Some of you may have seen my posts regarding a little writing job I got last winter. I am writing a monthly column, a
"Web Review", on websites that would be particularly useful to sportsmen and other lovers of the outdoors for the regional
magazine "Outdoor Adventurer". The column has been well recieved and I am on my fourth month now. I have obtained permission to re-publish these reviews on fishin247.com for anyone who may be interested in reading them. This then, is the first, it appeared in the February issue of "Outdoor Adventurer:". If any of you are interested in picking up your own copies of this magazine here is a link with the distribution points listed. http://www.outdooradven.com
"Web Review", on websites that would be particularly useful to sportsmen and other lovers of the outdoors for the regional
magazine "Outdoor Adventurer". The column has been well recieved and I am on my fourth month now. I have obtained permission to re-publish these reviews on fishin247.com for anyone who may be interested in reading them. This then, is the first, it appeared in the February issue of "Outdoor Adventurer:". If any of you are interested in picking up your own copies of this magazine here is a link with the distribution points listed. http://www.outdooradven.com
Fishing Pennsylvania
The first time I got on line was in the mid nineties at a friend’s home. He explained some internet basics then asked what I wanted to do. "Search ice fishing" I said, and I have been doing web searches ever since. I have been a member of many web fishing forums and I have watched them grow from a mere handful to the thousands of sportsman’s sites on the internet today. My passion for the sporting community has led me to develop a few of my own sportsman’s web sites. I have two fishing forums, a hunting forum and an extensive personal homepage. Accessing the internet has enriched my appreciation of outdoor sports and my fellow sportsmen.
My name is David Strunk. I will be writing a column on the various resources and vast amounts of information available to sportsmen on the internet. In this column I will present reviews of the different types of websites, interviews with the individuals that have put these resources together, and demonstrate how they can be of particular benefit to fishermen, hunters, and all Outdoor Adventurers.
Sporting websites fall into four basic categories.
Commercial Sites, such as the tackle manufacturer Blue Fox .
Government / Institutional Sites, like the PA Game Commission’s website .
Community / Forum Sites, River Smallies is a good example of a large fishing forum/community.
Personal WebPages like this informative blog, http://www.centralpafishing.com/
This month we will review a small fishing forum recommended to me by a friend. I joined the site and found the management and the members to be a friendly and experienced bunch.
Fishing Pennsylvania, (http://p196.ezboard.com/bpanfishanglersneighborhood),
was started in October, 2003 by James and Jason Rutter, Crappieman and Panfish on the forum. Their mission is to promote the pursuit of panfish as a worthy fishing target, and to advance their approach to deep water panfishing. They bring 30 years of solid panfishing experience to the forum which is in Crappieman’s words, “for learning not just for bragging”. Fishing Pennsylvania membership is open to the public and has grown, word of mouth, to 101 members. The board is currently averaging slightly over 1000 page views and 24 posts per day, with slightly over 785,000 total page views.
Organized in a straight forward fashion, the forum contains message boards for the following topics: Open Forum, Crappie Forum, and General Fishing Reports. Then, there are five fishing reports forums with the subject waters grouped by region. Some of the waters covered in this section of the forum are: the Susquehanna and Juniata Rivers, Lake Marburg, Maunch Chunk, Strubel, Marsh Creek, Blue Marsh and Beltzville.
Of the final two sections, the first, deals with the local salt water scene aptly named Salt Water Fishing. The second is called Terminal Tackle and is devoted to discussions of rigs, jig and lures. There is valuable information for anyone interested fabricating their own jigs, spinners, weights, etc.
Not surprisingly a large portion of the membership is drawn from the Southeastern portion of the state Fishing Pennsylvania covers. There is a great deal of info to be found on the pages of Fishing Pennsylvania. The lake and river reports are particularly good and frequently contain water temps, color, and level observations as well as what lures were hot or not on the day in question. Don’t expect to find out anyone’s honey hole here, that would be asking too much. But, if you had a question about a particular species of fish, body of water or presentation your question would be given due respect and answered politely.
One of the great things about belonging to a forum community is the people that you will meet. Fishing Pennsylvania is home to some interesting folks. EML, Elaine Long is a wonderful artist and graces the forum with her drawings of “clever fish”. There is the master jig maker Greg Zeigler of Zig’s Jigs who can paint the “perfect eye on the smallest of jigs” and the award winning outdoor writer and author Dave Wolf.
I liken surfing the internet to taking a drive exploring for new fishing spots. There are exciting opportunities around every corner and every fork of the road holds new possibilities. Fishing Pennsylvania gets a hearty thumbs up from me! It is a friendly and useful site with good information, a love of fishing and of fishermen.
