looking back at '09

[roughfish29]

oh god, where do i start????

2009 has been my best year of fishing in my 14 years of life

all of my new species were great! but some of the fish i didn't get pics of, like my koi and ghost carp (i know some people won't believe me, but whatever)

what i tried to do this year was catch as many species as possible. i know alot of people on this site don't really like roughfish, but i had the best time of my life this year chasing both game and non-game fish on rod and reel

anyway, here are a few highlights:

my first mirror carp, a fully scaled beauty!

i waded over 10 miles (barefoot) in a single day to get my 2nd largest northern ever:

i got my first trout on the fly:

my goldfish/carp hybrid:

of course, my pb pike, it was caught on an ultralight while i was fishing for carp. it bit BREAD!!! it was 35 inches and around 12 pounds:

fall walleyes. we were catching tons of fish like this from shore!

my first bigmouth buffalo, it took ALOT of work to get this one. i do find it ironic, the one buff that i caught is the smallest one i've ever seen:

my 20 inch smallie, caught the same day as the mirror on one of the most beautiful rivers i've ever fished:

my first redhorse....a greater! but just like the buffalo, this is the smallest i've ever seen:

last but not least, my 20 inch pb white sucker:

i caught 9 new species this year (read my sig.)

[PurpleHaZe]

Thats really cool. Good Job.

[SneakAttack]

That rock in the river behind you and the Buffalo fish looks familiar...

Nice pics

[JBMasterAngler]

The only new species of fish I caught in '09 was a golden shiner...the sad part about that is it was the biggest fish of the day

[roughfish29]

That rock in the river behind you and the Buffalo fish looks familiar...

shhhh!

i see your from downtown farmington. do you ever fish the vermillion? maybe i've seen you down there

[mnhunter17]

Nice idea, and 9 new species is pretty cool.

[jwmiller33]

roughfish---that is the sweetest looking smallie i have ever seen... here are a couple pics from my 2009 season. i too would say this is the best year of fishing i have ever had. part of it is because i got my own boat this year, and just fished way more then i ever have before. its a learning experience and i can't wait to do it again next open water season.

Here is a pic of my boat after completely redoing it

as for highlights, in early spring, I was fishing on Island Lake reservoir in Duluth for walleyes when my buddy hooked into a little 14 inch walleye, and as he was realing it in, a 36in muskie ate the walleye. After a couple minute fight, we had both fish in the boat. Here are some pics.

Also this summer, I got my first muskie. Although it was a tiny one, it was still my first and only muskie and it felt pretty good. (got it trolling at shallow shad rap in about 5 feet of water).

Another highlight of my open water season was figuring out how to fish the river. I got on the St. Louis river a bunch of times in July and August, and caught several 2-5 pounders, however, nothing over that range. Here are a couple pics from my boat.

And lastly, my trip to Alaska was the biggest highlight of my fishing season. We went around the Wasilla area and fished for Kings for a week. Here are some pics

And the single fish highlight of the summer, my little brother’s 38lb king on our last day in Alaska.

[jwmiller33]

here are a couple pics also from 09.

some are fish that my buddies caught while in my boat

a beaut of a slab [PoorWordUsage].

here is a beautiful DARK eye

hard to take pics by yourself, like this smallie

here is another pic of my lil bro's 38lb king

and a pair of mid 20lb kings

[SneakAttack]

Originally Posted By: SneakAttack

That rock in the river behind you and the Buffalo fish looks familiar...

shhhh!

i see your from downtown farmington. do you ever fish the vermillion? maybe i've seen you down there

Use to fish the Vermillion in town alot until about 4 to 5 years ago until the masses show up and the fish either disappeared or got smart. Still fish private land here and there with minimal success.

Tend to fish the Croix and Miss out of the boat or wade that nice little river where i think some of your pics were taken.

[roughfish29]

@ sneakattack: fish are still in the vermillion, but just not so much trout. the two big northers that i posted above were from the vermillion.

i've never really fished the croix, but i want to try it next year

@ jwmiller33: it looks like you had one heck of a year as well! those salmon are beautiful!

and about that smallie, you should've seen it in person! the fish was litterally black! and it gave me one heck of a fight! it jumped probably 3-4 feet out of the water, it was absolutely incredible!