Tired of catching fish

[Joe Valencic]

I never thought I'd say that I was tired of catching fish, but today did us in. I fished a private lake today with my brother and nephew, and we caught a fish on literally EVERY CAST!!!!! Granted, they were bluegills, but they were all BIG bluegills. We kept about 50 of them (the owner wanted some of them culled so the bass would have less competition), so we only kept 8" fish and larger. All of the fish were caught on a #10 yellow foam spider with white legs. We cleaned them all, had a great fish dinner, and my sister-in-law put enough in the freezer for three more meals. Here's one that was 8-1/2" caught on my Dan Craft 7'-0" 1wt that I recently built. From the butt to the winding check is 9-1/2".



All in all we had to catch over 150 between all of us, and we were worn out from bringing in so many fish. There was also a mixed bag of largemouth bass from 8-14" that hit the spider as well. Great fun! I can't remember a day when I've caught so many fish on just one fly, and nobody lost a fly today (we re-tied the flies several times, but no losses).

Joe

[SilverMallard]

A good bluegill pond and a lightweight rod and a topwater fly they like can be quite intoxicating. Sort of brings out the little boy inside the man. Great fishing report.

[DShock]

Joe,
Thanks for your report!
I hope you will recover soon from your tiredness.
Doug

[Danny Gober]

Joe I know what you mean. I finally got the float tube out yesterday, fins, and waders. the pond up the road was all mine for 3 hours. Caught enough sunfish to stop counting. One nice bass, one small bass and a small carp. All on size 10 woolybuggers. When you are finning around; letting the breeze move you along, you don't feel tired until you start to get the waders off. Today is overcast and threating rain, I'm sore all over. I going to tie flies. Dan

[Joe Valencic]

I'm not tired today, but even after multiple hand washings, lemon juice, salt and a shower, my hands still smell fishy. We cleaned them with the electric fillet knife: I zipped and skinned them, and my brother ribbed and final dressed them. I got that knife last year when we had over 100 jumbo perch to clean from an outing on Lake Erie, and it cuts the cleaning time by 2/3 compared to hand cleaning. Once you learn to use the knife, it's extremely efficient. My local bait & tackle shop owner taught me in one afternoon when we cleaned over 500 perch from the charter boats (He didn't even charge me for the lesson cuz I bought the knife from him . What a guy! ).

Had an offer to go out today for perch & walleye on Erie, but I've got to get out some bids so I have work for the next few weeks. Before you know it, the Michigan Fish-in will be here and I'll be off for a week, which means I make no money when I'm playing. Ahhh, the blessings and curses of self-employment.

Joe