Fishing with Noodles

When I was I kid, a community fish fry was a popular means of raising funds for some activity or organization. Lake Oconee was still years from being build, so Sinclair was the place to go. Folks would catch, clean, and freeze fish throughout the year in preparation for such events. One of the best ways to catch large numbers of fish in a short time was and still is "float fishing."

"Float fishing," or what we used to call "can fishing," is done by dropping some type of floating device with a line, sinker and baited hook along the channel of the lake. After a few hours you find your floats (usually marked for identification) and hopefully have caught a mess of big channel or blue catfish. The folks I fished with actually had quart-sized cans sealed with air from a local plant. The line was attached by soldering a wire staple to the can. These fit nicely in old wooden Coca-Cola crates stacked in the bottom of the boat.

While sealed cans were "high speed" for the 1960s, you may have noted a variation being used on the lakes that is most ingeniuos, the use of pool floatation noodles! Many of you have seen or used these as the float when fishing. It takes about a foot of noodle to do the trick. The line is secured about the middle and can bewrapped for easy storage until ready to be tossed out of the boat. Another benefit is the number of flourescent colors from which to choose. This makes them easy to locate when fishing at night. Based on the number of noodle floats I see each day around the lakes, there must be a fish fry in the near future! Hope I'm invited.