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It is Sunday afternoon. My wife is still gone and there is no one to
stop me from going to the water again. In fact the canoe was not
unloaded from Saturday, "Weed Top Crappie". I actually thought that I
had everything in the pickup. I changed out of my "Sunday go to
meetin' clothes" and headed out.
I was going to a pond that I have been doing some work on. Two years
ago it had a large algae bloom on it. I talked to the owner and told
him I would clean up a lot of the algae if he would let me fish the
pond. It took about a week of talking, but I finally got him to agree.
I went to the pond and raked algae up onto the shore. It was nice that
the wind was out of the west and blew everything to the east shore,
where the entrance to the pond was. I used a regular garden rake to
pull the algae up on the shore. I let it set two days, to drain, and
then I went out with a few buckets and a four tined fork and picked it
all up off the shore. It was a great addition to my compost pile. I
did it one more time that year and once last year. After that the pond
seemed to stay fairly clear.
The other thing that was done to help the pond was probably the greatest
help. The owner fenced the pond in and pipes water out of it now to his
stock. The stock cannot get into the water and mess it up. I think
that is what caused most of the algae problem.
But today it is clear and time to see what might be in the pond. The
other thing I have done today is to take flies that several folks have
sent me and use them. I did not take my vest, so I could not go to my
favorites. I would fish the flies given to me hard and see what they
would do.
As I unloaded the canoe, I ran into the first indication that the mind
is going. I did not have my fish basket with me. That meant that if I
caught fish I would not be taking many of them home. On the other
hand, Sunday is the day of rest and I would not be filleting a large
number of fish.
The second thing I found was the camera was setting at home. The case is
in the truck, but not the camera. That means no pictures of the pond.
More proof that the mind is not functioning well.
I got onto the pond and made a cast with a fly. The fly had just hit
the water when a bluegill smashed it. This was a nice sized gill and
did not like that it was on the end of a line. When I got it in, I
found the third thing that I did not have with me. My forceps were on
my fishing vest, that I left at home so I would not be tempted. I did
remember that I had another pair in a fanny pack in the pickup. I had
to go get those forceps to remove the hook from the fish. Look for this
fly as the fly of the week, Bluegill bomber.
I went back to fishing along the shore. I got a fish on almost every
cast. In fact I started keeping track of how many fish I caught on each
fly. When I got to six fish on the pattern, I took it off and tried
another pattern. After I had caught six fish on that pattern, I tried
another one. I wanted to see if they worked.
Here a pictures of a few of the flies. I did not take pictures of each
and every fliy that I used. That would be way too many pictures.
They all did, some of the better than others, but that is what I expect
to happen on any given day. But they all caught fish. I did loose a
few flies when fish got the leader around some debrie in the pond. I am
not sure if these were large gills or bass doing it, but they sure were
fun to hook.
I had been asked if I would bring some fish back by some friends. They
had company coming into town and knew that they loved fish. I had
said that if I caught any I would bring them to them. I kept fish for
the last 15 minutes I was on the pond before I went home. I figure
they could stay out of the water that long and not go bad.
I did fillet them right when I got home. I had 33 gills that I had
caught in that 15-minute period. I had been catching fish like that the
whole time I was on this pond. That meant that I had had over a hundred
fish day. I had 22 damp flies that had caught fish. That did not
include those on the fly lines or the ones that I had lost.
I did take some fillets to the owner and have permission to fish the
pond whenever I want to. I will return to this pond.
Hope you can get out on the water. ~ Rick
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