# Fishing Log Book.



## captken (Feb 24, 2008)

I found this reply to a question way back in Tips and Tricks. 

Hi Max,

My logs have mostly been a hodgepodge of notes, with ideas or speculations underlined. A couple of times per year, I've gone through and compiled relevant stuff. (Or that which I thought was relevant.) 

I started keeping notes as a child. I still have a drawing of the first fishing gizmo I ever made, a hook disgorger made out of a popciclestick. A lot of my short stories have come from notes made when I was a kid. Although I'd never heard the term chumming, I made reference to "Feeding hot dog buns to Bluegills then catching the heck out of them" when I was about 8.

With the advent of computers, this has become a lot easier, especially with compilation. I've thrown away many note books in the last 20 years or so as technology has allowed me to store the good stuff in electronic files.

These E-Books are the result of many hundreds of pages of my notes, read, re-read, edited and compiled. I also have a ton of information from many friends and fishing buddies who have kicked ideas around with me for most of my life. I've had some great mentors over the years and still have some. It is mighty nice to be able to have questions answered by experts. I still have access to a few mighty knowledgable people. 

Date, time, moon phase, tide phase, weather conditions, depth, water temperature, current speed and direction, observations, questions, and catch are most important.Anything out of the ordinary like "I saw 10 Ocean Sunfish,Whales, Whale Sharks or huge tide linetoday" might point to some unusual conditions that existed--possibly a spin off of the Loop Current. If something intrigues you on that day, try *(PLEASE TRY)* to get an answer that very day if possible. I have a ton of unanswerable questions because I didn't follow up soon enough.

When I was chartering, I kept up with the very basics, where, when, fuel burn, catch, crew, and mainenance problems in addition to "The Good Stuff." What worked that day was good stuff. Things mentioned in the paragraph above was good stuff too.

When you hear a fishing story that you are pretty sure is true, take a few notes. Treat this as a *DOT*. Sometime down the line, there may be enough dots to connect to give you a better understanding of what is going on. 

We are dealing with a very complex natural system. It takes a long time and a lot of data to even "Kinda prove" something. Whether you prove anything to science or posterity or not, you feed your own desire to learn something.

I've had the great good fortune to spend a huge amount of time in and on the water. My son spent time in diapers on my boat and we share the same love for our time on the water. We both know that future generations will never see what we've seen because who can afford to burn thousands of gallons of gas and diesel any more? He spends as much time as possible on the water when he is not working or with his family.

We have way more than 1000 pages of illustrated tips. How many will make it to an e-Book remains to be seen.

OK, my answer was a hodgepodge too but I am not trying to be ambiguous. Anything that makes you wonder is worth taking notes on. The biggest deal is having time to research all of this stuff. Of course, if we don't wonder, we don't learn.

Rhett and I are always open to questions. Questions make us wonder.


----------



## smooth move (Sep 25, 2012)

i've been trying to keep a good log for over a year now and it's hard to do. after fishing most of the day and clean up, i'm either too tired or i forget or i'm off to another function and don't have time. when i do have time and go back and read the entries, they all seem the same. i'm not going to stop though. i'll keep logging, maybe it will keep me from getting in the rut of always doing the same thing. i found a bound log online that's easy to use and has a place for all the info you need.www.fishtaleslog.com


----------

