A great evening 4/29

Fished a pond/small lake after work. Fishing wasn't quite what I'd hoped with the overcast weather but I got into a half dozen decent bass on a spinnerbait. They wanted it waked right under the surface so it was creating a bulge but not breaking the surface. The coolest part of the trip was a beaver that was very annoyed by me being there. I saw him coming a ways off and got the camera out and then froze. He just kept swimming and swam right up to me before realising I was there. Then he took a hard turn and swam back and forth about twenty feet away trying to figure out what I was. Several times he slapped his tail hard on the water before finally swimming away. There were also some bluebells blooming back up on the bank. I dont see very many of them around here. I do know a wierd fact about bluebells tho. Back when folk medicine was the rule rather than the exception bluebells were used to help with ...um.. how to put it delicately...ladies problems. I stopped on the way home where some clear water was running into the muddier water of the river and caught a few white bass including this big stud All in all it ended up being a great evening outside.

this week in fish

Three fishing reports from this last week... The first is written by Dave that he posted on OhioGamefishing forum about our trip to Little Miami on 4/16------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I met up with Steve and Dan at the LMR on Tuesday evening. We got on the water at 5:45 just as the darkness of the impending storm loomed overhead. As our first casts hit the water it started to sprinkle and the temperature dropped 10 degrees. Over the next three hours we caught white bass after white bass. Some of them were suicidal in their attempts to impale themselves. On at least three occasions I dropped my lure in the water after unhooking a fish, or dipped the lure to get off some weeds and one of the little kamikazes would my hit my lure and take off with it. I started off throwing a 1/4 oz. white Roostertail, then switched over to a Flicker Shad. I caught 39 white bass ranging in size from 4" to 13.5" and one 10-11" striper. I dropped it as I was walking to shore to get a better look and a picture. Dan also caught a nice striper and a nice sauger and a drum. I don't know how many fish those two caught, but I know it was as least as many as me; so I would put our fish total in the 120-140 range. All in all it was a fun three hours of fishing. We got pretty lucky with the weather; it rained, but never poured. And the lightning stayed a respectable four to six counts away. We also caught a pair of turkeys trying to sneak up on us, but Steve outflanked them and flushed them out. Dan and Steve also heard some coyotes talking back to police sirens 4/18----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Had a nice short trip this evening in the sunny windy weather. Went to a big pond/little lake for three hours. Caught half dozen largemouths on a spinnerbait shallow as you could fish it. Right on the bank in the weeds flooded by the rain. Fun fishing like that when you can see the strike as the fish comes busting out of the weeds and nails your spinnerbait. And the best part was an osprey that hunted the whole time I was there. (it was close to the river). I never did see it dive and then right at the end it flew by thirty feet away carrying a fish. One of the best looks I've ever had at one. One fish had a huge dent in his back between the two fins on his back and down his side a bit. looked like something tried to eat him and came really close to getting the job done. All were fat as can be. pretty little footballs 4/20----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Man it was cold today. But I was going to be driving right by one of my favorite places today so I thought I stop for a bit. Just to be safe since the temps had dropped like 25 or 30 degrees in two days I stashed a container of waxworms in the pack before heading out. Some years I find a fair amount of morel mushrooms close to this pond. I looked for a good while but not yet this year. There was however a carpet of trilliums blooming in the woods. I fished around the lake catching three small bass on a jig fished slooow and almost stepping on a goose nest. Which made the owners very mad. They hissed and looked very out of sorts till I fished on down the bank. When I got to the spot I see big bedding bluegills every year, I moved out and began fishing about nine or ten feet deep adjacent to the bedding area. I figured the gill had to have been thinking about moving in last week when it was 80 degrees and would be close by. It was pretty simple fishing really, a slip floater, rubber band, split shot and hook. Every few minutes the float would begin to rise and then lay on its side and I'd have a nice gill. Anywhere from seven inches up to nine. Not the most glamorous fishing trip ever but a fine way to kill a few hours on a cold sat evening. 4/26------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hit the LMR with Dan and the legendary House(Rob). The river was still up a bit but falling and muddy. Probably the worst possible conditions outside of flooding. We managed to catch several white bass apiece and Dan caught a sauger. I did also manage to have catastrophic wader failure and as I'm writing this my wallet and all its contents are spread out all over the counter drying out. But it was still a great time fishing with two of the best fishermen I know.

Spring has sprung

fishing nearly every day but this trip was something special... I hit the river right at dawn and ended up walking out after dark, thats what kind of day it was. Right after daylight you could hear fish busting the top. I was very excited. First few casts nothing. Then strikes on ten straight casts. Then a couple with no action and then strikes on seven straight casts. I fished for whites hard for six hours and never went more than a couple minutes without a fish. I lost track around forty and that was early. At least a hundred whites probably a fair amount more. With a few KY spots and hybrids mixed in. They wanted anything small white or silver. I caught the most on small 2 inch lipless cranks and inline spinners. Finally I was white bassed out and headed upriver to smallie fish. That turned out to be harder. The first place I stopped has only one good riffle and I caught three on a smoke metalflake grub in the eddy below it. Right on the current seam. The biggest was maybe 13 inches. Then I headed to a different spot with more water to fish to end the day. A beautiful complicated stretch with all kinds of deep holes and great riffles. An hour later no fish...Finally I found a few smallmouth they were tight to big rocks and rubble out in the current. Tucked right up against the rock. You almost had to hit the rocks with your jig to get a strike. I ended up catching three or four okay fish. I kept thinking I'm going to catch a good one to take a photo of and ended up not taking any smallie pics. I caught a fourish pound buffalo on a jig that I did snap a photo of. And an old medicine bottle uncovered over the winter and lying in the river bottom. The woods has changed overnight. Wildflowers blooming everywhere. Bloodroot and dutchman's breeches on the slopes and the river bottoms a yellow blanket of marsh marigolds. I saw two deer and a sharp-shinned hawk and heard a pair of barred owls calling back and forth to each other as I walked out in the dark.

A great bad trip...

So I decided to check out a stretch of the LMR I've never been to. On google maps you could see a nice big island with a bend right at the end. That bend looked like it held a big hole that might be a haven for overwintering smallies. Well on the way in there were deer everywhere. I must have seen a half dozen maybe more. It was kind of hard to tell, they were just kind of wandering around and I might have seen the same deer several times, very cool. Then I walked right up on a groundhog that took off in that amazingly fast waddle. Well when I got where I wanted there was just one problem. A big problem. There was a big hole alright but it was on my side of the river. At the bottom of a twenty foot tall bank that was anywhere from straight up and down to overhanging. It looked wonderfully deep and fish but there was no getting to it today. At least not from this side of the river anyways and I didn't bring waders. Downstream I could see another hole with the cliff on the other side. I wandered down there but it wasn't as deep or fishy looking. I finally managed to catch an 8 inch smallie. I glanced downstream and saw a coyote moving thru the brush. Puckering my lips, I made a squeeking noise trying to sound like something small and tasty like a mouse. The coyote disappeared but then appeared on the top of the cliff across the river from me. He stood around for five minutes at least looking for whatever made the sound. I was dressed in camo coveralls and he never spooked. Finally he turned and dipped over the bank only to pop back up when I squeeked again. Finally he caught me moving trying to get a better picture with my little point and shoot fishing camera and spooked. I fished for a bit longer mostly soaking up the experience with the coyote. Right then two osprey flew overhead heading upriver. Two. I wander if there is a nest nearby. By then the sky was turning crimson red. A perfect ending to a great bad fishing trip.