Good post. I was fortunate to be able to hit the water 200-300 times a year for many of my prime adult years. When you are on the water every day, or twice a day, you have the unique opportunity to stay with the fish, not only in terms of locations but those minute by minute, hour by hour adjustments to presentation that keeps you in tune to get the bites.

When you fish relentlessly you are the one pressuring your own fish, educating your own fish, then you make adjustments and continually re-educate their asses and move them around and make them tougher. That is why many anglers are so secretive and territorial, it's because the fish can't even stand the pressure of ONE intense angler, much less TWO!

Time on the water is everything - there is no subsitute (not even internet research), but it is not a linear relationship where a guy that fishes more catches more in proportion to the additional opportunity his extra time affords him.

A guy that fishes 200 days a year will catch triple+ a guy that fishes 100 days a year. A guy that fishes 100 days a year will catch triple+ a guy that fishes 50 days a year. A guy that fishes 20 days a year probably never catches big ones with pre-meditated intent unless he spent alot of time out there previously in his career.

Part of it is the weekend warrior "I may try to get out this Saturday" doesn't have the breadth of experience to go out and swing for the fences, be willing to not get bites. He just wants to catch some fish, so they don't develop much in the limited amount of time they have. They fish for action and not to learn. You can't care if you succeed in that moment, or that day! You have to think about the long run. Daily results mean nothing. Obviously I am not a tournament minded angler.

When I was fishing daily, or twice daily, (pre-multiple-crumbsnatchers era), I had total control of my fishing results. If it was tough I just worked harder. Allan Cole once wrote "Don't try to figure them out, just fish hard!" Part of that you can out-work the fish, and out-work the competition, or just out-last them. The other part is that when you fish harder than the rest you learn more, learn faster, and gain the wealth of all the little flashes of detailed observation that repeat themselves over time during successes, and failures, so you end up able to predict the future. If you do it every day or nearly so the string of observations stays solid in the mind and psychologically irrefutable, and the knowledge builds over time producing extreme confidence and a massive ego!

Marcus