Early October 2018

Cooler than normal temps and LOTS of rain defined this period.

Howitzer Poppers have caught some smaller bass recently, the water temps seems to be discouraging the bigger bass from hitting on topwater?  I've had some good success on a Feathered Gamechanger like the one in the picture below.

During one cold and rainy afternoon, I really had some fun with that Gamechanger:
17" Bass:

27" Channel Catfish!  (2 online sources suggested a weight of 9.4 lbs):

18" Bass:

21.5" Bass!

Although I had fished this pond pretty hard all year, I had not caught the bass above since November 15, 2017...almost a  year ago!  It gained 1/4" in length.

Another day was warmer and fairly calm.  Found some Common Carp willing to hit flies.  This one was 29":

This one measured 25":

Caught a few crappies:

Some bluegills....a few Pumpkinseed Sunfish:

As well as some other feisty bass in the 15"-16.5" range:

Late July, 2017

It's been hot, humid, low winds.  Fish pulled from the water feel 1/2 cooked already.  That's an exaggeration, sort of.  Relief is in the way later this week, which should be great for the fish and fishing.

In the meantime....my lunchtime forays have yielded no carp lately...they must be staying cool in deeper water, because I haven't even seen any lately.  I've been catching some bass and bluegills mostly...and still mainly on topwater flies.   The best fish lately have been Channel Catfish.  Most have been hitting a gold-bodied Hybrid Carp Fly, but the biggest one (24", 6 lbs) hit a bass popper after dark.  THAT was pretty fun!

Here's the 24-incher:

And a 20-incher from a lunchtime outing:

Just a couple Hybrid Sunfish have been caught recently.

And one surprise Crappie:

Lunchtime Report 7-18-2017

Got to a pond during my lunch hour.  The end I start at was pretty much devoid of visible fish or even bubble trails.  Fished for a bit there anyway, then went to the opposite side of the pond.  Saw some bass.  Had a strike or two, but didn't hook them.  Caught 5-6 Bluegills, then started looking for bigger fish.

Cast to some "carp bubbles"....a catfish intercepted the fly on the drop.  16":

Looks happy to play:

Saw a few bubbles closer to the outside edge of the weedline.   Cast into that area, set the hook into a heavier fish I thought was gonna be a carp, but ended up being the biggest catfish I've seen in this pond so far.... 22":

It was 'bout time to head back to work...finally saw a few mud clouds and bubble trails on the far side of the bay....made some casts.  The line finally jumped, I set the hook and was into a good fish.  25" Carp!

I didn't have high expectations when I went fishing during lunch today....I was pleased to even get some bluegills.  The cats and carp were welcome bonuses!

First Channel Catfish of 2017

I'd flyfished during lunch yesterday and had a HUGE bass on for quite a while before it finally spit the hook.  So, after work I decided to try another pond to see if I could entice any bass there.  I didn't see any bass.  But I did have a strike that smashed the fly, making a huge boil, and then it took off like a freight train!  I was several minutes before I even got to see what the heck this fish WAS.  Then I saw the tail...Catfish!  Great fight!  28"...a conversion table I found suggests a weight of 10.6 lbs.

The fly I was using was a #2 mostly-black Zonker.

Lunchtime Catfish 7-14-2016

Sometimes the story is better than the fish.  Right?

Channel Catfish on a fly.  Photos courtesy of Adam.

Earlier this week, a coworker and I flyfished a local public pond during lunch.  The pond has a black plastic barrel in it that sort of lays on its side.  Its been there for about 2 years now.  I don't know if a wind storm blew it in, or if somebody put it in there on purpose.  It doesn't stay in one place....wind and waves move it very slowly around the pond.

I hadn't seen the barrel recently, but spotted it on that trip earlier in the week.  It was near a corner of the pond I fish often.  I saw a couple Channel Catfish near the open end of the barrel.  They seemed to be guarding it, so were probably nesting in the barrel.  Floating mats of algae and the fact the open end was pointed away from shore made presenting a fly to these catfish nearly impossible.  I went back to work without catching the catfish.

So....today during our lunch hour my coworker and I visited the pond again.  The barrel was still there.  At first the barrel was positioned reasonably well for me to fish it.  But by the time I tried a couple options and settled on a third, the barrel had rotated so the opening was almost directly away from me again, and algae mats appeared right over the top of that end of the barrel as well.  I could occasionally see the catfish beneath the algae, but there was no way to get a fly there.

