Central Iowa OPEN WATER!

[FishnDave]

Evening, March 25:
The itch needed to be scratched, so I managed to get in about 45 minutes of fly-fishing on a public pond in one of the Des Moines suburbs last night.

The pond was completely ice-free, and the water was stained, with a visibility maybe to about 18".

I caught 13 bluegills and 3 crappies before it got too dark to see. HOORAY!

I was using one of these on my 5 wt rod:

[FishnDave]

I fished the same pond again on Wednesday (3/26/0 evening for a little over an hour. The same fly worked ok, but the water is a bit more stained now, so I switched to this fly and did quite well.
I ended up with 19 bluegills, 2 crappies, 1 largemouth bass.

[FishnDave]

I fished Sunday (3/30/08 ) afternoon at a different public pond. There were a number of folks fishing but nobody caught anything. I used that white fly in the above picture and landed 7 bluegills.

And then I tried that pond again today (Tuesday 4/1/08 ) during lunch. Same fly. It was COLD and WINDY today, and the water is getting murkier after the rain a couple days ago. I missed a few hits and then managed to land a feisty 11" crappie. Hooray!!

[Joe Valencic]

I'm envious. We still have some ice here, but the waters are slowly opening up. i can hardly wait to get out.

BTW, welcome to the board from the Island Nation of Ohio, and teh Bad Boyz of FAOL.

Joe

[FishnDave]

Thanks for the welcome!
Joe Cornwall's book is my warmwater stream "bible"!

What a difference a few days make...
The water in 2 of the public ponds I've fished has gotten "muddied up". A recent trip to each of them yielded 2 bluegills from one, and a crappie from the other. A third pond had relatively clear water, but yielded one bass (lost a second bass).

[EdD]

I hope the patterns of the preceding flies are going to be posted.

Hey Joe, the only ice we ever see is in the freezer or an ice chest.

[FishnDave]

I hope the patterns of the preceding flies are going to be posted.

I'm working my way from Newbie up to Novice/Complete & Total Amateur.
I can't remember the names of these patterns, or if they even have one. I've called the former flies "flashbacks" or "sparkle flies", but I think those names have likely been assigned to other fine fly creations.
At any rate, you take a half-dozen strands or so of some sort of mylar flash material and tie it to the shank of a size 10 nymph or streamer hook, so 2" sticks out backward past the bend of the hook. Tie on chenille up to near the hook eye, then bring those mylar strands up to near the eye and secure with 3 turns of thread. Then fold the mylar back towards the tail again and make several turns of thread a bit further back on the hook shank. This gets the mylar strands to flare a bit towards the rear of the fly. Then I trim them to just short of the hook bend.
VERY quick & easy fly to tie, hope that's clear enough.


The second fly is...well...I don't know what it might be or should be called.
Its a beadhead, short marabou tail, and pearl mylar tubing body.

[swellcat]

Dave -

No yellow perch?

[FishnDave]

Dave -

No yellow perch?

Although a few of the lakes around here DO have yellow perch, the ponds I fly-fish do not. Also the perch in the lakes tend to be fairly deep...difficult for me to reach with my fly gear.

[FishnDave]

A public pond in Ankeny, Iowa
4-7-2008
Wind: 14mph WNW
Mostly Sunny, 46 F

I fly-fished this pond today during lunch. Sure seemed a lot windier than 14mph!!! The wind about blew me over and nearly took my hat off a few times just walking back to the car!

It was slow, but I managed 2 bluegills, 2 bass, and 1 crappie. Also lost a fish partway in the looked to be a crappie as well. Used a purple wooly worm.

Here's a picture of the crappie, it was just under 12" long. Poor picture quality, since I used my cell phone.