A Bad Day Fishing!, What's your worst day fishing,,,

we all have nightmare fishing stories. i know i have my share. lets hear yours.

to get things started off I'll talk about 2 years ago. i already shared the story but its a good start to a thread like this.
2 winters ago there i was working nights and i worked my butt off over night through breaks and everything so that i could beat traffic and get to simcoe at the crack of dawn for some nice hard water perch. the wind was blowing like crazy but i was determined. i walked out about 800M
out at gilford and decided it was time to drill a hole but i could not have picked a worse place to drill. as i hold up my auger and put it in position my foot goes through someone's unmarked hole and my boot gets stuck at under the ice. i can't get my foot out without risk of losing my boot through the ice. i look around and im the only one out there so early and so help is not an option. after about a minute im able to get my foot out with boot in tact (BRAND new boot BTW) with the wind absolutly hallowing my wet hands from trying to reach down the hole to salvage my boot are freezing. not to mention my foot is frozen as the water proof boot which is meant to keep the water out keepdnthe water IN when it drains in from the top.
its a must go home for me.
i walk back to the car to change in to dry duds when someone asks me how my day went, i said i don't know as i never got a chance to fish. i told him the story and he told me he was up at Barrie harbour a few days ago and caught some nice jumbos.
this puts a bug in my ear. maybe i didn't waste my time after all. maybe I'll go up to Barrie harbour and fish in my running shoes and if my feet get cold atleast the car is close by to warm them up in. this makes total sense to me. why should i drive all this way for nothing?

i make the drive to Barrie but notice noone else is fishing. this is weird to me as if people were jist catching jumbos then why was noone fishing?
better inspect. i walk along a dock and notice that there was a pre drilled hole there from someone's hole before. i figure i can peak down the hole and see if there's any perch down there.
i step off the dock and sink through the ice like a knife through butter.

i pull my self back out and try to take the battery out of my.phone right away but... it was to late.
phone was ruined everything was soaking wet up to my neck and i never even got a line in the water.

time to go back home.
although this is not my worst fishing story... it probably was not better then my best day of work.

anyone else have a horror story like this or is it just me that has many?

Wow now this story takes the cake... Almost funny..

Beats my worst day hands down. All I did was drive 2 hrs to get to the lake, put the boat in, got ready for walleye opener and no boat keys. Forgot them at home.

Spent my day just trolling around in the launch area with my electric. Battery eventually died from trying to fight the wind, caught nothing and went home..

that's a good day fishing for me lol.

wait until u hear my worst

here's a copy and paste from tonello.
his grandfather had a bad day worth exploiting lol


My grandpa had called my dad just a little while ago and had to tell him about his day of fishing. My grandpa is 83 years old and still lugs his wooden fish hut back and forth from his house to the fishin hole(he thinks its going to freeze into the ice and he will never get it back). So he finally makes it out there and he opens the door and realizes that his radio fell off the ledge and the antenna had broke. As he was trying to repaire it he pushed down on the broken antenna and it slips, needless to say he cuts three of his fingers wide open on his right hand. He then grabs some snot rags to stop the bleeding while thinking to himself that it looks like his day of fishing had come to an end. So he decides that he should head back in and get some medical attention. While realizing that his boot needed fixing he leans his left hand on the shelf not noticing that a hook had been strategically placed there which would end up going straight through his finger tip with a barb still attached. Now he thinks to himself i really need to get outta here. He exits the fish shack and fires up his quad to let it warm up. He goes back into the shack and waits, then realizing after a few minutes that it sounded like the quad was getting further and futher away. He jumps up heads out and sees that his quad almost made it to shore(hahaha). He had been messing around with the throttle earlier and had left the quad in gear and it took off on him. So he had to run after the quad with three split fingers and a hook in his other hand laughing the whole time saying you gotta be kidding me. Oh gramps you kill me,now you thought you had a bad day think again. I almost died laughing when my dad told me this. Some things just happen in threes lol hope you laugh as much as i did. And by the way my gramps is perfectly fine he was laughin his head off when he told my dad

Hunting/fishing we all get excited and get slightly focused on getting there and then it happens....