I spent the next 10 remaining minutes of my lunchtime excursion tossing my fly (basically a black woolly bugger with black rabbit fur tail and black beadchain eyes) around the algae mats, trying to hook the algae and slowly pull the algae mats away from the barrel.  At one point I hooked into a muddy gob of algae, which broke loose from the rest and came flying towards me...hitting my pant leg and leaving a splatter of mud.  Nice....  I'll look great going back to work now!  Oh well.  The time and effort paid off, and I was finally able to get down to the business of trying to present the fly to the catfish.

And within a 1/2 dozen casts to the catfish, I hooked up!  YAY!!!  First flyrod catfish of the year!  It made some great strong, fast runs, bulldogged and thrashed, and I finally managed to bring it to shore.  21".

First Flyrod Catfish of 2015!

Caught during lunch today, after we got a BUNCH of rain over the past couple days.  The ponds are high, and waters are running!  This one hit a microjig under an indicator.
What a fattie!

Carp & Cats!

Flyfished last night for a couple hours at Saylorville Lake.  Northern Iowa has gotten a BUNCH of rain in the past few days, and the reservoir is expected to rise as much as 30 feet!  It was supposed to rise just 4' yesterday!

My buddy Jay and I headed out, and the water is moving up into vegetation that has grown up along the normal pool shoreline this year, but we could still walk along the shoreline easily.

We started out searching for carp to target with flies.  We didn't see any in the shallows, but we decided to fish an area where the wind was blowing into shore, and there were some rocks and gravel in the water.

Jay alternated fishing with a fly rod for carp (he caught a couple carp on flies earlier in the week!) & spinning rod for anything.  He caught the first fish (and the biggest of the night) on an inline spinner...a 26" Channel Catfish!

The wave action from wind and boats was substantial, and I was blind casting, there are a lot of small fish fry/fingerlings in the water right now...so I decided to use a beadhead woolly bugger under an indicator.  The indicator would give the fly plenty of action and keep the fly off the bottom, plus make strike detection easier.  I caught 2 Largemouth Bass while trying for carp, but finally got my target species.  I was happy!

Not a huge carp, but it was a good fight.  I imagined it probably spooked other carp in the area.  I decided to put on a shad-imitating fly pattern and practice casting it with my 12' 5wt Allen Olympic switch rod.  I wanted to determine whether this would be a viable option for the White Bass blitz later this Summer/Fall.  I think it will be.
Here's the fly pattern I was using (I think it was the top one below):

I got 3 nice surprises while doing my testing.  I caught 3 Channel Catfish...23", 24", and 25".  (Corresponding weights according to a conversion table for catfish suggests these would be @ 5.5lbs, 6.3lbs, and 7.3 lbs.)  GREAT FIGHTS!

I was worn out after that, so we left.

As we were walking out, we saw a lot of these big caterpillars...Hawk Moth/Sphinx Moth caterpillars, I think?  I was sad to think that they will be drowned within the next day or so.

Edit: Turns out both caterpillars above are likely color morphs of the White Lined Sphinx Moth.

24" Catfish on Fly Rod, 6-28-2012

I didn't get out fishing until pretty late last night.  Left the house at 8:45pm!  Since it was fast getting dark, I just visited a nearby public pond.  It was mostly overcast and had lightly rained earlier in the evening.  Almost no wind when I arrived at the pond, but then the wind kicked up to about 10mph, and then slowly settled down again as darkness deepened.  Air temp was low 90's...pretty hot for so late in the evening, especially since that followed and afternoon of clouds and rain.

When I arrived at the waters edge, it was obvious the City had been here recently to chemically kill the aquatic weeds that had been growing thickly along the entire shoreline.  The weeds hadn't been completely knocked back yet, but were mostly dead/dying.  I think this is fascinating, because it changes the dynamics of the pond.  What are the Grass Carp going to eat now?  Hopefully...one of my flies!! :)

I briefly tried a Bass Gurgler, had one strike.  It was getting dark, FAST.  No time to waste.

