Late-April 2016 Fishing Report

Weather has been warm for the past week or two.  The fish seemed to like that, but also seemed tougher to catch much of the time.  Maybe there are insect hatches going on that the fish are filling up on?
Have caught some chunky bass, but no 18"+ fish recently.  I've seen guys with spinning gear catch some nice ones, though.  This was a good fighter:

I caught another big 9" Pumpkinseed Sunfish this past weekend:

Based on the coloration of some of the male crappies, and the bellies on the females...the spawn may be starting soon.

What's the smallest crappie you've ever caught?  I was fishing a local public pond I had not fished before....and this one might be my new record smallest crappie:

I did catch a couple nice Green Sunfish there in the 8"-8.5" range:

A chartreuse 1/80th oz Microjig is still catching a good number of fish, but as the fish start moving even shallower, a #8 or #10 yellow Boa Yarn Leech is also catching plenty of fish.

Hit another pond the following evening.  Found some nice bluegills, medium-sized crappies that were sorta thin, and a few decent-looking bass.

Fished another pond and got this 12.5" Crappie just before a storm rolled in:

And a few others caught near the end of the month:

Big Green Sunfish

Apparently it doesn't take much to get me excited...
I've caught countless Green Sunfish over the years.  Most of them were small...like 2"-5"  range.
In the past couple of years I've been getting some larger and larger ones in a few places.  I've caught some 9-inchers this year, with the biggest I've measured being 9.25".
Today during lunch I caught another 9-incher.  This one was SO DEEP-BODIED...it just seemed even BIGGER.  I had to measure it.

 It takes a 10" Green Sunfish to qualify for an Iowa Master Angler Award...which seems crazy...I've NEVER seen one that big...yet.  I really kind of suspect that many of these "Green Sunfish" people catch that are 10" or better may actually be Hybrid Sunfish.  But maybe not?  If not, that means that these fish DO get bigger, so hopefully within another year or two one of my local spots will produce one that big.

Anyway, I also did catch a crappie, a couple Hybrid Sunfish, a couple more Green Sunfish, and a couple small Bluegills, all on a gold microjig under an indicator.

Lunchtime Flyfishing Report, 4/26/2013

Wow!  Today during lunch, it was partly sunny, warm (69 degrees F), windy (15mph winds from the South).
Or so the weather websites said.  In truth, it seemed much windier.

My buddy Jay and I met up at a local pond to flyfish together during my lunch hour.  The wind made casting a very REAL challenge.  Jay chose a position that enabled him to cast across the wind.  I chose a position where I was casting directly into the wind.  I must say...I REALLY love this Airflo 40+ fly line!  It just couldn't be any better than it is!  Cuts through the wind EXTREMELY well!

Anyway, we took our positions.  Within a couple casts, I hooked and landed the first scrappy Crappie.  I caught several more before Jay got his gear and casting in order.  But he found fish.  Oh yes!  Suffice it to say, in the short time we were there, we caught plenty of fish.  We both caught Crappies (mostly 9-11"...and we each caught a 13-incher), Largemouth Bass (13"-14" range), Bluegills (various sizes, nothing over 7.5").  In addition to those, I also caught a BEAST Green Sunfish!  It was a CHUNK!!

We both used microjigs about 12" below an indicator.  I used silver, Jay used chartreuse.
Some pictures from today:

My 13-incher.

Jay with his 13-incher.

An 11-incher, getting some good dark "spawning color" around its gills/throat area.

BEAST Green Sunfish.  Very wide body.  Estimating @ 9" long.