It finally happened

[DarrellP 0]

I had always heard the phrase, "it pulled the rod out of my hand."  I was fishing for Bream and not holding the rod very tight, watching some Herons feeding their little ones, and a relatively small Bream yanked the rod out of my hand.  Fortunately, the rod did not go into the drink.  Got to pay attention,  even if fishing is slow.

[Mark Knapp 0]

This winter while ice fishing I got a bight on one of my rods (which was in a rod holder) I put the rod I was holding (we are allowed up to two rods each) on the seat in the fish house to tend the rod I was getting the bight on.

I set the hook on the one and while I was landing that fish, the one on the seat got a bight. I flipped the fish I was landing onto the floor of the fish house just as the other rod left the seat and headed for the ice hole. I lunged for it as it went down the hole, I felt it right at my fingertips with my arm down the hole up to my armpit. As I was dealing with that rod, the fish I had just landed flopped back into the hole he had come out of and pulled that jigging stick into the hole. I lunged for it and missed it too.

I lost both rods. The first one was a conventional ice fishing rod with a reel. I could see it laying on the bottom below the hole. I used my magnet to fish it out, the fish was gone. The second rod was the jigging stick, that fish was able to tow the rod away from the hole.

I consistently lose one rod every season,

 

[niveker 0]

Sorry to hear you lost two fish and one rod, Mark, but am I an asshole for laughing out loud for the last five minutes at the picture your story created in my head? 

Good thing I'm working from home today.  

 

[Mark Knapp 0]

9 minutes ago, niveker said:

Sorry to hear you lost two fish and one rod, Mark, but am I an asshole for laughing out loud for the last five minutes at the picture your story created in my head? 

Good thing I'm working from home today.  

 

You're no ice hole. I hoped someone would at least get some enjoyment from the story.

I just remembers another one.

Last year, same fish house, same lake, I was fishing and minding my own business when my wife called. I switched my rod to my left hand, not my dominant hand, to answer the cell phone. While I was talking to her on the phone, I got a real good bight and set the hook but I didn't have a good enough grip on the rod. It flipped out of my hand and went right down the hole. I threw the phone on the bench and dove for the rod. It was just off of my fingertips with my arm down the hole.

That one was a fairly heavy rod with a reel on it. The next weekend I drilled a bunch of holes around the fish house and dropped an underwater camera down there to look around in all directions. The water was only eight feet deep but no matter how much I looked, I didn't find the pole. It must have been a pretty nice fish cuz he took the rod out of the area.

[mikechell 0]

I've never had a rod jerked from my hand.  When I used to use bait, I've lost a few over the side of the boat or drug off the bank.

[richmce 0]

those two fish are probably at the local bar telling tall angler tales of how they pulled a fast one on the fisherman.. now they have the rods to prove it

[Poopdeck 0]

I never lost a rod until I turned 50. Since then I've had three go over the side of the boat. My first split grip rod I bought I wasn't use to so much rod sticking out of the back of my hand. I was performing my patented and very intricate backwards  over my shoulder with a 1/4 turn casts and jammed the butt into the back of my seat. It flipped violently out of my hand and ended up heaving the rod a good 30' from the boat. No chance of getting it back so I just waved goodbye.

2nd one was a stand up rack on the front windshield of my boat. I was in the cockpit and wanted a rod so I reached over to grab a rod at the same time a wave tossed the boat a bit. I ended up Impaling two hooks from two different treble hooks into my hand. As a reeled back in pain while afixed to one rod, that rod knocked another rod out and I watched as it did the slowest roll out of the boat. I couldn't get it because my one hand was still hooked to the other rod which stayed in the rack. That was a nice custom rod with a Penn clash reel. 

The third rod my fishing buddy threw it into the river in his haste to grab the net. The net hooked onto the rod and threw it out of the boat. Of course the rod some how manage to free itself from the net when it was over the side of the boat.

Three rods in 8 years. Now thats s a dumbass for you.

 

[Mark Knapp 0]

Another time while deep sea fishing with conventional gear I had six people in my boat. One of the guys had put his rod in a rod holder. I had told them all to make sure the wing nut was tight on the rod holders so they don't swivel down when a fish bights and we lose the rod. Well one of them wasn't tight and it swiveled down and out goes the rod. I had just caught a fish so my line was pulled up. When I saw the rod go overboard I swung mine around from the other side of the boat to try and snag the lost rod as it sat just momentarily on the surface like they do just before they sink. Well, you remember I said I had just caught a fish, I still had fish gurry (that's "slime" if you are not accustomed to the terminology) on my rubber gloves from said fish and......

 

wait for it.....

 

you guessed it,

 

my rod slipped right out of my hands and followed the other one into the deep blue sea.

The nice fellow offered to pay for the rod he had lost and I asked him if he wanted to pay for both of them. He did not.

So you see, it does happen.