I walked around the pond to where I would have the wind at my back, and tossed some bread in to the water.  Yep.  I will "chum" for Grass Carp and Catfish.  Hasn't really worked for the Grass Carp yet, but it has worked for catfish at least 1/2 the time.  I tied a white woolly bugger on my line.  I'm tossing an artificial, so I'm still "fooling" the fish rather than feeding them.  Its no different really than tossing a baitfish imitation near a school of baitfish that are being worked by gamefish, or tossing a dry fly during a "hatch".  I am, however, artificially creating a situation that (hopefully) brings the fish to me.  Doesn't always work, but it improves my chances.  Even when it draws in bigger fish, they don't always go for my artificial fly pattern.  At least when the bigger fish show up, its exciting to watch.

It had gotten so dark I couldn't see my line well.  So, I was fishing by "feel" at this point.  And believe me, you will FEEL a catfish!  I was slowly retrieving.  It tightened my line, I set the hook, and it jumped CLEAR out of the water!  Nice fish, back-and-forth give-and-take battle for awhile, then it just wanted to stay deep. Finally got it back up to the surface of the pond and in to shore.  24" Channel Catfish, estimated weight 6.3 pounds.

Chucked out the last pieces of my remaining two slices of bread.  A couple big fish were still around out farther from shore, but I wasn't able to entice them into striking.  Probably those DARN Grass Carp!

I did catch a couple small bluegills, and also a 10.5" Bullhead....only the second one I've ever caught on a fly rod.

Lots of fish activity on the surface, I'm sure I could have caught a lot more fish on a topwater pattern.  But sticking with the white Woolly Bugger had paid its dividend for the evening.

Evening at Saylorville, 6-18-2012

I took the day off work, and as luck would have it, the wind was blowing 25-30mph all day.  It seemed to taper of to something more reasonable...like 15mph or so...by 7pm-ish, so my buddy Jay called and we headed out to Saylorville Lake.

As usual on trips to this lake, I took both spinning gear and a fly rod.  With the fly rod, I was hoping to target  carp.  Even though the water was riled up from pounding waves all day, plus the big waves from the non-stop pleasure-boat traffic, I saw evidence of plenty of carp.  Couldn't really see them unless their backs were out of the water next to shore, or I'd see their swirls as they'd get spooked.  They like the rockier areas, and while they are easy to spot when they are in such shallow water that their backs are sticking up out of the water, the rocks make it pretty impossible to present a fly to them without getting hung up.  Maybe an unweighted fly with a weedguard?  Hmmmm, might have to work something up like that.

But, I haven't got anything like that ready yet, so I was tossing a Whitlock Neer'Nuff Crayfish (my version, no claws) about 6"-12" under an indicator, depending on the water depth I was fishing.

Long story short, I didn't catch any carp.  Set the hook on what I thought were strikes and managed to spook some fish.  Were they "on" it?  Dunno.

I did manage to catch two fish on this set-up, though.
First was a 10" Crappie.

Later on, I finally hooked into a nice fish near some carp...and I thought it WAS a carp...until I landed it.  Turned out to be a 21" Channel Catfish.

Jay caught a couple 10"-12" range White Bass on spinning gear.  I didn't spend a lot of time casting a topwater with the spinning gear, but I did manage two Largemouth Bass on it.  Below is the larger of the two bass.  Jay guessed it at 14.5", while I was guessing it at 15".  I had a tape measure with me, but didn't feel like digging it out for the bass.

Turned out to be a really nice evening.  Saw a deer near the trees as we were pulling out of the parking lot at the lake, then saw a fox standing on a sidewalk as we got into our town.

Tuesday Evening Fly-Fishing, 6-12-2012

First...some recent updates:

I got out Monday night to the Prairie Ridge South pond.  It was windy, and I’d hoped to see (and fish for) grass carp back in the east end of the pond, but there were several other people fishing back there, so I didn’t even go on that side of the bridge.  I ended up catching a couple bass and around 20 bluegills, with some nice ones up to at least 8.5”.

I fly-fished during lunch on Tuesday at the backwaters below Saylorville.  Tried for carp.  Might’ve had one take, but no hookups.  There were some visible carp feeding in the area, and I made casts to a handful of them.  Mostly tried an egg pattern, both with and without an indicator.  It was really shallow where I was fishing.

-----------------------------

Last night I went to Georgetown Park pond.  It was pretty calm for a change.  Caught 15 crappies, 8 bluegills, 1 bass, and 1 catfish (25.5").

