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Buck Fever

1862 Views 20 Replies 20 Participants Last post by  plaegreid
I hit a local beach for the first half of the day today and experienced something I haven't dealt with in a long time... I got buck fever. Bad!

Apparently I hit the timing just right on this beach because from the second I stepped on the beach there were fish all around me. Jumping, swirling, rising, splashing.... They were everywhere.

I quickly peeled off line after spotting the first swirl, and hooked up first cast. Released that fish and was instantly into another, then another, and yet another. After about my tenth fish is when the buck fever really kicked in. As I released a fish I noticed that the Delia Squid pattern I had been fishing was bent and shredded. My leader, which I've fished for several weeks now, was more wind knot than leader. I decided I better go ahead and put on a fresh leader as I was tying on a new fly anyway. No sooner had I clipped the loop of mono at my fly line loop all hell broke loose. There were suddenly fish swirling and jumping in every direction I looked... All within 50'. It was at this moment that I completely forgot how to tie a non slip loop knot. My fingers started shaking, I couldn't thread the line through the eye of the hook, and once I did it took me 4 tries to actually tie a knot! On top of that I made another rookie mistake.... I had pulled off about six feet of Maxima and tied a loop at one end. After the several tries I also finally tied the fly on the other end. At this point yet another nice fish jumped right in front of me. Then without actually looping the leader onto the fly line, I quickly fired a cast into the rings left by the jumping fish. It was a perfect cast, and I'm sure I would have caught that fish had the fly line actually had a fly and leader attached. I looked down and there was the fly and leader sitting in my stripping basket. Man I felt dumb. All I could really do at that point was laugh out loud.

I then lit a smoke, took a couple of deep breaths, reminded myself the fish weren't going anywhere, attached the leader and promptly caught more fish.

It's been a long time since I've experienced a good bout of buck fever, and honestly it was a hell of a lot of fun. Made me feel like a kid again.

So, any of you vets still get a case of buck fever any more? If you don't, you're missing out :)

I had my Gopro running the whole time and am really looking forward to watching the footage. I know I was laughing out loud and talking to myself the whole time so I'm sure I'll get a chuckle out of watching it.

Not much life left in this squid

Finger Terrestrial plant Thumb Marine invertebrates Invertebrate


Pretty cutthroat. The spots on this fish were awesome. The pic does not do it justice.

Food Salmon-like fish Fish Ingredient Seafood
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Who does your nails?
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Good stuff man! Congrats on a great day.

I can usually tie on a come back fly ok. Casting it back out there not so much... That's what the flask is for!
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Nick - GREAT story and I can just see you out there shakin'!
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Who does your nails?
Great day, Nick! And yes, I still get "Buck Fever" on occasion, only I call it "The drizzling shakes.":D

@napawino - Damn! You are as warped as I am (that did elicit a chuckle - well done!) . . .
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Fantastic Nick!...true fun!
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I'm relatively new to the fly fishing game and experience this regularly! Glad to know it's a known phenomenon and I'm not just completely hopeless. Anytime I know I'm in the vicinity of some fish I probably couldn't tie my shoes, no less thread and tie line and get a good cast out haha
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I hit a local beach for the first half of the day today and experienced something I haven't dealt with in a long time... I got buck fever. Bad!

Apparently I hit the timing just right on this beach because from the second I stepped on the beach there were fish all around me. Jumping, swirling, rising, splashing.... They were everywhere.

I quickly peeled off line after spotting the first swirl, and hooked up first cast. Released that fish and was instantly into another, then another, and yet another. After about my tenth fish is when the buck fever really kicked in. As I released a fish I noticed that the Delia Squid pattern I had been fishing was bent and shredded. My leader, which I've fished for several weeks now, was more wind knot than leader. I decided I better go ahead and put on a fresh leader as I was tying on a new fly anyway. No sooner had I clipped the loop of mono at my fly line loop all hell broke loose. There were suddenly fish swirling and jumping in every direction I looked... All within 50'. It was at this moment that I completely forgot how to tie a non slip loop knot. My fingers started shaking, I couldn't thread the line through the eye of the hook, and once I did it took me 4 tries to actually tie a knot! On top of that I made another rookie mistake.... I had pulled off about six feet of Maxima and tied a loop at one end. After the several tries I also finally tied the fly on the other end. At this point yet another nice fish jumped right in front of me. Then without actually looping the leader onto the fly line, I quickly fired a cast into the rings left by the jumping fish. It was a perfect cast, and I'm sure I would have caught that fish had the fly line actually had a fly and leader attached. I looked down and there was the fly and leader sitting in my stripping basket. Man I felt dumb. All I could really do at that point was laugh out loud.

I then lit a smoke, took a couple of deep breaths, reminded myself the fish weren't going anywhere, attached the leader and promptly caught more fish.

It's been a long time since I've experienced a good bout of buck fever, and honestly it was a hell of a lot of fun. Made me feel like a kid again.

So, any of you vets still get a case of buck fever any more? If you don't, you're missing out :)

I had my Gopro running the whole time and am really looking forward to watching the footage. I know I was laughing out loud and talking to myself the whole time so I'm sure I'll get a chuckle out of watching it.

Not much life left in this squid

View attachment 135918

Pretty cutthroat. The spots on this fish were awesome. The pic does not do it justice.

View attachment 135919
You know me Nick, I get Buck fever every freakin trip, but I got to say this report had me cracking the heck up. I know you well enough now that I could easily picture the whole damm scenario. What's more funny is knowing that I would have been even worse, I would have swore a couple of times, but even more likely, I would not have changed my leader. You've seen my beach leader right?
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See, it is hard to get this on instagram or facebook.

Good stuff Nick.
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Yeah, I would "like" your story again if I could. It just makes me happy. Thanks Nick.
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Have not heard of this term before but that's freakin awesome!
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Great story. Last case of 'the fever' was a few seasons back. GIANT Brown feeding on spinners, could not get him to go for anything.. fast getting dark

Sweet pic of a tore-up fly, gotta love those. They speak volumes.

Congrats with the epic outing
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Have not heard of this term before but that's freakin awesome!
Haven't heard the expression in a while, but that's not what I read at first glance. Must've had a dyslexic moment when my brain swapped the first letters in the thread title. For a millisecond I thought Nick was upset with a large aquatic rodent. Stupid brain.

Great post BTW.
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Sounds like some good video for your presentation! Great story too!
I used to fish with gear in the winter time. I was fishing the S/F Stilly below the swinging bridge. I was using sand shrimp at the time. I was throwing it out and reeling it back in at the end of the swing. I wasn't paying that much attention to what was happening, Fishing was lousy that day. My buddy gave me a shout that I had fish following my bait. I saw the fish open it's mouth to suck in the sand shrimp and I jerked it out. Talk about buck fever, I had it all that day.

I have never had that kind of luck again.
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It good to feel that "alive".

Show the video, it's gotta be funny
My buddy gave me a shout that I had fish following my bait. I saw the fish open it's mouth to suck in the sand shrimp and I jerked it out. Talk about buck fever, I had it all that day.
200% on your friend Jim.. had he not shouted you'd of surely hooked that fish ;)

Years ago I had a short vid clip of me trying to set the timer on point-n-shoot digital camera. Mostly me cursing the camera big time, not knowing it was set on vid. Hard not to laugh at yourself when it finally dawns on you.. which in my case was after pics were loaded onto p.c. Hmm.. what the heck is this video?
Great report Nick !!! I know the feeling, thanks for the reminder it can happen to anyone at anytime.

Mark
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