[Capt Bob LeMay 0]

I'll add a war story to the mix (and this ones actually true..).  I didn't lose a rod - I lost the rod and the angler.... Here's the story... 

We do all kinds of fishing in the salt or brackish parts of the Everglades -lures, flies, bait -and with everything from an ultra light spinning rod to a big heavy fly rod... That day we were fishing heavy spinning gear straight up and down on a grouper hole in a small river that drains into the gulf coast of the 'glades.  The river at that point was about ten feet deep and the usual routine is to fish right on top of a spot that might hold gag grouper (our biggest around 12 pounds each year).  After getting beaten twice by good fish I allowed my angler ( a big guy - maybe 270...) to step up onto the rear platform at the corner of my skiff to make a last drop - this time with his reel set to "exterminate" - the drag locked down as hard as possible to give him a chance at pulling this fish away from the bottom on the strike... You guessed it, something really large had moved in under us and picked up his bait.  When my angler set up on the fish it simply snatched him off of my skiff in an instant... As he went over the side in to the water I grabbed his hand and the two of us managed to lever him back into the boat.  I was scared to death since the water is dark, we were anchored in a current, and I was concerned that I might lose him entirely... Of course he let go of the rod as he went over the side so I  had another rod to build... 

I never charge my anglers a penny for a broken or lost rod - as long as there was a fish on the other end... I did joke with my angler later that day saying the next time he fished with me I'd have a leash on him... 

 

Just nothing like the 'glades... 

[DarrellP 0]

Turning out to be a good thread.

 

Had a spinning rod bungled to the side of my daughter'ssit inside kayak, because I was too lazy to load my sit on top.  It is heavier.  So of course the bungee popped out and the rod was "consigned to the deep".  I guess it serves my lazy a#$ right.

[mikechell 0]

Went fishing with a co-worker who considered himself a bass pro.  We'd been out a few times before, and he could catch fish, but he was no pro.  This trip proved that point, as I was catching two to his every one.  Being me, I was reminding him of that, perhaps too often.  He finally got fed up, threw his rod to the deck and said, "I'm done, we're going back to the ramp.

As he got his Ranger boat up on plane,  we hit a good wave.  All four of the rods on his deck (which he'd been too pissed off to tie down) took a good hop and end-over-end, flipped out of the boat. He circled around.  As we were nearing the spot where they'd gone airborne, he explained, "The cork handles should float the rods."

Did you know, a high dollar bassin' rod and 60# Fluorocarbon line would lock up a 150 horse outboard's prop?  Makes a hell of a crunching noise while it's doing it, but it CAN stop that engine.  By the time he go that mess untangled, he'd saved that one reel.  We couldn't find the other three rods, if they stayed afloat at all.

It was about a month before he even talked to me again.

[cphubert 0]

I lost one of my favorite fly rods while trolling from a canoe in November a couple of years ago. Fish hit and took the rod over the side, as I maneuvered quickly to retrieve the rod I upset the canoe and followed the rod, it was a cold water wake up and to make matters worse the electric motor does not have kill switch. As I watched the canoe leaving I tried to swim to it with no avail,  ended up swimming to shore and walking more than a few miles wet and cold around the back side of the pond to retrieve my beached canoe and dry clothes in my dry bag. Now I always use a dollar store pet leach for the rods. I am still amazed as to how fast I ended up in the drink, how slow I moved with heavy clothing and a PFD. Not at all like the drown proofing training in the military, I realize that I not as spry as I once was. I thank the Man Upstairs I was not on a larger body of water and the weather was warm for November.

[Mark Knapp 0]

On 3/18/2020 at 7:31 AM, mikechell said:

Went fishing with a co-worker who considered himself a bass pro.  We'd been out a few times before, and he could catch fish, but he was no pro.  This trip proved that point, as I was catching two to his every one.  Being me, I was reminding him of that, perhaps too often.  He finally got fed up, threw his rod to the deck and said, "I'm done, we're going back to the ramp.

As he got his Ranger boat up on plane,  we hit a good wave.  All four of the rods on his deck (which he'd been too pissed off to tie down) took a good hop and end-over-end, flipped out of the boat. He circled around.  As we were nearing the spot where they'd gone airborne, he explained, "The cork handles should float the rods."

Did you know, a high dollar bassin' rod and 60# Fluorocarbon line would lock up a 150 horse outboard's prop?  Makes a hell of a crunching noise while it's doing it, but it CAN stop that engine.  By the time he go that mess untangled, he'd saved that one reel.  We couldn't find the other three rods, if they stayed afloat at all.

It was about a month before he even talked to me again.

It sounds to me like the month that he didn't talk to you was a great relief.

[mikechell 0]

Yeah, I wasn't too concerned.

[Poopdeck 0]

6 hours ago, Mark Knapp said:

It sounds to me like the month that he didn't talk to you was a great relief.

While he may not have talked to Mike, Mike never said he stopped talking to his coworker