Bassin' USA - Bass Fishing Forum Archives

That's a book written by Tom Mann of Jelly Worm and Humminbird fame. I mentioned this in one of my posts about a week ago. This is a good book for historical reasons and as a way for Tom to have some "gas money". But as far as thinking like a fish, there's very little of that in the book.
If you want to read it, I suggest you do like I did, go to your public library and check out their copy. I wouldn't pay $22.95 for it and I think Tom's great!

Joe I've read parts of the book too. It seemed like Tom Mann was just blowing his own horn throughout the book. I did read one part that really bothered me. During practice for a tournament he found some scattered brush on the edge of a channel near a marker buoy. Another competitor saw him catching bass, so when Tom left the other competitor came over to fish the spot. After the tournament meeting (the night before the first day) Tom went out on the lake, hooked up the channel marker to his boat and towed it 100 yards away. Tournament day, the other angler went to the channel marker and caught nothing, while Tom went to the spot and loaded the boat. My problem with this is the following two things:

1. It is illegal, and dangerous to relocate a channel marker.

2. B.A.S.S. and every other tournament trail has it in the rules that an angler is not allowed back on the water after the tournament meeting. I'm not sure if that was a rule at the time Tom did this, but it makes me wonder.

After reading that part of the book, I had no desire to continue with it.

Tim- My sentiments exactly. I meet the guy at the Classic that Larry Nixon won on the Ohio River. He was selling his Humminbirds and he still owned all the companies he talked about in the book. Our club had just won the B.A.S.S. Chapter-of-the-Year Award and he was very gracious.
JoeMo

I enjoyed the book. I thought some of his stories were amusing and yes, he did toot his own horn a bit. What successful angler doesn't. His moving the channel marker was not the best example of angler ethics but he did it to prevent guys from stealing his spot. In the early days there must have been a shortage of angler etiquette. I won't condone it. In all it was a different approach to a fishing book that I've never seen before.