This will be no surprise to anyone reading this, but bass fishing is extremely addictive!!!! I have been fishing ever since I was 10 years old catching minnows with a few friends in local streams, in the…
This will be no surprise to anyone reading this, but bass fishing is extremely addictive!!!! I have been fishing ever since I was 10 years old catching minnows with a few friends in local streams, in the UK where I once lived. I moved up the fishing ladder by starting to chase bigger fish and eventually I got into fly fishing for stocked brown and rainbow trout. When I moved to Korea for work I stopped fishing for a number of years. Then one day during the end of 2005 I found a Korean fishing site that had a few guys from the U.S. and some local Korean anglers posting reports of themselves catching BASS!!!! This quickly caught my attention. Up until that point I was unaware that there even any kind of game fish in Korea.
I looked for and found a fishing store that sold some cheap rods and reels, along with a few lures ..and in April of 2006 I was fishing for Bass for the first time and actually caught one bass around 15 inches long that actually turned out to be full of eggs. From this point on I was never the same.
For the next several months I searched the internet looking for more waters that held bass close to where I lived and actually made several new friends in the process. I started to buy a new rod and reel every now and then, but good quality tackle was kind of hard to find for a foreigner in Korea at that time. I found more reports for Korean bass fishing and started to learn more about how to catch them, but I was not all that successful myself. So came the next step I told my wife I wanted a small portable boat with an electric trolling motor and in September of 2006 that became a reality. The first time on the water was an amazing feeling and I even caught 2 personal bests on that maiden voyage.
But then winter came and cabin fever hit me hard. In January 2007 I found and joined the UltimateBass.com forums and began to read and learn. This is where things really started to change. I was seeing photos of what a real bass boat looked like and I wanted a piece of the action, but I had just bought my little Portabote and the waters I fished are not suitable for a real bass boat, so I started to compromise. I turned my little 10 foot folding boat into a full, small water bass boat. See photos in another of my articles!! This article will be up shortly.
I have been a member of UltimateBass.com ever since and quickly became apart of the family there and became a Charter Member. I have made many new cyber friends there and I still learn so much from this amazing source of bass fishing information. I eventually became a Life Member and was even asked to become a part of the moderation staff which I jumped into with both feet.
Also during the early months of 2007, I found and joined a local Bass Fishing club (UBWC) of which I am still a member and the only non-Korean member. We have a small tourney each month, of which I have won once and came second in another. These 2 great finishes were a direct result of what I learned from UltimateBass.com.
To add to my addiction, in June of 2007 I actually caught and brought home with me a small 9 inch bass that I caught from a virtually dried up pond during a very dry summer season. I still have that very same bass (named TC) in my aquarium in my home and he has now reached a size of around 12~13 inches. I have learned so much from watching his behaviors during feeding and different weather changes. Find out more in another of my articles!!
After only 3 years of chasing my quarry of Bass, buying and modifying my boat and just shopping for tackle, I will be the first to admit that I am in fact addicted, my wife even asked me a few weeks ago (in a semi-serious manner) what I loved the most, FISHING or HER??
My next step is to begin making my own tackle. I will begin with making spinner baits as these are one of my favorite techniques for catching bass. Who knows what will be next , pouring plastic baits, painting hard baits to rod building??
I go fishing at every spare chance I get and one day when my working schedule suits I will begin fishing a more competitive way in the Pro/Am tournament series here in Korea.
Addicted to bass fishing??……..who me??
Steve Bell,
Bassinkorea
