THURSDAY TRY
Thursday was the second day off for this week. I wanted to go out to another pond and try it. The last trip was cut short by the wind. I had the itch to be out again, even if the wind had not blown so hard the previous time, but it seemed like a good excuse.
I headed off to another pond. I have not fished this one for a few years. I had put some small bass into this pond to help control the numbers of small panfish. Time to find out what might have happened since the bass went in.
It was a nice sunny afternoon with a very gentle breeze blowing. I had my 10½ foot 3 wt and another 3 wt with me. I had received some flies, from swaps, and decided that I needed to take those out and see how they worked in this area.
I put the flies in three hook boxes and headed out to the pond. I carried forceps in my pocket; always have those with me to take out the hooks. It will be a while before I can drive into this pond since there is water standing over mud in the low spots.
This pond is slightly smaller than a football field. It is in an area where a gully was starting to form so they made a dam and a pond. There is a lot of brush in the water. The water goes to about 14 feet deep in the middle of the dam where the gully is. The rest of the water is about 8 feet deep for most of the pond.
This is a great pond to lose flies in. You must keep the fish up or you will be fighting the brush in the pond. I tied flies on and started making some casts. After I made several cast with no success it was time to change things.
I cast out and started counting the fly down. I needed to be sure that I kept the fly out of the wood in the pond. I wondered if I needed to be near the tops of the brush to get the fish to bite.
It turned out that this seemed to be the ticket. With the fly dropping near the top of the bushes the fish wanted to take it. It was very nearly a fish a cast. I did not catch all of them, but a good number came to hand.
I would catch a few fish and then change flies. It was fun to see how many of the flies worked. Some the fish seemed to barely lip them and others the fish seemed to want to annihilate. All of them were fun to catch.
I looked at the fish basket and realized that there was some filleting to do. Also it is about a half-a-mile hike, uphill, in a snow storm, to get to the truck. I considered this it was time to head out. I had been out for about an hour and a half.
It is amazing how much 65 gills and four crappie can weigh as you are carrying them out. When I got to the truck I had another farmer stop and ask me if I had caught any. He was impressed with the numbers and the size of the fish.
I got home, filleted the fish. It took me about an hour and then I got to go out and share the fillets. I got to see some folks that had not had fresh fish in a long time.
Hope you can get out on the water.
Rick