One time got all the way to hunt camp 2 hours away to realize I forgot my tag, met up with a friend half way to bring me my tag.....all good now!! But wait, go out into the bush with everything in the truck except forgot key for gun case which also had trigger lock on same ring.....thankfully there it was a nice evening so enjoyed the "everything in truck" until the guys came from the bush empty handed.

Put boat in water on another trip to go for early ice out trout.....bilge won't stop running and after a few minutes realize the boat sitting funny. Yup...put the plug in the wrong spot so was taken water in faster then could put out......it happens!!

And #3.....driving back to cottage from friends place, decide to slow down for trolling on way back for trout, boat starts hesitating and next thing you know, out of gas. Had to use trolling motor at dusk for half hour in earl June.....no bug juice so gotten eaten alive by squitters......probably will happen again....haha!

Wow great stories..

I am feeling embarrassed now about my minor mishap.. LOL

Those are a lot worse...... But yes good to laugh about them after.

I always fear the day I will get a hook in the hand. I think it happens to all fishermen sooner or later. I have come close, real close, but so far knock on wood, no major hook-ups..

Jerry sometimes that is a blessing in disguise.
I was fishing with a friend in a canoe at Rice Lake about 15 years ago and I was catching tonnes of bass, I'd even go as far as to say it was my best day of fishing ever. I caught a 5lbs bass on a top water which was my biggest bass to date and then it goes south. My buddy burries 2 treble hooks into my arm. now although this sucks this is one hell of a day of fishing so to go to the hospital is just not an option. I grab the pliers and try to pull out the hooks but they aren't moving they are stuck. so I just drove them in deeper and then back out another part of my arm so that I could clinch the barbs down. I did this with every single hook and then was ready to fish again.
now as much as the sucked and hurt it was not even close to the feeling about 20 minutes later when a 6lbs Larmouth smashes my top water.
Thats still my biggest Largemouth to date, and I consider this a good story not a bad story.

telling that other story made me HAVE to tell the absolute worst day of fishing I have ever had by far. if anyone has had a worse day than this I think I need to bake them a cake.

I'm sorry for the LONG read but if you can get through it i'm sure you'll realize maybe your day wasn't that bad after all



This bad Fishing story starts miles and miles before I even got a chance to hit the water. September 2012 I planned to go up and fish Muskie on the Ottawa river, I pack the family up (even the cat) to head out for a weekend of fishing/cottaging.
We got off to a later start then planned and so were forced to take the dreaded and over priced 407. cruising along on it for about half an hour when my transmission overheats, the gears start slipping and so I pull over and check everything out. Everything seems fine. I let it cool down and start driving but it starts doing it again I have just enough momentum to get off and pull over in a parking lot.
I call my auto club but they can't tow me because i'm pulling a boat and I can't get ahold of anyone I know with a hitch. I tell them I'll work on the boat just come get my car. I should mention that this day was blistering hot and that we are sweating up a storm in the car while waiting for the tow truck to come and I can't really open the windows as my cat will get out.
the tow truck finally gets there and the plan was for me to wait with the boat and for him to take my GF and the cat and my car back home. he informs that he can't take the cat as it doesn't have a carrier. now i'm sitting here in the baking hot sun with an over heated car, girl friend and cat and can't do a thing about it. I figure I'd try to start my car and see what happens as it should be cool by now. It starts right up and sounds fine I tell the tow truck driver to just follow me home and I will count it as a tow. We'd take all back roads just to be safe.
We get home, I drop off the cat and GF and I take my car to the mechanic. He keeps my car for a bit but insures me nothing is wrong. This is confusing to me of course as I was in it when it started skipping gears and revving funny before then not giving me any gas.
Now it's to late to leave for Quebec and So we decide to leave the next day. With a day already wasted, what else can I do?
I gamble on my mechanics word and decided to drive my car and boat there the next day, it wasn't as hot out and I didn't drive as fast just to be safe. Traffic was horrible and it took almost 7 hours but It makes it there with no problems at all but this is still not the bad stuff yet.

