Evening Fly Fishing Report, 5-24-2012

I had 2 separate fishing outings this evening.  The first was at a public pond in a nearby town, while my son was at one of his activities.  Tough conditions with a front that moved through around mid-afternoon.  Fish weren't very active.  Weeds were also pretty thick along shore.

I decided to try the Bass Gurgler on this pond, just to see what I could come up with.  It is extremely rare for me to catch ANY bass at this pond.  I ended up catching at least two bass (nothing big), and had several others on that managed to not get hooked or quickly freed themselves.  About the time I had to leave, I found a spot that had probably 100 bluegills in a small area.  I'm sure I could have switched flies and caught a bunch in short order, but decided to let them be...this time.

The second fly-fishing outing of the evening was after we got home.  It was a little after 8pm, and the sun was still above the horizon.  I went a public pond not far from my house.

I still had the Bass Gurgler on my line, so I stuck with it pretty much the entire night.  I ended up landing 8 Largemouth Bass on it, had about a 1/2 dozen decent fish (bass) that managed to shake free before I landed them.  I also landed 2 bluegills on the Bass Gurgler.  The biggest fish of the evening was this 16.5-inch bass.  It looks recently "spawned out".

I also watched a "tail" waving on the surface right near shore.  I slowly fished my way towards it, and it was still there.  I was hoping it was a grass carp, but as best I could tell in the fading light, it was a channel catfish that was VERY intently feeding on the bottom.  I can't know for sure, but I suspect it may have been feeding on fish eggs?  I spooked it away several times, and it returned to the same spot several times, but eventually seemed to disappear.  Then again, it was VERY dark by this time.

The foam on this Bass Gurgler is getting "chewed up" by bass teeth.  "Badge of Honor" and all that...Its still working very well.  I need to tie up a few more spares, because this pattern is WAY outperforming the foam bass poppers I was previously using.

Evening Fly-Fishing Report, 5-21-2012

I was hoping I'd get a chance to fly fish today.  It was the calmest day we'd had in 2 weeks.
My son had a cancelled extracurricular activity, but I didn't get confirmation of that until I drove him 1/2 hour to get there.  Long story about horrible communication skills by certain people, which I won't detail here.

By the time I got back home, it was 8pm.  I grabbed some mosquito repellant (a.k.a. "cigar"), a few recently tied flies, camera, and headed out the door.

I arrived at the pond to find a couple other folks fishing with spinning gear.  I'm not sure if they ever did catch anything.  I started out with the Bass Gurgler I recently posted about.  Once again it was a fish-catcher.  No biggies this time...but I did land 2 largemouth bass on it, lost a third one near shore, and had a handful of missed strikes.  In that short amount of time, a tot on a Razor scooter stopped behind me to watch.  He no sooner went on his way, when a Dad and son stopped by to watch.  They followed me around  1/3 of the pond, during which time I caught zero fish.  I know, impressive, right?  But I had spotted a grass carp back, and had begun stalking it.  Cast after cast with a deer hair "pellet" fly.  I may have actually gotten one strike on this, but no hookup.  Then I switched to an unweighted white woolly bugger.

When I had arrived at the pond, I noticed a woman on the opposite side of the pond chucking some bread into the water for the ducks.  I actually like to see this, since it often gets the catfish active, and it should get the grass carp active.  But those darn grass carp...frustrate me to no end, and I want to catch more of them SO MUCH!

Anyway, I worked my way around to where the bread was.  Some smaller fish were playing with it.  The grass carp I was stalking was hanging out near it, but about 30 feet further away from shore from the bread.  As I was casting to this grassie, a couple other large fish that I suspect were also grass carp that were slightly deeper, showed their locations with some large rings at the surface.  Eventually (and after my audience finally gave up on me), one or two large fish started coming in closer to shore for the bread.

I cast a bit beyond the floating bits of bread and slowly brought the white woolly bugger back through it.  Sooner than I expected, my line tightened...FAST.  Big fish on!  I didn't want my hooked fish to disturb any other fish in the area more than it needed to, so I immediately started walking the fish down the shoreline away from the area.  This was a strong fish, but mostly slow.  I could walk it around like a dog on a leash, but it would simply parallel shore.  Whenever I leveraged the 6wt to try to get the fish to the surface, it would turn and make a powerful run for deeper water again.  The happened repeatedly, and I still hadn't gotten a visual on the fish.  Plus, it was getting dark.  From the way it was fighting, I was SO SURE it was a grass carp.  I was so happy!  FINALLY hooked another one, after a hiatus of over a year!

I finally got the fish up into the shallows near shore, and it made one more short run before I was able to get my hands on it.  Hands.  I pinned it down with one hand, but couldn't secure a grip across its back (by this time, I realized it was a nice channel catfish instead of a grass carp, and was sort of bummed....but I love catching catfish on the fly rod too).  I set my rod down and got on my knees and put two hands around the fish's midsection, with fingers on either side of its pectoral fins.  With this grip, I was able to lift it onto shore.

