Super Duper Smallmouth

I had one heck of an adventure today. I went back to the spots visited on Monday on the lake, hoping for some pickerel and maybe a carp. One was going to happen, the other not so much. But some crazy stuff would make up for that.

Fairly shortly after I arrived at location A Mr. Big showed up, shoveling around in the leaves. The water was clear and he was nicely visible.

I made my cast, presenting my fly very gently... right on the Carp's back. He had moved forward about a foot. The reaction was rather fast, and the only sign of the fishes presence was a boil and cloud of silt. Oh well. It happens. On to the next goal. That was achieved fairly quickly with three powerful pickerel, with some other species in between. I talked a bit with the land owner. I really appreciate his generosity in allowing me to fish there. It is a great spot.

So I had achieved my goal, and done a little more. What good angler stops there? I moved to a good Bass and Perch spot. There I caught a few small fish before meeting a gentleman (I think his name was Mark? I'm so bad with names.) who told me how he had caught an enormous carp on a Doritos chip and a couple maggots.

Right after he stepped away I lobbed a long cast. A few figure eights into the retrieve there was simply resistance. Then that resistance shook its head. Then it jumped. The animal throwing spray around the end of my line was a Smallmouth worthy of admiration. With that first jump my heart stopped. I could not mess this one up. Losing this fish would be quite the bummer. The fight was as a Smallmouth should be, with stubborn runs and fantastic Acrobatics. I am willing to say that it was easily as good, if not better, then the fight of a big carp. It was certainly more active. Eventually that big thing came to hand, and what a gorgeous fish it was. Long, and with exceptional girth: probably pushing six pounds. I went over to show the fish to Mark, then returned it to where it had come from.

The patented RMLytle big fish face, as well as the lucky Lane Trap Rock hat and flannel shirt.

So hey, a very nice PB Smallmouth, good Pickerel action, plenty of other species. Why not stop while I'm ahead? I stayed and caught a bunch more perch and one more good smallmouth. On another note, two people asked me where I was from today. Apparently I have not yet shed that Western PA accent. 

An Evening Bass (Written on the 18th)

I went back out today to see if the carp were in the same mood as yesterday. I should really have taken the conditions into consideration. Yesterday, the morning and much of the afternoon was rainy or at least cloudy. Today there was mild to no cloud cover. The vacuums of the lake were just not in the mood to play. But hey, why leave? Carp are by no means the only fish around worth hunting. In fact the are pretty low on most peoples' lists. So I used the same flies, just with a faster retrieve and a little less sinking time. It worked fairly well, as I hooked into a very nice largemouth that fought like a bull. 

Gaining Courage

I noticed this afternoon that the weather was ideal for carping. I chose to return to the site of the crime, to once again do battle with the fly line stealing crowd of Common Carp. As I expected there was plenty of activity. However, for one reason or another, it was just not to be. I lined one fish and missed two takes. Not to be out done, I still landed a well colored Perch. In the end I was wet and late for a meeting. I guess that's all I really needed out of the trip anyway.

Lake Pocotapaug Multi Species

This afternoon felt like a good one to try out the new fly line on some big water carp. I geared up and hit the water, where I found a very happily feeding carp. He was quite large. Unfortunately he spooked and left in a hurry, forcing me to target smaller fish.

Nothing gets my heart pumping quite like a 25 ponder kicking up a nice mud cloud.

The next fish I saw was a Smallmouth, and he nailed the fly with precision. The fight was short but full of acrobatics. I continued on to catch Smallmouth, Largemouth, Pickerel, White Perch, Yellow Perch, Bluegills, and Pumpkinseeds. That leaves three other species that are fairly catcheable on flies: Carp, Rock Bass, and Walleye. Hey, I've even seen a big Native Brooky come out of that lake.

Speckles

Upon returning home after my highly enjoyable wilderness survival outing, I decided to go out and catch some Native Brookies. The location of choice was a thin blue line deep in a ravine. The streams are running well. I planned to use dries, but they were only being taken when the sun went behind a cloud. The next choice was a wet fly, and that is what stayed on the end of my tippet for the majority of the time. When I scrambled into the ravine I spooked a few Fish in the pool bellow me. I vowed to catch them on the way back down.

I did get a few on dries, but eventually, in a deep man made plunge pool, I started nailing nice ones on wets. Then I went back down and caught two of the ones that I had spooked. These fish were all strikingly spotted. One was already in full fall dress.

I picked out a section farther up, but it appeared to have been cleaned out by herons. All I could find was two inch juveniles. Maybe in a few years it will be really nice.

On the way home, I stopped at a swamp to get some big panfish on dries. I got some nice Bluegills and Pumpkinseeds before calling it a day.