and now the bad stuff starts, the absolute worst day of fishing imaginable
I am so pi$$ed about missing a day and a long drive and hearing about all this stuff along with everything else but I just need to get out and fish a little and then I will calm down. problem is I was supposed to get there friday so that I could fish a little bit saturday then help do cottage stuff for most of the day but since I came up saturday and was late because of the traffic I wasn't even able to fish saturday at all AND these cottage errands ran into the next day as well. and so here I am Sunday at noon ready to put the boat in and fish for the first time and I have to be back at 4:00 for dinner and then pack up and head back.

I drop the boat in the water and park the car, I absolutely can't get the boat started, I try for like half an hour and it will not start. I even tried taking off the motor cover and using the pull cord but nothing happening. then I woke up and realized that I had the run switch turned off not one of my finest moments but I was trying to do everything so fast and was already so p##### that I guess I missed that step.
I get it started and and notice that a wind is now coming up fast. great the only weather that I hate while on a boat besides lightning. (which I'll get into later)
I figure I'll head for a little sub channel that I know that will block the wind, problem is it is tricky to get to and this wind is REALLY starting to blow now. by the time I get to the little back sub channel the wind is a full blown gail, there are white caps in every FOW. and blowing from straight behind me. there is a part that is really really narrow and shallow and I'd have to to an s turn to make it in there but once I make it in it is a really good place for muskie that few if any know about.
I have to use the trolling motor to get in there around the s turn but the wind is blowing my boat every where and since it's coming from behind me it's making it REALLY hard to maneuver. The wind ends up blowing my into some rocks and wedges my trolling motor inbetween 2 rock perfectly. I mean you couldn't plan this better if you wanted to. now with the front end wedged in the rocks the wind pushes my boat and turns it around in the opposite direction. To this day I don't know how my trolling motor didn't snap off. I can't get in unwedged but I think of a genius idea. I will throw my anchor in the opposite direction wedge it on something and then I'll be able to pull my self out of the rut that i'm in before my trolling motor breaks off. I throw my anchor and i get it grounded on a rock first try, awesome my luck is changing... no it's not, I couldn't pull my self unwedged no matter how hard I pulled on the anchor rope and i am not a weak guy by any means. not only that but my pulling on the rope wedged the anchor in deeper, now both my trolling motor and my anchor are wedged with a crazy wind blowing and the sky is now turning a weird greeny/yellow color which i know Is not good for anything.
I decide to jump out of the boat into the water and try to get trolling motor unwedged before a storm comes up as it looks like that's what going to happen. Keep in mind I am in a hidden spot on the ottawa river where fisherman rarley would come near it on a nice day let alone in white caps.
I basically had to lift my boat out by the trolling motor to get it unwedged I jump back into the boat quick before it could take off on me. I knew that the boat would imediately start taking off but that I was safely anchored and so I let the wind take the boat which would then let out the rest of the anchor rope and went to go check out the trolling motor to see if it was ok (it is indeed my best friend) I look at my trolling motor and see that it is fine but notice that my transducer for the front fishing finder is broken. great.
Then as I come to the end up the rope i here a splash before my boat haults to a stop and spins around from the combination of wind and grounded anchor. you see since I NEVER anchor it's been a loooong while since I've last used it and didn't notice how mangled the rope was, the rope caught two of my rods and my net and flinged them into the water, I still don't even quite now how that worked. I quickly grab another fishing rod and cast for my rods so that i can bring them in instead of losing them. I cast for them and catch them... but then when bringing them in the lures on them catch the anchor rope (if they weren't already on them). I am now caught on my rods that are caught on and anchor rope attached to an anchor that is caught on the bottom of a river in a wind storm and just as if on cue i hear thunder crashing in the distance. I let the bail go on my rod as I know they're stuck to the anchor and I can't lose them and decide to cast another rod at my net which is sailed past the boat but that was now starting to sink (this net is supposed to float BTW), oh and I'm no longer in the shallow S turn where my trolling motor was wedged and so it's to deep to walk out and grab all of this stuff (about 100ft away actually judging by my anchor rope)
problem was when i cast this rod (I fish with like 10 rods for those who don't know me)to try to get my net before I can't see it any more the the wind takes my lure, my most expensive muskie lure of course and gets wraps it wround a reid and it won't come lose.

