Fly-fished in the light rain during lunch on Friday, Sept. 12. Caught a couple of decent bluegills, and this 23" Channel Cat:
On Saturday, Sept 13, our fishing club (Central Iowa Anglers) held a multi-species “trophy outing” on Saylorville Lake. Its a “just for fun” tournament whose winner gets to have the “traveling trophy” until somebody else wins it at a later event.
There is a sophisticated “point system” used, and its all honor-system too. Since there are no prizes, we figure there’s no reason to lie! We’ve got a bunch of those rare “honest fishermen” in this club! :rolleyes:
Anyway, fishing has been extremely tough on this body of water for the last couple of weeks. Fish are located, but won’t hit anything!
On this body of water I often go with non-traditional approaches. While almost everybody else if fishing from boats, I’ll wade the shorelines, for example. This year, I launched my kayak, and made for the nearest spot that had some seagulls circling overhead. Then, I beached the 'yak and fished from shore. I used spinning gear and caught a few white bass, but it was slow. I decided to try my fly rod, and it was nearly a fish-per-cast for a long while.
While the 16 guys in boats struggled to catch fish, I was doing well. Still, there were length limits for points for the various species, and big fish were rare (as big fish usually are).
In the end, I came in 2nd place, but caught a lot more fish than anybody else!
I ended up with about 30 white bass (but only 2 that exceeded the length limit), 2 carp (and didn’t land 3 others), and a 24" channel cat. All fish but maybe 1/2 dozen of the white bass were caught on my fly rod.
The biggest white bass I caught on the fly rod was about 15", and really fought hard on the 8wt rod I was using. Most of the whites hit chartreuse over white Clouser Deep Minnows, but several other flies worked too.
The carp and catfish went for a hex nymph fly.
The carp I landed were 27.5" and 8 lbs 10 oz., and 27", 8 lbs 9 oz.
The bigger carp won me the “big fish pot” for the day! 
Dave -
Quite a GRAND time !! Those big carp must have been a handfull even on an 8 wt.
John
Indeed they were! It was a 10-15 minute fight for each of those that I landed. Fought another about that long, but it ran further from shore, and eventually got me on a snag and broke the line. The other 2 I didn’t land were running straight away from me when the pressure I was putting on trying to slow the fish down just pulled the hooks out.
The catfish in the top picture was caught on a 6wt, and it too was a good 10-minute fight!
I’ve learned that both Carp and Catfish HATE getting into shallow water to be landed! When I work them in close, they just wanna turn around and run again! Or maybe they just find me “scary ugly”? :oops:
Dave, those Cats are a riot on the fly!!! I have never caught a white bass before! I would love to get into some of those!
I landed this 37 inch and some change kitty the other morning… Amazing! My 7-wt was all kinds of hard working.
Will you share the Hex nymph pattern with me, please? My buddy goes to DMU and I plan on visiting him. I have a IA license so I can fish Manawa (I am in Omaha)… I would love to meet up with you and fish if you have some time to spare!
Scott
Holy BUCKETS thats a HUGE CAT!!! What did that hit???
How one EARTH did you manage to land that???
I too have a friend at DMU! I believe he hails from Alberta, Canada? Really nice guy…Garrett is his name, lives here in Ankeny, and is well-versed with a fly rod. Ties some awesome flies too! Any chance he’s your friend?
I’m sorry I don’t have a pattern for those hex nymphs. I have to admit I’ve just been buying them at the local Sportsman’s Warehouse. I hope to try tying some up this winter.
Other folks have been asking about them, so I suppose I should take pictures and post them.
To describe them, they’ve got a yellowish or cream-colored dubbing for the body, covered by a piece of dark brown mottled turkey quill for the carapace. it looks like gray marabou on the sides of the adbomen for “gills”, and some thin copper or silver wire wrapped up around the abdomen as well. And there are large black mono “eyes”. Off hand I don’t recall if there is any sort of tail…Maybe a short split brown or black goose quill. Looks like a stout #8 longshank hook.
The marabou for the “gills” is important, it is the only material that gives the fly movement.
Other good catfish flies for me have been darker colored woolly bugger type flies, usually without weight, or just a bit of weight; bass size topwater poppers, especially near/after dark; and white minnow-imitators. Its surprising, but I haven’t caught as many on the bottom as I have on top or mid-depths!
I haven’t fished Manawa, but I do know it is stocked with hybrid “wipers”!
That thing about the “Central Iowa Fly Fishers” being honest.
I am not sure, they have let me come up and tie flies with them at Stonebrook.
Rick
I am afraid I don’t know your friend. He may know my friend now. My buddy is from Colorado (like me) and is attending the Podiatry program.
Can I talk you into mailing one to me? I would love to see it, copy it, then get you back a few for your trouble. Wish we had Sportsman’s in Omaha!!!
I haven’t fished Manawa, but I do know it is stocked with hybrid “wipers”!
I haven’t caught one bigger than 16 inches out of it. I have seen some, but never landed one out of that body of water. Actually, the lake has had all the wipers removed!:rolleyes:
Oh, the catfish… a size 6 brown woolly bugger!!! It is about 18 inches below a strike indicator. I caught that one just as the sun peeked over the horizon! I use my 7-wt, it’s the biggest rod I own, and it is a chore to get them to shore, especially after they see the shore for the first time, they are across the lake in seconds! I use my float tube so they pull me around a bit, then I kick to shore and do the fighting there. The coolest part, I regularly catch cats in the 26 inch range… my biggest was a few cents short of 38 inches. I have become accustomed to “muscling” them in… I saw a buddy fight one a little smaller than mine one day for 30 minutes… he beached it, it swam away slow, then it was floating on the shore the next day. I try to keep my fights to 15 minutes or less… sometimes it’s hard to do that. Carp, they let you know when they are ready to come to shore:)
Wow, those are some seriously sizeable cats!! I’m in awe! I just keep going back and checking out those pictures! That ones gotta be pushing 20 lbs? I’ve never caught a double-digit catfish on ANY gear. Wow…just WOW!
I’ve caught about 15 catfish on the fly rod so far this year, and most have been 20" or better, but 24.5" is the best I’ve landed so far. I’m usually using a 5wt or 6wt, and I usually wish I’d hooked 'em on something stronger…
PM me with your address. I bought some extras yesterday. I owe some to Larry (okieflyfisheman) as well, for sending me some of his “corn” flies.
Don’t send 'em back. Just catch some fish with them!
Rick, Central Iowa Anglers and Central Iowa Fly Fishers are separate groups. I’ve met a number of the CIFF guys, though, and they are a super-nice bunch!! Very helpful to me when I was starting out tying flies!
Interesting week (Sept. 15-19), what with the steady weather pattern, generally warmer than the past couple weeks, and the steady wind direction.
I had some occasionally very difficult Lunch Outings, but managed some bluegills on the fly rod.
Evenings produced better, with a number of bluegills, and crappies caught, plus a couple of 15" bass…all on woolly bugger-style flies, and a 17" channel cat on a topwater bass popper fly.
Dave,
You keep with these pictures and my computer’s going to fry from drool in the keyboard !!!
Amen to that!!!