With thousands of miles of coastline and literally millions of fish frequenting our waters, why is fishing one of the biggest kept secrets?
I remember my early days of salt water fishing. I begin my day driving an hour to the the bait shop for $20 shrimp, then slowly zig-zag the trailer down the ramp in reverse only to say a prayer that the motor with crank and it all be for nothing. But once the engine fired up, that’s when reality hit me… Where do I go now?
With very little knowledge on what I was doing, I reached out to coworkers and anyone else that fished for info, only to find out that they too are struggling. Or worse yet, they only knew a handful of spots but we’re in no way sharing any information about it. I always thought there had to be some sort of community of helpful people that wanted to reach out and share knowledge but I also fell short finding that needle in a haystack.
At night I would search for as many fishing videos as I could on the internet and try to do my detective work to figure out what types of areas they were catching fish in but unfortunately none of these TV shows or YouTube channels were fishing in the LowCountry or Coastal Georgia. I knew if I was going to be good at this, I had to start spending more time on the water.
I knew that fish had to eat to survive, so I began looking for areas that held bait. Once I found areas that had bait, I then mimicked those types of areas and different waters, and started charting out on a map where those trending spots were.
In the beginning, many of my fishing trips turned into nature watching trips, but as I began to look at what lies beneath the surface of the water, a picture began to form… (bait tends to hold around structure points)
Once I turned my focus to fishing around those areas, I started finding fish. Now there are many other things that go into locating fish and having a successful day out on the water but you do have to start somewhere and that was my starting point.
I soon learned the importance and the effects of current, and even figured out how fish move throughout the tides. At that point, everything seem to be coming together easier and the guy that was struggling the year before, was no longer.
It was interesting to see how those guys that would not give me the time of day in the beginning, were now wondering how I became so consistent. They soon started asking me questions just like I did in the beginning.
So how did I respond to them? You may be asking yourself… well, I decided I would chose the high route and not only help them with the algorithm, but I would also go one step further and create an environment where anglers of all levels could share a passion. This is honestly what drove me to create my LowCountryFishing Facebook group, launch my YouTube channel and begin coaching on Patreon.
A lot has happened since that day. I have networked with some of the top guys in the industry, picked up a couple nationwide sponsors, and made some amazing friends along the way. It’s crazy to think what could happen to someone if they just reached out and help their fellow neighbor.
The old Wiseman’s tale says “If give a man a fish he eats for a day, but if you TEACH a man to Fish, he will eat for a lifetime. Think about this next time someone approaches you and asks for help. We’ve all been in his shoes.