I am now snagged with one rod, one rod is attached to two other rods that are snagged on the anchor which is snagged on the bottom and my net is flaoting out of site and oh ya I broke my fish finder transducer and it is now starting to rain.

this all happened in like the span of 5 minutes, usually I get mad and then i feel better but with all of this, I was so mad that I didn't even know what to do. I literally had to sit down and think. the thunder is really starting now though and so i'm like it's time to cut my losses and just go back home. I'm at a sort of peace with my self. almost giggly crazy eye'd from all this madness.
first I decide to accept the fact that the net is gone.
second I have to accept the fact that I just lost my most expensive muskie lure and so as I was going to try to start pulling the rod horizontally to break the line I figured I'd give it one last yank to see if I could shake the lure from the reid.
I give it one yank and it doesn't come out... I then start yanking it like crazy to snap the line but instead... I snap my rod. now I can only laugh, if there was someone with a voodoo doll on my life that day they definately hit me with the book.

I pulled that line until it broke and so I lost that lure... and rod... and still the net...

but yet the day has just begun muhahah (evil laugh)
it is now POURING rain and I am in the middle of a full blown thunder storm. the white caps are even worse then before and if I wanted to I wouldn't even be able to see my way through the S turn so i'd have to get back a different way. At this point I wouldn't even be surprised if a see a tornado, it's that bad out.
I toyed with the idea of just swimming to shore and leaving the boat hanging by the anchor. but since there was only thunder and I had not seen any lighting yet I figured I'd chance it back. I pulled on the anchor rope until I i was close to my rods, i threw them all in to the boat, cut thier lines leaving the lures in the rope, cut the anchor rope just passed the lures so that i'd still have them and I take off deeper into the back bay, I am no longer laughing.

there is one hard part to get through between two points that are shallow to get through and then I can speed through after that. I get to those points and the wind is HALLOWING through the point. no way I could go slow enough through there to get to the open water, it is still POURING rain and I can't even see anything, I can't even tell how high the water is to see if i can motor through it, this section is dammed and you never know where it's at. I still haven't seen any lightning but i'm still a bit worried as the thunder is now RIGHT over my head. I put the motor up, get out of the boat and decide to walk the boat through the narrow channel between the two points. it's hard to get through the channel but I get it through and jump in QUICKLY so that I can put the motor down and rush out of there but.... my motor won't start and the wind starts taking me full speed I run up to the front to put my trolling motor down and notice i'm like a meter away from hitting a rocky shoal. I jump back out of the boat and hold the boat to try and keep it from getting bashed on the rocks. oh and nooow I see lightning. I'm standing on a rocky shoal in like one ft of water in the middle of a bay holding an aluminum boat in a lighting storm.. great. oh and my attempts keep the boat from hitting the rocks were not 100% effective as this wind was insane.

