Field Work

On Wednesday night, Garrett and I went fishing under the bridge to complete some field work and found a mentor in the process. He told us he fishes under the bridge almost every night and the best working bait at the moment was cut shad. Our mentor had just gotten done from soccer practice and special Olympics training, he actually graduated from Kennedy in 2004 and was a basketball and football manager during high school. He told us you could get a good amount of bait behind the Quaker oats factory. He also told us who people have been treating the ecosystem under the bridge, leaving their trash and left over bait and supplies laying around. This not only makes a mess but it also leaves behind certain unpleasant smells. Unfortunately we couldn't catch a fish Wednesday night but the experience and knowledge we gathered from this trip will be very important in future trips. Just to compare we asked our mentor what kind of tackle or gear he's been using under the bridge and it turned out he uses just about the exact same tackle we use. He even showed us where people have been getting the most bites lately. We asked him if he had been fishing anywhere else so far this year and if there were any places catfish might be more active. He told us he's taken a couple trips to the Cedar River in Palo so far this year and the fish have been really active up there already, but for him being under the bridge is his money spot. So far this year he's caught a couple kinds of catfish under the bridge like Flathead and blue catfish. Another place he recommended was North Liberty, he's also had a couple of successful trips on the River there, Garrett and I decided to try these locations out to see if our mentor was right.  I was surprised our mentor had been getting a lot of luck already because the weathers been pretty cold. Our next step for our project is getting more field experience and reports.