What's old is new again

Second Potomac smallmouth ... for the year.
At least it was a good fight.

Another close-to-uneventful fishing trip over the weekend on the Potomac.  I managed to catch one smallmouth bass just before I was going to call it quits Sunday morning.  The fish was about 11 inches and made a couple nice leaps from the water. 

It fell for my original "secret weapon" -- a Berkley Gulp! Nightcrawler.  When I started fishing again a few years ago, I used these with very good results.  However, the plastic material is really soft -- wouldn't be out of the ordinary to lose the worm on just a bite.  Eventually, I went to using the Z-Man Finesse TRD worms, which are much more durable and catch fish, too.

My first secret weapon from 2015 caught fish again in
2019 -- a Berkley Gulp! Nightcrawler.

I still had a bunch of 2015 Gulp! worms marinating in their tub and figured I'd try them since nothing else seemed to be working on the Potomac.  That one fish was the only bite I had.

I also landed something else -- a crankbait and small spoon-looking lure.  I noticed an orange spot just in the water in front of me and snagged it with the end of my fishing rod.  Both lures were tangled together with frayed fishing line, so I'm guessing two people fishing together got their lines crossed or something.  The hooks didn't have any rust, so lures had not been in the river for very long.

The crankbait is a Bandit 100 and happens to be the same model as two I recently ordered from Susquehanna Fishing Tackle, although it's a different color.  One from the order is "Black" (seriously, that's what the color pattern is called ... not "Midnight" or "Stealth" or "Dark Matter" or something catchy), the other is "Blue Splatter Back," and my freebie looks like "Spring Crawfish Yellow."

Sweet!  Free lures!  A Bandit 100 shallow crankbait
and a spoon thing.  Of course counting all the lures
I've lost on the Potomac this year, I'm nowhere close
to breaking even.

No idea what the little spoon is, but it's probably a sunfish or crappie lure.

Saturday evening, was even less eventful.  I didn't catch a thing, and neither did Karen.  I was more annoyed by getting pushed out of an area by a mother and father who apparently encouraged their six kids to "swim" out in the river further and further as close to the guy (me) who was wading in the river.

I love people.

In hindsight, I should have tied on something with multiple treble hooks and used them as target practice casting to them as close as I could.

The countdown is still ticking, though!  Less than two weeks as I'm writing this, and Karen and I will be fishing on Rainy Lake!