I should fish the lake south of the dock instead of north where I was. When we got back, someone had just caught a 6.5 pound bass from the dock using a crawfish on a C-rig. I motored out to the spot where he said he had caught it (he very kindly directed me) and hooked a 1ish fish on a C-rig but no others. I tried deep cranking, C-rigging and T-rigging down the lake but no luck. It was a windy day and as luck would have it, I hadn't brought my anchor! Finally, I practically beached the boat on a point near the old river channel and caught another 1ish fish on a C-rig. I was ready to leave but I made two more casts with a drop shot rig and caught one last smaller one. Tough day but at least I got a few!

 

[wademaster]

Sounds like the docks were the place to be! Nice job helping those folks out, it'll come back to you!

 

[yakattackabass]

Thanks! Yeah, I think it already did since my luck changed after that.

 

[SurfRider]

yeah that's a tough one, I have been there as well. Had a short window to fish and ran across a lady and her 10-ish year old and two younger kids (2 paddling one board together) daughters paddle boarding; they had (in my opinion short-sightedly) paddled with the wind for the first part, but as the wind had picked up (as it had been forecasted to do) they were struggling to make any headway against the wind at all while trying to get back. The kids were clearly getting frustrated and tired and were probably 100 yards behind the Mom. The Dad apparently had already made it back much closer to the marina. I felt really bad for the kids, annoyed with the Mom for leaving them to paddle for themselves, and really irritated with the Dad for basically what I took to be poor planning and poor execution of a family outing. Basically I could stop and take the time to tow them all in, or fish. I would not have time for both.

I decided to tow them all in. The Mom was grateful, the kids were very grateful (the 10 year old took the time to come up to me and tell me 'thank you' herself as I was trailering), and the Dad was conspicuously aloof. Dunno if he was just a d-bag or if he was irritated at me, or himself for letting this whole debacle go down, or what... I'm no psychologist.

Had to take the satisfaction of helping someone and leave it at that, just like you did.
For the record, I think you did the right thing and the better thing. I did too, but the Dad's reaction did not help enhance that very much.

I was always taught that when you're out on the water, you always help people who need help, period. It's just an unwritten rule of water-born sports and boating, I guess. Same reason boaters almost always wave when they pass another boater... just something that people do.

Some days it's harder or more inconvenient to help than others, but it's worth doing. Kudos to you.

 

[jerry condrey]

Good for you. I and a friend once saw a boat going in circles on Badin. It was October, nearly dark, we rushed to the spot, and I crawled in and cut the boat off. There was a man and his son in the water, very nearly ready to go down, they were shaking and incoherent. We towed them in and warmed them up with a fire.