June 24, 2023

 I've wanted to catch a Bowfin on a topwater fly.  Finally made that happen.  I saw a bowfin gulp air, then instead of diving back down like they usually do, this one started swimming just under the surface.  Fortunately, I'd already put a surface fly on, and was ready to make the casts to it.  It ate the Tuscan Bunny fly!

I caught 7 more Bowfin on subsurface fly patterns, including several on a smaller fly I put on to try for carp.

Speaking of carp... I got one! :) 

I even managed to get 2 Freshwater Drum.

...And two Yellow Bullhead from a ditch that was drying up.

That ditch is one I walk by buy almost never fish.  Never looks like much is in it.  But now that it is drying up, there are dead fish in it, some are good-sized.  In one small area, I noticed a commotion in the water.  Turned out it was a bunch (over 100!) of Bowfin that were swimming out of a small slightly deeper spot into the shallows near shore and beaching themselves, stacked tightly like cordwood!  There were also a few gar, and a couple bullheads and small carp.

It was a hot day... 95 degrees...and with the stagnant, hot water, I can only assume they were trying to reach what little shade there was near shore?  I rescued a bullhead and three bowfin...putting them in an adjacent ditch that had more water...but I wasn't prepared to do a full-scale rescue operation.  The ones I did rescue where REALLY WARM to the touch.  I'd read that bowfin will bury themselves in the mud when their water dries up, and will re-emerge when the water returns.  There are stories of rivers flooding into fields, then the following year when the field is plowed for crops, the farmers will find the bowfin still alive in the dirt.  I hope these survive!

Also caught Largemouth Bass and some Green Sunfish.