Day 1:
Crazy weather for August 19th (my birthday)! Drizzle and 53 degrees when we arrived to fish Waterloo Creek. We layered up to stay warm/dry....so yes, l looked absolutely ridiculous in what I ended up wearing. 
Waterloo has naturally-reproducing Brown Trout (no stockings), and stocked Rainbows & Brook Trout. We fished the stretch below the parking access that is downstream of the Bee Rd bridge.
Tough section! Very few deep pools, and lots of weed-packed shallow stretches that look devoid of fish, or extremely difficult to fish properly.
I did make friends with cows...
Jay got on the board quickly, with a Brookie and a Rainbow. It took me awhile to finally find a fish, but it was a nice, 17.25" Brown Trout:
I did manage to catch the trout Grand Slam here, but overall numbers were very low.
After an early dinner, we hit the lower C & R section, which I think has recently been "improved". The weed growth was nearly impenetrable along the banks, and the creek bottom was really soft clay crap that really wasn't conducive to safe wading. I caught a Creek Chub and one more Rainbow here.
The big surprise in that stretch was...Jay caught a chunky Smallmouth Bass...
...While I was shocked to catch 2 Northern Pike!
Day 2:
Day 2 was still unseasonably cool, but better than Day 1. And the wind was more of a factor today, as we fished a pasture section of the upper North Bear Creek. (We didn't get pictures of our new set of bovine friends, but they seemed to like us....and sang to us for quite awhile.) Casting was easier in the cow-mowed pasture area, but the abundance of thistles still caught our lines WAY more often than we'd care to admit.
I like this stream section! Interesting runs, which the Brown Trout seem to prefer, and intermittent deeper pools to waste time trying to catch non-feeding brookies, rainbows, and the occasional brown. I got a trout Grand Slam here as well, along with better numbers of fish. Jay caught his first-ever Brown Trout, and his first trout Grand Slam.
I got a trout Grand Slam here as well, along with better numbers of fish. Jay caught his first-ever Brown Trout, and his first trout Grand Slam.
We were worn out by 1:30pm, so we gave it up and began our journey home. NE Iowa is always a good time!
Thank you to everyone that gave me tips on where to fish, where to stay, and where to eat! I appreciate it!
Everything was caught on a gold Springbrook Wunder microjig, or a Beadhead Gold Woolly Bugger. Here's the microjigs I tied up for this trip:
Sounds like an awesome trip. I really like NEIA, becoming my favorite place to land when I plan a fishing trip. Good job!!
ReplyDeleteThanks. One thing that was also great was...we only saw 2 other anglers the entire trip, and we never even got close enough to chat.
DeleteSome of my favorite places in those photos! Looks like you guys had a great time and caught some really nice fish.
ReplyDeleteSince we were "first-timers" to both of these streams, we didn't know what to expect, or where the best places to fish might be. We made our choices, for good or bad. We had fun, but I don't think you can fish trout streams in NE Iowa and NOT have fun, right? :)
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