OTW Reader Submission: The Year Of...

By Joshua Farr

I confidently believe I speak for most fishermen when I say that cabin fever truly sets in just before the arrival of spring. I have personally spent the last few weeks of spare time cleaning out the tackle boxes; bags, and performing maintenance on all tackle I possess. From changing split rings and hooks, to touching up lure blemishes and recompiling the “go to” plug box, it is this time of year that invokes the most anxiety in wanting to return to the water.

Despite the anxieties of waiting on the snow to melt, the weather to warm and the stripers to arrive, it is this time of year that I reflect.

Each lure I possess has its own story, and upon annual “pre spring cleaning” I am able to put myself back in the moment. Sure (hopefully) there have been multiple fish caught on a single lure, but I can put myself right back in the best of moments just by handling a particular lure.

As I rummage through my tackle, I come across a beat-up 3 oz. Andrus Smiling Bill Bucktail (white of course). I begin my maintenance by sharpening the hook, I fill in the blemishes on the jig head with white and red sharpies respectively, I start to re-tie the bucktail to firm up the integrity and ensure I won’t be losing more strands this season, and I go back.

I go back to day one of the previous season, the flounder bite was hot in Boston Harbor but the Striper bite started slow. I was throwing the regulars (recurrently utilizing Super Strike poppers, Yo-Zuri Mag Darters and Daiwa floating SP Minnows) but to no avail. There were fish around, as I had been marking them on the finder, but they were deeper in the water column than I normally fish with lures and they didn’t seem interested in chasing what I was throwing. I needed some weight to get down to where the fish were and as a classifiable top to mid water Striper fisherman, the options in my “go to” box were limited. I plunged into an old backpack I had on my boat hoping I would find something with some weight, what I stumbled upon was a 3 oz. Smiling Bill still in the package. Additionally there were a handful of mix and match grubs I had purchased as Surfland P.I. a few weeks before. I threw a 4″ action tail grub on the bucktail jig and proceeded to try get down to the bottom of the water column.

3 oz. may seem excessive to some guys, but I normally fish the Deer Island flats which drop from 12 feet to 60 feet within a stretch of 30 yards. I threw the jig beyond the rip into the deeper water and proceeded to jig and bump the bottom all the way up ridge from deep to shallow water. Three casts in I had a more aggressive bump, as I had not fished the bottom in quite some time I was assuming a snag in the eel grass, but the rod shakes suggested otherwise. What followed was landing the first Striper of my season, a 26″ schoolie, but a fish none the less. I was ecstatic to have hooked up, as this meant the season was officially underway.

A bucktail stayed on one of my spinning rods and continued to produce time and time again for the remainder of the season, yielding a handful of 40″ fish, only switching up to a popper or plug in a blitz for some top water action.

But I digress; I realize I am in my basement at my workbench, tuning my tackle, over a month away from true spring.

For me, 2014 was the year of the bucktail, it started with a whim and wound up producing the majority of my seasons fish. It is experiences like these that lead to stories worth telling, which in turn creates lasting memories. And it’s the creation of these memories I (and I’m sure many of you) live for…On the water.

As we continue to anxiously await the return of both the spring and the Striper bite, I can’t help but think, what will 2015 be the year of?