Chapter 358: Chapter 220: Dominant Leadership Far Ahead
Zhang Yang’s fingertips lightly pinched, naturally separating the double hooks’ lines, with the hooks attached to the linear magnet on the bait plate. His left hand deliberately shifted the bait ball slightly to the middle, pressing it down and steadily applying force, pulling out two moderately sized, smooth and full bait balls.
Using the same type of bait, Zhang Yang employed different bait-pulling techniques, resulting in noticeable differences in the condition of the bait on the hooks.
When scraping the surface, the bait balls pulled out were relatively large, their contours rougher and wilder. These bait balls scattered quickly after entering the water, accelerating the fish gathering process.
When pulling bait cores, the bait balls on the hooks were slightly smaller, but they were more solid and full, with almost no ragged edges. This condition was more suitable for fish bites once in the water.
Completing the dual-hook bait pulling, a flick of the wrist effortlessly threw the fishing set into the fishing spot.
At the instant of entering the water, Zhang Yang began silently counting in his mind, 1, 2, 3, 4,...
By the count of five, the bobber hadn’t turned over, clearly indicating the double hook was caught by a fish!
Zhang Yang decisively lifted the rod.
Double bite!
Zhang Yang quickly raised the rod to hook the fish, removed the hook using the blocking needle technique, then repeated the previous action, casting the rod into the water again.
This time, counting from 1 to 4, Zhang Yang decisively lifted the rod.
At this point, some might be confused, wondering what the counting was for. Isn’t the normal fishing supposed to involve watching the bobber to catch a bite?
Normal bottom fishing indeed involves watching the bobber to catch a bite, but this is not a normal bottom fishing scenario.
For float-fishing, there’s no need to watch the bobber. Zhang Yang simply needed to pinpoint the time interval between the fishing set entering the water and the fish biting the bait on the double hooks to determine the lifting rhythm, aiming for ultimate efficiency.
Mental counting serves to determine the time interval.
Through several consecutive attempts, the optimal time interval was found to be approximately 3.5 seconds to lift the rod, ensuring a high double bite rate while minimizing waiting time.
Having identified the rhythm for catching fish, the subsequent battle became repetitive.
In the first half, Zhang Yang, who barely got any fish in the net, transformed into the War God, crazily chasing after the temporary lagging catch with a super high catch efficiency, far exceeding that of ordinary people.
Double bite!
Double bite!
Another double bite!
...
Zhang Yang lifted the rod five times, achieving at least three to four double bites.
The speed of bait casting was extremely fast, and the efficiency of hooking fish was even higher. Ordinary anglers would wait for the bobber to turn over normally at the preset fish layer position before catching fish.
While Zhang Yang’s side had already caught fish at less than half a meter below the water surface, virtually eliminating the time in the middle of the fishing set’s journey.
As the high-frequency cycle of catching and casting continued, the fish population in Zhang Yang’s spot kept accumulating in numbers.
As the competition neared its final ten minutes, the entire spot area clustered into a densely packed mass of fish.
With the high fish density, every time the double hooks, with bait, entered the water, it triggered a series of fish scrambling noises akin to firecrackers. The fastest interval for bites had shortened further from approximately 3.5 seconds to less than three seconds.
Zhang Yang was rapidly catching fish, while the anglers sitting to the left and right of him had already gone slack-eyed.
In the adjacent spot, the continuous float-fishing frenzy was evident, while the anglers sitting on both sides experienced no response at all when their bobbers entered the water. The few fish caught in their spot were either caught or lured away by the neighboring fish group. With an hour of the competition over and just over ten minutes left, the situation had prematurely frozen.
With Zhang Yang continuing his high-speed float-fishing and fish-retrieving rhythm, many anglers practicing their skills without aiming for fish had also noticed the situation on Zhang Yang’s side.
From a distance, people occasionally lifted their heads, watching Zhang Yang’s exaggerated fish scene and whispering to friends.
Meng Fan and Liu Zi also noticed the aggressive float-fishing scenario on Zhang Yang’s side.
The quick attack fishing method they chose was generally fitting, but fell far short of the direct float-fishing efficiency. Especially Liu Zi, seeing small crucian carp being fished in such a way for the first time, had his attention somewhat diverted, clearly indicating a significant impact on his perception.
Ring!!!
After another ten minutes, Ding Wen’s phone alarm rang.
"Time’s up, everyone put down your rods, get ready to count fish!" Ding Wen abruptly stood from his fishing spot, loudly shouting.
Around ten or so people were gathered, with no one taking advantage of those few seconds, and everyone nearly simultaneously put down their fishing rods.
While Zhang Yang was preparing to lift his rod right on the whistle count, with fish still in mid-air, Ding Wen stood up to announce time was up.
Zhang Yang, assured of victory, didn’t bother with the two crucian carps on the double hooks, nor needed any reminders. In front of everyone, he directly removed the hooks and tossed them into the pond without adding them to the net.
"Everyone remain still, I and Xiao Dao will separate into groups to tally the fish count!"
Ding Wen turned to retrieve two plastic basins, and with Chen Xueqiang, they started counting the catches from both ends.
Ordinary anglers’ catches were all over a hundred fish, making counting relatively quick. Counting four fish at a time allowed them to quickly finish tallying for one person.
Soon, Ding Wen reached Zhang Yang.
"Impressive, Master Zhang, you’ve directly started float-fishing for fish!" Ding Wen said, grinning as he approached Zhang Yang.
Zhang Yang smiled, "Got lucky. The fish bites were decent, so I took a gamble, didn’t expect it to actually work! Lucky! What was the maximum count up front?"