at this point it's in for a penny in for a pound I just stood there and held my boat and waited for the storm to pass as my boat bashed against the rocks, I was only softening the winds blows. This is the point in time when I realized that as much as I love fishing I would probably trade this day for a bad day of work, ANY day of work.
The storm passes after maybe 10 minutes and it goes from windy and rainy to actually pretty sunny and the wind dies down quite a bit. not totally but there were no longer 4ft white caps out there. I jump in the boat use the trolling motor to get around the shoal, and decided i'm going to troll my absolute biggest muskie lure back to the cottage. I said to myself with a day like this there is no way on earth that I can't catch a fish, theres no God or karma or anything else out there so bad to do all this to be and yet not have a reward at the end of it. I threw out my biggest muskie lure as far as I could and started trolling back. while trolling i'm looking at the mess of a bunch of rods I'm going to have to fix when I get back, thinking about how i now need a new transducer,how it's possible that I bashed a hole or two in my boat, thinking about how even if I get a muskie on I now have no net to land it and how I've only been out for like half an hour and i've never wanted to get off the water more in my life. still I keep trolling back because I said I would and I was not willing to be denied some justice. not even 3 minutes into it my rod almost gets yanked out of my hand, MUSKIE i yell to my self, maybe all of this wasn't for nothing, I put the boat in neutral and start fighting the fish, it's huge by far the biggest muskie Ive ever caught and it's fighting hard. I get it about three quarters of the way in and notice that the wind almost has me up against a rocky shoal (yes another one) I put the motor back in forward and try to steer my self out while fighting the biggest muskie of my life in the other hand. I do this for a little bit but I guess I gave the muskie some slack and I lost her.
One more thing to add to my trip of shame. i decide thats it for my trip its so over that i dont even bring my boat back to the car to load it, i want off my boat and pronto. i just drive straight to the cottage dock where there I see everyone waiting for me to see if i survived the storm and i say to them "not a word,not one word" and i kept walking.


It's a hell of a long read and was worse in person then my words could even describe, and it probably took me longer to write this then the whole ordeal combined but if something like this has happened to you and yet you still come out to fish another day then you my friend are truelly a fisherman.

Matt, I read the whole crazy story..

Just nuts... What a mess! It's funny now thought, sorry can't stop laughing..

I can see you are very passionate about fishing. Man you'd have to be...

No matter how much you plan sometimes stuff just happens, I usually try to cut my losses and figure there will be another day.. But after all that you decided to troll back to the cottage and keep trying..

Jerry sometimes that is a blessing in disguise.
I was fishing with a friend in a canoe at Rice Lake about 15 years ago and I was catching tonnes of bass, I'd even go as far as to say it was my best day of fishing ever. I caught a 5lbs bass on a top water which was my biggest bass to date and then it goes south. My buddy burries 2 treble hooks into my arm. now although this sucks this is one hell of a day of fishing so to go to the hospital is just not an option. I grab the pliers and try to pull out the hooks but they aren't moving they are stuck. so I just drove them in deeper and then back out another part of mr arm so that I could clinch the barbs down. I did this with every single hook and then was ready to fish again.
now as much as the sucked and hurt it was not even close to the feeling about 20 minutes later when a 6lbs Larmouth smashes my top water.
Thats still my biggest Largemouth to date, and I consider this a good story not a bad story.

I read this too and this part: "so I just drove them in deeper and then back out another part of mr arm"

Ya I'll pass on that.. OUCH

Well at least the fish god's were smiling, 6lb Largie, bravo

Jerry sometimes that is a blessing in disguise.
I was fishing with a friend in a canoe at Rice Lake about 15 years ago and I was catching tonnes of bass, I'd even go as far as to say it was my best day of fishing ever. I caught a 5lbs bass on a top water which was my biggest bass to date and then it goes south. My buddy burries 2 treble hooks into my arm. now although this sucks this is one hell of a day of fishing so to go to the hospital is just not an option. I grab the pliers and try to pull out the hooks but they aren't moving they are stuck. so I just drove them in deeper and then back out another part of mr arm so that I could clinch the barbs down. I did this with every single hook and then was ready to fish again.
now as much as the sucked and hurt it was not even close to the feeling about 20 minutes later when a 6lbs Larmouth smashes my top water.
Thats still my biggest Largemouth to date, and I consider this a good story not a bad story.

I read this too and this part: "so I just drove them in deeper and then back out another part of mr arm"

Ya I'll pass on that.. OUCH

Well at least the fish god's were smiling, 6lb Largie, bravo

the thigs we can do off of fish adrenaline lol

Yup I would say that is probably the worst day I have heard of fishing. Hard to beat that one Matt.