The catfish was awesome fun and extremely strong.  Since it wasn't 27", it isn't the same one I had caught at least 3 times before.  I caught the catfish and most of the crappies on an unweighted #8 white Woolly Bugger.

I also finally hooked another grass carp!  I had cast near the grass carp, and it looked like the grass carp moved towards the fly, then sunk out of sight.  Then my line started moving away so I set the hook.  I fought it for quite awhile...but every time I got it to the surface it was coming in TAIL FIRST...so I think it was snagged/foul-hooked.  I'll never know for sure because as I was trying to drag it over the top of the weeds/algae near shore, my line broke.  Pretty exciting while it was on, though...it was making huge boils on the surface and peeling line!

Fly-Fishing Report, 4-2-2012

When you fish as often as I do, and post reports on most of those trips, it gets really hard to come up with a catchy title for the blog post.  Hence the boring titles I usually use, along with the date of the fishing trip.  Just for kicks, maybe I should start making up completely nonsensical titles that have nothing to do with the post, but may have some comedic value?  How 'bout "Eliot Spitzer Steals Canine Droppings from my Yard"?  Or, "Sasquatch - A Binge Leaf Recycler!"?  "Angry Trout Falls Off an Iowa Mountain"?  "Chew First, Then Swallow"?  "Angler Tells His Version of the Truth"?

I hopped over to a local public pond last night for some evening fly-fishing.  It was good.  Caught plenty of Bluegills and Crappies on a variety of fly patterns.  3 kids (2 girls around 10 years old, 1 boy around 6 years old...totally guessing on these ages, of course) had been working their way around the pond, trying to spot small fish that they were trying to catch with their hands.  They didn't manage to catch anything, but as they worked their way closer to me, they saw me catch a fish, so they ran over to see it.  I probably caught at least a dozen more fish, and they took turns holding the fish and releasing them back to the water.  They all thought that was pretty cool!

Later on, my friend and fellow fly-angler Dale S. stopped by the pond for some fishing.  He was also catching plenty of fish.  He had got a new 12' 5wt (switch?) fly rod, and generously let my give it a try for a bit.  Casting it was interesting...and I managed to catch a few fish while I was at it!  It was getting dark, and Dale had to leave to get some other stuff done.  Before he left, he asked me if this was about the time the catfish had started hitting last week.

I worked around one corner of the pond, catching more fish here and there. It was very dark, and I was about done fishing.  I put on a yellow Boa Yarn Leech, and decided to start working my way back around the pond the way I had come, towards my car.  I cast out, and started looking around at the water, the ducks, the stars...when the surface of the water just EXPLODED about where my fly was as I was slowly working it back in.  Holy Crap!!  For some reason, my first thought in situations like this is "Maybe I accidentally snagged a muskrat?"  Then its, "Maybe its a GRASS CARP!".   As that initial splash subsided, I noticed movement in the water coming right for me.  This was weird, because while I assumed it could be the fish I was fighting, I also felt through my rod that the fish was farther out from shore, and moving to the side.  I turned on my cap light, shined it onto the movement in the water and discovered a very chubby TOAD swimming frantically towards shore from the direction of where the fish had struck my fly.  Maybe the fish had been following the toad when it hit?

It was a fairly long battle...I didn't see the fish for probably 5 solid minutes.  Back and forth...I followed it down the bank for probably 35 yards, scaring a few frogs into the water as I walked along.  In towards shore, then surging back out to deeper water again.  I finally got its head next to the bank once, saw that it was a catfish, got down on my knees to reach down to grab it...and off it ran again.  Dang!  Another couple of minutes passed before I was able to bring it in once again.  I got on my knees again, reached low and grabbed one side of the fish.  No way could I hold it with one hand, so I set my rod down and grabbed the thrashing fish with both hands behind the pectoral fins and hoisted it onto shore.  LANDED!!  I saw something that looked like weeds coming out of its mouth, so I reached down the line to unhook it...and the fly just fell right out of its mouth!!  What the heck??  The hook must not have been in the skin, but just pressed against its jaw bone!  With that much fighting, the only thing that kept the hook from coming out must have been the constant pressure I had maintained.

I measured it...27 inches!!!  Nice full belly, wide head...must be a male.  I snapped some pictures, carried it back to the water, revived it for a few seconds, and it was ready to swim away.  I didn't even make another cast.