RAINED AGAIN
On Monday we got over 2 inches of rain. It is Tuesday and I have the itch to get out to a pond. There is always an itch to do this, but sometimes the weather conditions are better to do it. It is too wet to try to get the canoe into any place. I head for a pond that is near town that does not get much fishing pressure. I tossed about 30 bass in this pond a year ago and wondered what might be happening with it. Going to the pond is the way to find out. I did not let anyone know that I had put the bass in this pond. When I got to the pond and found that the water was fairly clear. With all the rain this was a surprise.
I had grabbed two fly rods as I headed out to the pond. These were the first two to hand, and one had a white boa yarn leech and a hare’s ear on them.
I was wearing rubber boots as I knew the grass would be wet. This would also allow me to get closer to the water on the pond. The water was back six feet farther than normal, but this was not a problem with rubber boots.
I started with the white boa yarn fly. It had worked last time and turned out to work fine on this pond also. The first cast brought the first gill to the bank. The fish had not hit hard, but he line felt funny and that is enough to set the hook.
Over the next several casts I found the pattern to get the fish. The casts had to be about five feet apart to get the fish to bite. After a few casts I could return to an area and get another fish. Two casts to the same area did not result in any fish after the first cast.
I did keep one eye on the clouds as we had a chance for more rain. When I had several fish in the basket and decided to try some other flies. For my friend, Joe Hyde, I cast out the hare’s ear and started retrieving it. The fly was almost back to the bank when I started to lift the fly out of the water to cast it again. That is when the crappie came out of nowhere and took the fly.
Big surprise as I did not know there were any crappies in this pond. It was an even bigger that it would takes a hares ear, almost on the surface. I tried it again, but it did not work.
I caught a few more gills on it, then I made another cast and had the fly almost back to the shore when another crappie took it as I was lifting it up to cast. Were the crappie keying in on an emerging insect? I don’t know as I did not see anything coming off.
I did get three more crappie doing this. They must have been cycling through, because casting to the area where I caught them did not produce anything.
The weather eye saw some rain to the southwest of where I was, and also a few bolts of lightning farther to the south. I knew it was time for this guy to get off the pond.
I was out for an hour and twenty minutes. With the bass that were released, I had caught 60 fish. Many more that I thought I might get after all the rain that came.
I had fillets to eat and fillets to share with others.
Hope you can get out on the water.
Rick