Hey guys. I'm Andrew. I've fished and hunted my whole life, but generally only on our family land in far far southern IL. Recently I saw two friends tweeting about fishing exploits and it put a wild hair up my ass. I've spent a lot of free time recently re-learning fishing. I have a background in film, I brew beer for a living, I'm married with a house and no kids, I'm 29. I grew up out in the south western suburbs. I studied some Integrated Natural Resource Management in High School so I can throw out terms like benthic macroinvertabrates, keystone species, biomass, land ethic, etc. Seeing discarded blue plastic night crawler tubs drive me to no end of frustration.

I prefer to be away from other people while I'm fishing if they're strangers as I often fish as stress relief. But I also love to fish with friends and have spent many hours in a john boat with a case of cold ones earning a farmer's tan.

So far this year I've been scouring google maps for blue spots, searching for new places to fish. I would describe it as mixed success. I came across this place via another forum after reading Ken's reports. I immediately knew I was looking in the right direction for quality information. I'm looking forward to getting my sea legs back and hopefully developing some new fishing friends.

amason wrote:I brew beer for a living,

You'll regret putting that up here. Ed and Travis are about to become your Best Friends Forever.

I'm pretty good about giving away spots on the Fox and I know just enough about the Dupe and Kankakee to be dangerous. It may take some substantial bribing to get me to part with creek names. That's where I go to get away, but I slip up now and then.

I'm not much of a pond angler, too much competition around here for space.

Just ask lots of questions. I also have a long list of rivers and creeks in Northern Illinois I'll probably never get to. Someone should go check them out.

Welcome aboard Andrew.

Del Lorme Atlas and Gazzeeter can be a big help