2nd Week of July 2020

The sale of our house closes this coming week.  We've closed on the home we purchased in Missouri.  This is our last week in "Temporary Housing" in Iowa, before moving to St. Louis.

Lots of stuff to do, but I still managed to get out flyfishing a time or two more.

I caught one more big Goldfish, my 18th big Goldfish of the year.

Also caught more channel catfish and black bullheads.

I've lived in central Iowa for 45 of my nearly 52 years.  I'll miss it.

I'm looking forward to exploring the fishing near our new home.

Early November 2018

Feeding carp were located, but I could not detect any strikes when I presented them with flies.

I tied up these on a "chartreuse whim"...a Gamechanger, and a Howitzer Popper:

In one pond, at least, bass were still hitting topwater fly patterns (bass poppers) thru the first week of November...in fact, one day they were charging top-speed from up to 30' away to smash the fly on the 2nd pop!

Feathered Gamechangers were still working as well:

As I write this on November 14, we've had some rather cold weather in central Iowa so far this month.  This past weekend, I visited 5 ponds....2 were 100% ice-covered, 2 were 65%-75% ice-covered, and one pond was completely ice-free.  I fished the ice-free one, and one of the partially-open ponds.  I only caught fish out of the ice-free pond.  Over 25 Crappies, plus 4 bluegills and a bass in a few hours of flyfishing.

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 August 2018

Yellow Bullhead on a GameChanger?!

19.5" Largemouth Bass on a Howitzer popper:

28.5" Channel Catfish that got lassoed by the line and gamechanger fly:

Caught some White Bass and small Wipers on Howitzer head poppers and Clouser Deep Minnows:

Catch-Up: Late June, July, and early August 2018

I've been remiss in keeping up with my blog posts lately.  I've not posted any fish reports/pictures in nearly 2 months.  Here's some of the fish caught in late June, July, and early August:

26" Channel Catfish:

Smallmouth Buffalo:

Green Sunfish:

19":

18":

Northern Hog Sucker impaled itself on the fly:

16.75":

16"+ Rainbow Trout surprise: