Fishing Journal

I decided to keep a fishing journal this year, prompted by my buddy Ralph's incessant record keeping.

Recording stuff like dates and time where i fished, who i fished with, air and water temp, water clarity, what bugs i see,what bait/lures and techniques and what if anything i catch.

Ralph brought over his records for last years fishing. We figured out that he fished 72 days on the yak and i fished about 85 days. I'm gonna crush that this year

 Sounds like a great idea. I have tried to keep a journal for different reasons in the past but have never followed through very well. More power to you if you can. Should provide some valuable information about effectively fishing the south coast. Good luck.

I have been using the "Tidelog" spiral bound tide book since 1991, it has space for notes, the layout is very nice---2 facing pages per week, with a graphic that displays the tides for each day, and a space for notes on the right hand page.
It comes in Puget Sound edition, and other areas as well. Very handy, about the size of a paperback book.

What sort of info would people like to keep.  I've been thinking about adding to the AOTY site by making a fishing journal component where you could record this sort of stuff along with photos, google maps, etc.. and then sort/search your records when  you're done.  It's basically what you do know when you post and AOTY fish, but you'd have the option to also post more info about the trip itself.  Oh, and you'd probably want to have the option to either keep your journal information private or share it with others.  Anyway, it's just a thought.

Brian

I have been using the "Tidelog" spiral bound tide book since 1991, it has space for notes, the layout is very nice---2 facing pages per week, with a graphic that displays the tides for each day, and a space for notes on the right hand page.
It comes in Puget Sound edition, and other areas as well. Very handy, about the size of a paperback book.

I like that. Someday I'll break down and get one.

Z

www.tidelog.com

New Years resolutions: Eat more vegetables and keep a more detailed fishing journal. I use a three ring binder full of sticky notes pasted over maps which has worked well for me.  I keep track of when I catch but need to do a better job at documenting those fishless days too.

I've kept a fishing journal since the mid 1970's. Last year I copied all of the entries back to 1992 (when I got my first home computer with a hard drive) to a database. The database allows me to analyze and use the data. For example, I can tell by my notes which local lakes fish best early in the year, and the ones where you need to wait until late May.

I'm inconsistent recording all of the facts - time of day, tide levels, barometer, temperature, etc... all of which would be useful. A lot of my notes are stuff like this that mean nothing to most people, but I enjoy.

"I saw three coyotes running up the shoreline right toward me. As they got closer, I noticed that one of them was a little puppy who was running fast and playfully trying to get the adults to chase. As they got near me, the adults stopped, but the little guy was having so much fun that he kept going. So the adults followed, and the three of them stopped right in back of me - about 30 feet away. Beautiful animals! One of the adults followed the pup on his beachcombing adventure, and the other one ran the other way. My guess is that the latter coyote was trying to distract me from the pup. I think all three of us adults - me and the two coyotes - felt a bit skittish during the encounter, but I never once felt threatened. The little one was having too much fun to be scared. The mama coyote has a lot of training to do!"

(Note from a cold January trip to a local beach) "I saw a young lady go swimming this morning. Her dog stayed on the beach and watched. Go figure…."



Tom