The Labor Day holiday weekend found us camping at our favorite place in New Hampshire. Unfortunately when we do go camping the boat has to stay home as I am unable to tow both a camper and a boat. So I decided to bring along the kayak and also my underwater camera and I wanted to take a look around some of my favorite spots and see what was down there. By taking this opportunity to try this, with no fishing going on, forced me to do something that I have wanted to do in quite some time. Went out to the first spot which is a point that has rocks on the end of it and there was definitely baitfish activity there but didn’t see any bass cruising around. The water clarity on this lake was allowing me to get to around 25 feet deep before it would get to murky to make anything out. Moved over to a ridge that is lined with rocks but after scouring the bottom for a while there no activity was found. Then moved to my best spot and right away this area was teaming with life with baitfish all over the place as well as bass but these bass were 6 inch or less. Moved to a deep underwater point and didn’t see any fish activity but did see some trees as well and stumps that lined the bottom in this area. Moved once again to a spot that I frequent quite a bit and once again I had seen plenty of baitfish as well and a nice smallmouth and largemouth bass swimming in the area. Started noticing a pattern forming as to fish location and the only areas that I had seen any activity whatsoever there had to be weeds around because any rock or barren bottom areas were void of life. Figured that I better start heading back in so I decided to stop at the mouth of the arm that we were camping on. As soon as I lowered the camera down, life was everywhere and so were the bass. As I floated this area a school of nice smallmouth bass swam by and I was rotating the camera to see them again as I wanted to see how many there were in this school. As the camera was rotating, I caught the tail end of the school but following them were three very nice largemouth bass and this had made my whole experience with my camera so worth its weight in gold. I haven’t used my camera much at all as I will start using it in the boat, but my wanting to fish always takes over and the camera gets put away. But by going out on this day and not bringing a fishing rod along, forced me to do something that I had wanted to do for a long time and I feel now that anytime that I go camping, there is a new pastime to explore on the waters that we camp. I felt I had an understanding of what was going on down below the waters surface, but until you actually see it with your eyes, this opens up a whole new world and also educates you in the relationship of what these fish do in our lakes and ponds. I know that I am looking forward to many more trips out with my camera as well taking it along on the ice this winter. Now I just need to start recording what I am seeing and this will allow me to put videos and stories together to educate other anglers as to what fish are doing with the habitat that they live in as many fishers don’t get to see this and it really is something to watch.
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