Well wife and I were having so much fun with Gators yesterday late that I didn’t go to the second day weigh in for the memorial tourney this weekend….but I just got the call…. I finished third in the Bass category 3.11#s, and BAAAAED my way to third in roughfish ,11#10oz sheephead..found a mess like it trying to catch walleye Thursday with customers.
But here’s the rest of the story. The 4.2#er wasn’t even weighed. On Saturday the weighmaster had told me there was already a 4#er weighed , and a 5#er weighed(turned out to be a Pike the other fish I had in my hand). There was a 1/2# penalty for dead fish…we still aren’t sure why but she didn’t make it and has been donated to a local taxidermist..so when Nancy and I started to look like we might grab a northern large enough to cash a check we had heard that 8#s was leading it after day one we stayed and got caught up in smashes and follows.
Bottom line …it cost us $90 for second place,(not a lot of money, but it’s the confidence “Thang”), if I understood correctly this morning. The reason I feel sheepish is because I made a similar bonehead move once last year in the Tristate Tuesday night league and 3 years ago in a falling rock club event…. none of those fish died.
So guys don’t do what I did and a bunch of guys did earlier this year at the Stoddard Bergen tourney. Don’t ask what it takes to place just weigh the fish. I should know after weighing fish for three years the guy weighing the fish, is busy enough and the chance of him hearing the right question and giving the right answer isn’t a very high percentage.