Article 31 – Keeping A Ledger

Knowledge is power. What you experience is what you must write down. An avid fisherman cannot remember everything over a long period of time. Make one mistake and now it become a guessing game. A good ledge will maximize your time on the water and provide you with the information in years to come to be more successful. If you are a tournament fisherman a ledger will give you the knowledge to put you above the competition. Keep it simple; the more you write the less effort you will make to accomplish your goal. You must stick with it from season to season. Build a ledger that has preset statements; so you only have to write a couple of words to jog your memory. If it takes too long you will begin to make excuses not to do it and it will never get done. Your ledger should have a spot at the bottom for comments; so you can make a note or two if it was a great day. The comment section pulls it all together when the fish are biting and you are more interested in writing it down. All ledgers, no matter how simple requires commitment of time and how willing are you to take that time? Your first year of records are the hardest and are of no value until the second and third years roll around. With a good ledger you will begin to see patterns on each of your best areas taking place over the years. The system I use on each area is to fish them at different times of the day. Each trip to the lake that area gets fished two hours later than the last trip. The conditions must be similar to do do this and a ledger will provide the information needed. You will eventually be able to pull up to an exact irregular feature, make a few cast and catch a quality fish. An Example: I have two inside bends on a cloudy day that will produce top water fish on a regular basis. They will both produce a limit with at least one kicker fish, during the hot Summer months. I am always waiting for things to fall in line for these two spots to be productive. As an old football coach my fishing journal is as important as my playbook.

I am Old School and always chose to write it all down during and after each fishing trip on a simple ledger as the one below. For the more Tech. Guys the Angler App., may be the way to go.

https://bassanglermag.com/what-if-your-fishing-log-book-could-talk/

LEDGER

LAKE _____________________________ TIME: ______________

AREA #: _________________________ DATE: _____________________________

FISH WEIGHT: _________________________ DEPTH: ______________________

BOAT-FRONT/BACK:__________________WATER-COLOR: __________________

WIND: _________________________ TEMP.: ______________________________

SKIES: _________________________ WATER TEMP: ______________________

COVE OR MAIN LAKE: _______________________________________________

WIND BLOWN OR CALM WATER: ______________________________________

STRUCTURE: _________________________________________________________

IRREGULAR FEATURE: ________________________________________________

COVER: ______________________________________________________________

BAIT: ________________________________________________________________

COLOR: ________________________ SCENT: _____________________________

TECHNIQUE: __________________________________________________________

COMMENTS: ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Ledgers- One of the hardest things to start doing! But like you said the data after a few years will be priceless!

I’ve used various iterations of a log for years. Most recently, GPS located photos on my phone with date stamp and waypoints on my sonar units. It’s helpful to look back at when big fish or lots of fish or no fish are caught and see if any patterns are apparent. To me at least, so I don’t feel bad when I skunk out. Memory fades and distorts things, but photos and notes help keep the details accurate.

I have been keeping a ledger ( or notebook ) for many years . It's kinda funny how we forget something over time and stop using those techniques when they worked in the past .
I have learned more from my notebooks than any other article or book I have ever read .
EXAMPLE ---- learning what wind can do to a lake or a bite at certain times . I found that in early spring , as the water starts moving from low/mid fifties to upper fifties/low sixties ---- following the wind to those banks where the slightly warmer water is being pushed ----can make a huge difference with those big females and their search to find quality food and warming up their bodies to finish egg development.
If I hadn't written it down several years in a row ---- probably would not have remembered it .

Like anything else that is important, the work isn't done until the paperwork is complete. I've been keeping a log for the last couple of years. I've notices weather patterns, water depth, the lake layout and water temperatures play a big role in where I look for fish. The older I get, the more I forget -- unless I write it down.

Have been doing that since 1974. Mine is indexed by time of year, then weather and water temp. So I know its July. I know the wind is out of the SW at 10 and its 80 percent sunshine and the water is 84 degrees. Now I just look in my book for Lake X, find July and look up those weather conditions. That tells me exactly what worked in that exact situation. 90 precent of the time, it works again. Makes life easy especially on a lake you may not have fished in a couple of years.