This was a really nice male channel catfish.  I measured it at 27", which would put it in the 9-pound range.  I snapped some photos and released it.

I love it when a fish makes my gear look small!

See the beat up white woolly bugger hanging from its lip?

Here I'm holding the fish down so I can hold it still while I photograph it.  Looks like I could have picked it up with one hand...but I really couldn't get an adequate grip with just one hand.

I returned to the breaded area.  A couple nice fish showed up on it, but nothing was feeding quite as aggressively as before.  I switched to a fresh white woolly bugger that was bit larger, since the catfish had beat up the first one pretty good.  I caught at least a dozen crappies on it before I left.  I also caught a couple bluegills, but found it very odd that I foul-hooked almost 10 bluegills!  Its very rare that I foul-hook a bluegill EVER...and to snag that many from one spot was bizarre!  All I can figure is the fish were pecking away at the bread and were either slapping at the fly to break it into smaller pieces, or were oblivious to my line/fly passing near them while they were distracted by the bread?

Anyway, its always a great night when one can land a big fish on a fly rod!

The Murdich Minnow

I'm a big fan of the Fly Fish Ohio website.  Lots of great info there, and tying instructions for a good number of useful fish-catching fly patterns.  The website's Publisher, Joe Cornwall, wrote a book called Fly Fishing Warm Water Rivers.
http://www.flyfishohio.com/Fly_Fishing_Warm_Water_Rivers.htm

When I purchased my second copy of his book (long story), he sent me a fly he had tied up for Smallmouth Bass.  On the website, there is an excellent write-up about the pattern, and step-by-step tying instructions.
http://www.flyfishohio.com/Murdich_Minnow.htm

One thing that especially caught my attention in Joe's write-up is his mention that this pattern was very successful on catching Ohio River Wipers.  Those Wipers are accustomed to chasing/eating shad, just like our local Wipers are.

So, I finally sat down this weekend to tie up a few. The one change I made was to cover the head/attach the eyes with Sport & Outdoor GOOP adhesive.  I unsuccessfully tried 3 different stores looking for the Liquid Nails Clear Small Project Adhesive.  This version of the GOOP sounds like it has the same attributes as the Liquid Nails product...it is waterproof, dries clear, and remains flexible.

I can't wait to show these to some fish this Summer/Fall!

DMACC Pond-West Des Moines, 5-19-2012

I fly-fished the DMACC Pond - WDM Saturday afternoon for about 1.5 hours.  First time I've ever visited/fished this pond.

While there, I talked to a fellow who said he has fished the pond for years.  Said there used to be a lot of BIG bass and lots of nice Hybrid Sunfish in the pond.  Then the bucketeers came, and now there's just smaller fish left.  I said, "...even with the signs posted around the pond that say 'Catch and Release Only'?"  He said that was before the signs were put up.  He seemed embarrassed to be caught out fishing with spinning gear, telling me he normally only fishes with fly gear, but he brought the spinning rod today because it was so windy.  And it was definitely windy!!

I had fun exploring a new pond.  Here's what I caught:
-4 lmb
-2 crappie
-1 hybrid sunfish
-2 green sunfish
-28 bluegill

The bass, hybrid, and green sunfish were on the small size.  The crappies were in the 8"-9" range.  I caught a lot of nice bluegills, though.  Not BIG bluegills...but nice ones.  Looking at it now, this one probably measured around 8.5".

Also saw some cool flowers behind the willows on the north side of the pond.  Anyone know what kind of flowers these are?  Look sort of like irises....but the leaves looked thinner and more narrow like a lilly.

The Bass Gurgler

The bass spawn may be about over.  I didn't see the amount of big fish activity in the shallows last night as I had last weekend.  Then again, it was pretty windy.  I tossed one of the Bass Gurlgers I talked about in some recent posts.  It is not MY original design.  I gave the credit where it was due in one of the previous posts.  It worked well again, and scored 3 bass (all under 14" this time) and a NICE bluegill.

I tied up a few more last night, and thought I'd post the pictures.  I tied one for bass on a #2 Streamer hooks in black-and-yellow.  I tied up 2 on #4 Streamer hooks that I think might work for white bass/wipers when they are feeding on shad near the surface or in the shallows.  Catfish might even go for 'em when they are feeding on shad.  I tied 2 different colors for these, one a sparkly white foam with white boa yarn body and a red tail, and one a sparkly silver/gray foam with a light gray boa yarn body and white tail.  After I took the picture below, I decided to shorten the marabou a bit on the 2 smaller ones.

I may do some in colors that smallies might enjoy, and maybe in slightly smaller sizes.

Here's some closer shots of the pattern...

Top:

Bottom:

And here is a close-up of the "mouth"...when tied tightly, the bottom lip and top lip both will naturally curve, forming a nice "popper" face.

