By all accounts from those who attended the Shallow Water Striper University, both students and vendors, the weekend was a huge success. We did experience a few growing pains right from opening, but nothing that wasn't fixed and taken care of quickly. Those who attended were the best bunch of anglers that I've ever seen or had the pleasure to be associated with in one spot at the same time. Almost everyone who attended was totally satisfied and I believe that EVERYONE left there with something ( a prize ) and learned an awful lot more than what they knew before they arrived. The Live Pool Demo was a huge hit as we showed how to fish all types of soft plastics in a crystal clean swimming pool. One of the big hits there was Ron-Z's unveiling of a new bait that was tested that very night for the first time. In fact we got to test two lures that had never seen water before. The big 14-inch long eel-type bait was absolutely incredible in the way it swam, moved, darted and dived as we worked it. Many asked to see it again, even after we had already finished with it. The second lure was Ron-Z's new "White Ghost surface Popper", which is a Ron-Z 10-inch lure with a cupped-out face in the head so it pops on the surface like an ordinary surface popper, except that this popper has life-like action to it. The owner of Ron-Z said he got the idea from reading my first plastic's book on rigging and decided to make one. He has and it works and I was extremely humbled that it is going to be marketed with the White Ghost name on the package. For those who didn't take part in the weekend seminar series that we just completed, we will be holding one again next year, in fact, we've already booked the dates for the hotel. It will be March, 11-12 and 13, 2010. We will come back with another great learning program, more great prizes, great speakers, and new ideas to educate our students. One thing we promise right now. This will be kept as it is and not blown into a huge, over budjeted project, where hundreds of people are hurded like cattle all over the place. The limit and number of students will be kept at the current level, between 110 and 120 and never any higher. We had 103 students for our first event. This will keep this event personnel, easy to manage, low keyed, and informative for those who attend our seminars. This morning I received three or four dozen e-mails from students saying how satisfied they were, how it was the best money ever spent on something fishing related, how professional our speakers were, and how much they learned from each and every one of them. We intend on presenting and doing the same thing again next March. So mark your calender and don't miss the Second Annual Shallow Water Striper University seminar series. Thank each and everyone of you who attended and supported our event. Without you, we couldn't have made this past weekend the success that it was. You were all great and I hope to see all of you there next year again. Captain Jim White/ Shallow Water Striper University
