No Koi, Crazy Bass, and Frogs Galore!

I went to my secret koi hole early this morning. The only two times I saw the big orange and red guy he was not eating. What I did catch were panfish, and quite a lot of those. I actually had a big largemouth take a few bluegills off my line.

The craziest fishing was during long lasting attacks by bass on small bait happening in and around the reeds and near rocks. The bait would leap out of the water in mass quantities and the bass were not far behind. In the reeds in made for some crazy sounds.

Some froggy things happened today. I caught a nice big bullfrog who allowed me a very cool photo op, and a neighbor came out of his workshop with a rather lost grey tree frog, a fully grown one. Very cool to see.

They can climb just about anything.

Panfish and Pickerel

The weather has warmed up again here in Connecticut. Today I had a brief window of freedom in which to fish. The location ended up being one I would much rather fish from aw kayak or canoe, and probably will do just that later next week, but it does fish OK from shore. There's just so little of that that I'm allowed to fish. But today the little public shoreline gave me some very nice bluegills. I caught ten of those. My favorite had a nifty tiger stripe dress on.

The water in this lake tends to stay nice and clear, unlike some lake I fish that suffer from the wrath of fertilizer and road salt and the blue-green algae blooms it causes. There are lots of springs that the bass apparently stage on. I'm told that there may even by some brook trout here.... but that's a secret so I'm not giving up just where this is.

I got my little streamer caught on a reed and as I quickly dragged it back a splashing strike startled me. I cast again and hooked the culprit, a nice little Esox niger.

The heftiest of the day was this nice pumpkinseed.

I love throwing around simple little patterns in a pretty setting to catch colorful fish, and when the brooky streams aren't the best option (they are still quite low) panfish are just the ticket.

Menhaden and Heavy Surf on the Fly

I spent the day yesterday in Rhode Island with the family. I spent the whole time on the beach napping, but when we passed a very nice little harbor and I spotted tons of menhaden I sprung into action. I was soon waiting shore side with fly rod in hand, hoping some big predators were there to eat the bunker. That never happened, but I realized that the bait were willing to nip and a tiny nymph I had on my hat and I caught quite a few of them.

Tiny but very pretty!

 Later on I found myself being pounded by surf on a rocky shoreline trying unsuccessfully to reach stripers feeding in the waves. Even the very kind surf caster next to me was having a hard time reaching them. He did get two while I was there. At one point he offered me two lures, I had to decline as I was only rigged with fly rod. Thanks any way, friend... people like that are one of my favorite thing about fishing.

The last 3 photos are courtesy of Malachi Lytle.

A Big Evening Carp In The Rain

I went to the lake this evening to get a bit of carping in before a second bout of rain came in. When I opened my bag I realized that I had put the wrong fly box in. Instead of the carp flies I had a box full of big streamers. Luckily there are some woolly buggers in that box, so I pulled out a black one and tied it on. While I waited for the wind to calm down I blind cast in hopes of smallmouth and got lucky with a nice one.

As I biked around the corner I spotted some big tails waving next to a friend's dock. I Put the bugger in front of the closest and it moved over and took. I failed to set the hook but the fish didn't spook. In fact, more were coming in. I got a few looks and then a solid take that did end with the fish all spooking and me muttering four letter words.

I wasted time riding around hoping the school would come back. They didn't, but as I passed the tree line I saw a big ugly curtain of rain coming in.

Then I looked in the water and saw a big beautiful carp feeding heavily. I put the olive woolly bugger I had tied on just passed it and preformed a perfect drag and drop. The fly was just a little bit ahead of the fish and it was still focused on the bottom when the fly settled. I waited for it to start to move forward and gave the fly a little twitch. The fish very clearly noticed and it moved forward and gave that carp eat tail twitch. I set the hook and it dumped straight into the backing. There were only a few turns of line left on the reel when I stopped it. keep in mind I am using a rod that is missing a bit off the end. Fortunately I'm very well stocked with guides and end tips so I had one that fits and works. After I got done worrying about how the rod would handle the fish did another run into the backing. The fight this fish gave was ridiculous. Fortunately when it was close to shore there was plenty of shallow water to keep it from flipping out when I tailed it.

Once I had a good look at it I could see why it fought so well. It was long and by carp standards, fairly lean. That meant it had a lot more swing in its tail, which was a huge paddle anyway. There were a few times when it boiled at the surface and I was sure it had to be one of those 20+ pound monsters, but it ended up just having more fight in it then most it's weight.

I'm looking forward to seeing how they're behaving tomorrow morning.

White Perch at Night

The above picture sums up night fishing pretty well. Last night I went to the pond and threw a large assortment of streamers around hoping for walleye. That did not happen, but the smaller flies were hammered by these small predators:

The cold weather is likely to blame. The rain and warm front today will help things along greatly.