I trim the corners off the foam lips, but this may not be necessary for an effective Gurgler.  Doing so seems to spread the lips apart better in this particular design, and since some of the foam sheets I use have adhesive on one side, this seems to help prevent the "lips" from sticking together.

Evening Fly-Fishing, 5-15-2012

I fly-fished at Blue Heron Lake this evening (5-15-2012) from 7:15pm-8:30pm (1.25 hrs).

It was a bit windy, but warm.

I started out using a Blue Thunder streamer.  I cast near some large gizzard shad spawning in the shallows, and caught a crappie.  I moved along the shoreline until I neared another spot where shad were active against the shoreline.  There was a short section of a log in the shallows near shore.  Wind-generated currents had deepened the water around the log.  I made some casts around it, and ended up catching mostly crappies from one side of the log, and mostly yellow bass from the other side of the log.  I did accidentally snag a large (10") shad there.

I switched to a silver Springbrook Wunder microjig and caught another yellow bass and crappie before deciding to move on.  I moved down to a spot where the shad were splashing on a small point that had current blowing across it, parallel to shore.  There was sort of a current line there, so I cast beyond the shad a ways, and started working the microjig in.  I caught a crappie, then a bluegill, then a catfish!  It may have been one of the smallest channel catfish I've caught on a fly rod, but it still put up a heckuva fight!  I continued moving along the shoreline.  I think I scared up some carp from the shallows, since I didn't see them before they saw me.  I caught some more crappies, bluegills, yellow bass, and a tiny largemouth bass.

Fish totals for the evening were:

3  Bluegills

1 LMB

15 Crappie

10 Yellow Bass

1 Channel Catfish

Here's the some of the fish...
Channel Catfish:

Yellow Bass:

Yellow Bass are sort of colorful.  They are a native fish to Iowa, often found in low numbers in rivers.  Unfortunately they don't get very big, and have a reputation for overpopulating and ruining lakes in Iowa, which then must usually be drained and refilled to get rid of them.  This lake is adjacent to a river, and the river regularly floods into this lake, so they are here to stay in this particular lake.  I hope the other fish species can thrive alongside the Yellow Bass.

Evening Fly-Fishing, 5-13-2012

It was a fairly calm evening, so after dinner I headed to one of the public ponds in town to do some fly-fishing.  Quite a few other people had the same idea.  Only one other fellow was flyfishing.  The rest were using spinning gear.

I started out with a bass Gurgler I had tied up, after having such good success with the first one.  This 2nd tie was tied on a #2 streamer hook, slightly larger than the previous one.

First cast, I took the fly away from a fish that was investigating it.  Next cast, FISH ON!  This was a good fish, and it went completely airborne, and re-entered the water with a huge splash.  Cool!   This bass measured 17".

When I released this one back to the water, it charged away from shore with gusto!

Now, I honestly can't say for sure that the next fish came on the very next cast.  Maybe it did, but it more likely was a 3 or 4 casts later.  Anyway, it hit aggressively, I set the hook, and this fish just TOOK OFF!  It charged for deep water and went DOWN.  Then it turned to parallel the shoreline and was swimming straight away from me.  The pressure I was putting on the fish brought it up from the depths somewhat, because I could tell where it was by the swirls and wakes of other scared fish taking off out of its way.  And some of those looked like they were from good-sized fish!

I did get the fish turned and brought it back to me, and soon landed it.  NICE BASS!  This one measured 19", which goes into a 3-way tie for my biggest Largemouth Bass caught on a fly rod.  Such a strong fighter!

I released this one, and it mosied away a bit more calmly than the previous fish.
I resumed casting, but the strikes I was getting seemed to be from smaller fish that didn't want to get hooked.  I moved along the shoreline a ways.  I put a cast out sort of parallel to the shoreline, and got another good strike.  When I set the hook, the line parted immediately.  Darn!  That fish took my new fly!  I was sort of bummed.  Within a few minutes, a nice-sized bass leapt for the sky out near the middle of the pond, and I had a feeling that was my fish...trying to throw the Gurgler out of its mouth.

I tied on the "older" Gurler.  I got strikes from small fish, and caught a smaller bass on.  Then I started changing through different fly patterns to target crappies, bluegills, and hoped for catfish.  I saw some catfish porpoise as they were feeding near the surface.  I also saw several grass carp around with their backs occasionally sticking above the water.  Pretty large fish!  Of COURSE I wanna catch more of these on my fly rod, so I spent a fair amount of time trying to cast to them.  I was unsuccessful in hooking into one...but was heartened to see these in this pond being so VISIBLE.  I know they are here, but almost NEVER see them.

I did catch just one bluegill, and 8 crappies before trying the Gurgler one more time.  I had some really nice, loud strikes on it, but didn't hook anything.  I wondered if maybe if these strikes were from catfish or smaller bass.

I am definitely going to be tying up a few more of these Gurglers.  They are definitely working well for me!