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!