re: Fishing etiquette?

I usually let that stuff fly. BUT ONE TIME....I'm fishing a reef in the middle of BSL catching a few but slow. I'm soaking a croaker on bottom when this slap nutts starts trolling close. I pay no mind till he HOOKS MY F*^%+?# LINE.

eleventy billion miles of water and that dude hooks my line. He knew he messed up but I layed it on thick anyway.

I can't stand people who need to be within casting distance. Plenty of water, go somewhere else. The exception is schooling fish. We get big schools of hybrids and white bass here and the action top water is awesome. May have 12 boats all fishing same school. People get close. Sometimes when landing a fish and wind is moving it's hard to manage the trolling motor too. It happens. However...

This one fella would wait to see us on a school and cone screaming in with outboard going right up to school and push emdown. Politely told him that if he went upwind of school and killed motor and drifted in they would hang around longer. He keeps doing it. Finally 3 schools later hes so close he casts across the line of my back deck angler. After getting untangled I told him maybe it was better if he called it a day or at least stay beyond casting distance. Since we had drifted apart 20 yards or so he asked if that was far enough. I answered by bouncing a 1 oz slab off his outboard "nope!" He cranked and went home. We limited shortly there after.

We were killing the specks at enstar (platform near last island) guy comes up and anchors right where we were casting. I yelled WTF...he replied "we came a long way to catch fish". I tied on an old Topwater bait and broke it off on his anchor rope.

I hope he hooked himself. Saltwater fishermen are assholes. You would be amazed at how many will get on plane when leaving a spot surrounded by boats, will run right where you are casting, won't give you a wide berth, etc. They don't care about etiquette. When I go freshwater fishing I am shocked by how considerate most fishermen are.

I'll just mark the spot to try out later and keep moving.

A friend and I joked that we needed to act like we don't know each other...one pulls up too close to the other with lots of boats around and we start arguing....then fire a shotgun. Maybe then people will say "damn I need to quit crowding people...they shooting at people over here"

The bad thing is people that are this stupid don't read this board. Sounds like all you guys know how to handle yourselves on the water, but some people don't have a clue.

Sounds like you were far enough away, OP.

I have problems with yakers in Florida. They come right up to our docked boat and start casting right next to it (1-2'). I politely ask them to not cast so close to the boat so they don't chip our paint ($100,000 paint job). Most understand, but some don't listen. If they don't leave, I turn on the motors and blow them 20-30' away. Sometimes they still don't leave and move to the bow of our boat. That's when I hit them with the bow thruster.

There are good and bad fisherman, but I would never throw rocks at them. Besides, throwing rocks from a boat is bad luck. Almost as bad as having bananas.