This past September some friends and I do a canoe fishing trip for four days. We typical portage 4-6 hours to a secluded area and set up camp and fish from there for the duration. This year I picked a place that there wasn't a lot of information on. We drove up near Sudbury then took logging roads for 1.5hours to where we were to launch the canoes. The only report on the lake and drive in I found said the guy used his girlfriends Mazda 3 to get there. So we took a civic and a vw golf. Well we get about 300yds from launch and the civic died. We were pretty sure the alternator went. it was now early Friday afternoon and by the time it would take to drive out and get back in with a tow truck no mechanics would be open anywy. So we decide we will unload the vw and come back for the gear from the civic. We unload and on our way back to the civic we scrapped over a rock. As we got to the car we looked back to see a long trail of oil on the ground. One punctured oilpan and now both cars disabled.

Well there were some more adventures for the weekend but to cut this story down we ended up doing next to no fishing (I caught the only fish...a 9-10" brookie) and had to pay $1200 in tow fees plus repairs to the vehicles.

At least the weather was nice that weekend. 😜

Next year WILL be better!

AA

hahaha Adam that would suck.
its one thing to have a bad day, but an expensive bad day REALLY sucks.

maybe not in headaches but $1200 beats my lure, rod, net, transducer,and anchor in the wallet lol

I've had plenty of good fishing trips but the bad ones i've had have been AWEFUL.
fishing for pike a few weeks back reminded of another horrible fishing story i've had but I haven't had time to write in until now.

15 years ago I planned to go fishing at centre Island for pike. After ice out i used to do well at the islands and all around the Toronto harbour but the fish don't seem to come in like they used to.
any way it was early March and I thought i'd head down to see if the ice was out yet and more importantly if the pike were in yet. I didn't even bring a tackle box as I half expected them not to be in and also in the past I have only used and caught fish down there on 3 different lures and so I only brought those 3 lures with me. (I definately needed more)

I took the first ferry out to Wards Island (6:00AM) I walk about 20-30M from the ferry and notice that for the most part everything is still pretty much frozen. still I decide to take a cast as I have not yet casted an open water line since the fall. that very first cast BOOM a pike smashes my lure and it feels like a good one. I didn't really expect a pike to bite there so I kind of pouched my self as i'm standing on sort of high wall and I don't have a net. I realize that to get this fish in i'm going to have to try and lean over to try and get grab the fish. I get the fish close and see that its a really nice fish, about 35". I bent down to try and grab it with one arm while holding my rod back with the other hand. I'm coming so close to grabbing it but can't quite get a good grip. I'm pretty much only getting my hands wet and touching the fish I swtich hands and try that but still nothing, my hands are getting wet with the cold water though and it's taking everything I have not to fall in. then the fish takes a big run and snaps my line. I'm down to 2 lures left. My hands are really feeling the cold from being wet , not to mention the cold Island wind does not help however I manage to retie and I cast my second lure back out for revenge. I kid you not next cast I get a follow, I cast it back to the same spot but work it slower and BOOM another big pike takes my bait I start reeling it in but I guess with my hands being so cold I didn't tie my knot properly and my lines snaps out of no where.
Now i'm left with one lure left in what seems to be water that is stacked with Pike. I go to retie my LAST lure and it is now a real struggle, my hands are chilled to the bone. I could warm them up in my pockets for awhile but I really want to take advantage of this hot fishing. I try to tie my last lure but with my hands being so cold I end up dropping my last lure into the water and it sinks like a stone. I now have no lures left and after only 3 casts my trip is over. I look over at the ferry and notice that it still hasn't left, i really wasn't even on the Island for more than like 5 maybe 7 minutes and so I could still make it back on the same ferry I came out on. Than I hear it HONK it starts taking off and I have to wait on the Island for an hour for the next one to come back.

I kind of find it to be a funny story now but at the time I was raging mad. crazy thing is though that the fishing has never been the same there since. I came back a few weeks later and actually got my PB pike there (i'll post a pic of it here when I get home) but other than that I've really not caught anything there since, it's like the fish have left and not returned. But atleast the memory will live on for ever.

Wow fork... After reading all your stories I came to a conclusion..... Do not go fishing with Putaforkinya!