I took the XXLFISH Challenge!

I took the XXLFISH Challenge!
By Bob Zettler
April 8, 2012


Whether you are a fisherman or hunter, it is the challenge of the pursuit that is what motivates many of us. And even though life in general can and does throw us all challenges – some days more than our share – we somehow rise to the occasion when it does and do our darnedest to either meet the challenge or beat it!

Today was Easter Sunday, a day where, according to Wikipedia, many “Christians feast and celebrate as a holiday celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” As a single parent with very few relatives still with us, I decided around Noon to head over to Lake Shelbyville to celebrate in my own fashion and try my hand at catching a limit of Crappie!

It was a rush as I didn't leave Chatham until after 1 PM and it takes me nearly 90 minutes to get there after picking up some minnows at Findlay. Yep, I have been using minnows as I am still a newbie after my 20 year hiatus from fishing and right now am focusing primarily on getting around and finding spots to fish. I decided on four dozen as I would rather have too many than not enough and headed to Wilborn with George Thorogood playing “Bad to the Bone” blaring over my stereo. Amazingly, the parking lot was not full and only four other boat trailers were there at 3 PM.

S0 here I am getting the boat ready and making sure my plug was in when all of a sudden this man appears out of nowhere (actually, he had been there all along it turns out) and says, “how is the boat?” At first I didn’t recognize XXLFISH as he hadn’t shaved today but the conversation quickly turned to what were my plans and I mentioned I was using minnows. Well, it was like I had run my fingernails down a chalkboard! It was if real men only used jigs and he even showed me what color to use and asked me if I wanted some. I declined and showed him my tackle box that contained several hundred different types of tubes and said IF I wanted to jig for Crappie, I came prepared!

We parted and I was off an running to see if my secret spot was open and was ecstatic that it was! And to pour gravy on the potatoes, the winds had died down to nearly nothing. Thank you Jesus! Well, I placed a minnow of a quarter-ounce red jig head and another on a chartreuse head and placed them into the water where I hoped the brush held fish. After a few drops and freed snags, I hooked one on the minnow but was having a darn time keeping a minnow on due to all the snags. That is when I remembered Jerry's challenge and decided to dig up a tube in the color he suggested only to discover I was down to only a handful.

Well, I put one on the Red jig head and set out to see what happens and within a couple of drops, I hooked and landed a nice over. Thinking it was probably dumb luck, I tried again and once again hooked another over! Putting the minnows aside, I began to rely solely on the jig and Good Golly, I caught seven for seven drops and they were ALL nice (overs) Crappie!!! It was minnows – 1, and jigs – 10 in short order and within the hour I had a limit and all due to my accepting XXLFISH's challenge!

Never in a million years did I think I could rice to the challenge and do so well. But when I had survived the “wrong-hole” drain plug episode the day before and kept at it to catch my limit, here I had doubled-down and did it again and all because I found the courage to face the challenge when I had limited time left in the day. Normally, I would have taken what I consider the easy way out and use my minnows but today I chose to use my jigs and caught my limit! Thank you XXLFISH.