Outdoor adventures: Are you ready to up your game in 2013?

I am trying to formulate some kind of plan to offset the certain carnage and macabre to come.

Being a flathead fisherman, I always worry about conditions for the upcoming season. But following up what was possibly the best big fish year I have ever had? Well, I can’t help thinking I have been set up for a tough year.

Generally, I just assume that my work ethic will overcome everything that Mother Nature, the fish and the forces of the dark side will throw at me. But in my line of work, assuming is the worst thing I can do.

That’s why every day, I am thinking through scenarios for the upcoming season. I go over things that went right last season, and things that went wrong. Spots I need to eliminate from the trips this year, and areas I need to add.

More shallow-water fishing is a must, especially since shallow water is about all we have. Or will we get rain and make the fishing completely different this year than last?

I know you’re thinking I’m obsessed, but I get paid to put people on flatheads. It’s a tough proposition. These aren’t easy fish to catch. Catching a real pig – say, 35 or 40 pounds – well, that’s like killing a Boone and Crockett buck. So what does the 2013 have in store? Hopefully big fish, and lots of them.

Are you ready? Are you going into this season dead set on doing what you have always done, because you’ve always done OK? Same gear, same technique, same baits and same everything?

Or have you vowed to make this a year of change? Is this the year you stop talking about catching a 10-pound walleye and actually get one?

Or are you going to just keep fishing for walleye in general and hope you get lucky and nab a giant? Same if you’re fishing for crappies or bluegills or carp or whatever fish trips your trigger.