There was rarely anyone fishing, and you could rely on catching at least one bass worthy of a photo. I’d be dripping with DEET, trudging through waist-high grass, my sneakers caked in mud. When I was a little squirt, reaching this pond meant parking on the winding country road at a shallow pull-off and traversing the old farm property all the way to the back. There, at the deeper end, milfoil grows thick along the bank, sloping away to create a juicy edge. There’s a dike at the other end and a spillway that was installed long before my time, back when this property was still a private farm. Dragonflies dance over them, and the sharp sucks of bluegills taking swings at these airborne morsels carry across the water. The shallow end is ringed with crisp green lilies. It’s only a couple acres, making it ideal for foot missions. Let me take you back to that little bass pond in central New Jersey. “People want to show off, and they don’t care if they’re revealing their location when they show off.” The Story of a Burned Spot “Those spots get posted for the same reasons fish pictures with distinct backgrounds get posted on Facebook and Instagram,” Scharf says. ![]() He uses Fishbrain solely to look at maps and see where other users have posted catches. (You can buy most of these lures right through the app as well.) These are all fine features, but Scharf doesn’t use a single one of them. The app aggregates and logs weather and water condition data for your catch, helps you find public access and bait shops, and it will even recommend lures based on what other users in the area have been reporting success with. Outdoor Lifeįishbrain is promoted as a learning and journaling tool, which isn’t inaccurate. I guess the way I look at it is since I have no control over what other people post, I may as well use their information to my advantage.” The Fishbrain app shows catch locations, leaderboards, top lures, and much more. I mean, how do you not utilize a data resource like that? But at the same time, I’d prefer nobody posted anything on the app ever. If I want to catch, say, big pickerel, I can set filters so I only see locations where users have posted pickerel bigger than 20 inches. “I’ve had Fishbrain for about four years now,” he tells me. He believes there are two primary types of people who are attracted to the app-those who want to boost their ego by posting catches and those who benefit from the ego junkies by fishing their spots. ![]() For example, there are almost 30 pins and reports on one tiny, insignificant bass pond in central New Jersey where I grew up fishing (more on this in a moment.) I gleaned those numbers from my 26-year-old buddy Pete Scharf, because I don’t have Fishbrain. Fishbrainįishbrain says it has 14 million users worldwide who share their catches, create pins, and give fishing reports on waters across the globe week after week. Brain Games Fishbrain is the biggest app in the game. ![]() The good news is that some developers are coming up with ways to incorporate ethics into their apps, but to understand the significance of that, we must first look at Fishbrain-the app anglers love to hate and hate to love. I’d posit that fishing apps produce more burn victims than any other platform. Forums? In my experience, you give away too many goods and your post will get shut down. Facebook and Instagram? Sure, grip-and-grins of trophy fish that show obvious landmarks in the background don’t help. The question anglers should be asking is: How do we forge ahead in the information age without compromising fisheries? To answer it, you must first identify the biggest culprits-in other words, which platforms burn fishing spots the hardest. But I get sick of rapping about it because it’s an inevitability. I’ve also been the victim of it many times throughout my life. I’ve been accused of it many times in my career in fishing media. It’s not that I think it’s not a problem, or isn’t real, or isn’t capable of altering fisheries, because it’s all those things. At this point, I just kind of hate the term. ![]() Have fishing apps killed the secret bass pond?.
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