NOVEMBER: stripers

NOTE: I am not a big fan of winter. When the weather turns cold I get less active; I do less fishing, and less blogging. Due to a fairly cold and snowy winter so far, I've gotten two months behind in posting what little fishing-related news I do have. In an effort to catch up, I intend to retroactively publish posts for November and December.

The carp had gone deep for the winter and so my friend Toby suggested we catch some bait and try for striped bass. Our first stop was below the dam where Toby managed to hook two baitfish (herring or shad of some kind.)

Next we headed above the dam and rigged up four rods with fresh cut-bait. We had some action on one rod but whatever was out there avoided the hook and escaped with a meal. It was a bit too cold to be comfortable just standing around but we stayed out until dusk, which, at this time of year, comes at around 4:30 pm!

dig-dug

Just before conditions took a turn for the worse, and the carp all but disappeared, I spent a cool Fall morning on the water. Visibility was poor due to an overcast sky but I finally spotted a fish feeding in the shallows. Determined not to blow what I knew might be my only shot of the day, I anchored and slipped off the boat to stalk the fish on foot. As soon as it turned away from the bank and started gliding towards deeper water I made my cast. Carp tend to become more aggressive in the late Summer and Autumn so I cast just past the fish's nose and made a few quick strips. As I expected, the fish darted forward to grab my fly.
It was a small fish (for a carp) and it didn't run far. I fought it through the shallows, trying to move back to the boat where my landing net was. I could feel the fish tiring as I reached the boat, but before I could grab the net the little carp did something I've never seen a fish do before. With a final burst of energy it turned nose down and burrowed through the thick mat of algae on the bottom and into the silt beneath. I've seen carp take cover before - seen them swim under docks or into a tangle of tree branches, but this fish didn't swim, it dug.
Once it had disappeared from sight the fish just stopped moving. With the added weight of the algae there was no way I could pull it out of hiding. Instead I picked up my net, and using my line to point out the spot, I scooped deep and lifted the fish, along with a big glob of algae and muck, out of the water.

"F" for Fall

 It's been a lousy Fall for carp so far. I'm sure that I deserve some of the blame - I've missed plenty of fish and maybe I haven't spent as much time on the water as in the past. However, I have noticed some definite differences this year. For example, in the late Summer and early Fall the shallow bays that I fish have always produced verdant fields of reeds where I could usually count on finding a couple of hungry carp. This year those reeds never grew. I waited, thinking that perhaps things were just a bit late this year, but due to a lack of rain the water level has fallen and all of those shallow flats are now dry! Still, there are fish, and Fall isn't over yet.

Bycatch

I took a new friend fishing last week. Toby recently moved to Nashville from Florida and was interested in carp so I took him to one of my more consistent spots where we spent the morning (and a good portion of the afternoon!) throwing flies at fish. Toby did very well for a first timer. He quickly learned to pick up on the subtle body language of fish and had four or five very near misses. I hooked one fish which unfortunately made a sudden and explosive run and broke me off under a dock.
One thing that again struck me that day was how easy catching other species seems in comparison. At one point Toby "saw a flash of fluorescent green and flicked (his) fly at it." A minute later he had a nice bass in the boat:

 I had a similar experience this week, again while hunting carp:

Unfortunately, the carp fishing was not as good as the bass fishing. Conditions were tough and the fish were spooky. With some persistence, and some mucky wading, I finally got a carp in the net:

As luck would have it, I also brought a light spinning rod and a jar of corn. In the last half hour before we had to leave I baited a hook and tossed it into a depression where I knew carp were feeding. After about 20 minutes the reel buzzed - we had a customer! I paddled the boat while Tara fought the fish across the bay. She did a perfect job and played the fish like a pro. She was not so eager to actually hold her prize for a photo but I managed to convince her:

That's a big fish!

Special Delivery

Some time ago Drew, a friend of mine from way back, called me and asked if I tied my own flies.

"Sure" I told him.

"OK, I'm sending you something."

That was pretty much the extent of the conversation.

A few days later I received an envelope with no letter. Instead, it contained a single flight feather from a macaw!

Most of the feathers I use in fly tying are small and soft - hackle feathers, so I had to think for a bit about how to employ this unique specimen.
With some advice and inspiration from the Ronnie at the fly shop I sat down at the vice. First I tied a very simple bead-head nymph:

Next I tied in a bunch of barbs from the macaw:

 I pulled the barbs back and secured them to form an iridescent "shell." Finally I trimmed the ends to make a short tail:

I tied a couple of these "macaw nymphs" in slightly different color schemes. I gave one to Ronnie to try on some Caney Fork trout and I took the other one out just this week to try on some hungry locals:

Trans-Siberian

We're just back from a trip on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, a nearly 5000 mile journey from Moscow to Beijing. We spent several days in Severobaikalsk, a small city at the northern tip of Lake Baikal.

 The lake has about half the surface area of Lake Michigan, but at over a mile deep it holds more fresh water than all of the Great Lakes combined! It is also home to many unique species of plants and animals, including a rare freshwater seal and a small salmonid species called omul. Omul is an important food fish in the area. It is mostly dried or smoked but also eaten raw with salt sprinkled on top.

 We spent one day touring the tip of the lake by boat. We stopped for lunch at a beach on the end of a long, thin barrier island. Great schools of juvenile omul moved close to shore and, despite their normally zooplanktonivorous nature, I was able to catch quite a few of them on a small red fly.

 For more pictures of our trip, please visit my Picasa Web Album: Trans-Siberian Railroad.

Trophy Hunting

I recently met Gil, a fellow carp angler, through a mutual friend. Via email we have been sharing some of our favorite fishing spots. Gil mentioned an urban pond near town that is full of small carp.

Not wanting to fight the crowds on the Fourth of July Weekend I decided instead to check out this new spot. It was very urban - fed by storm drains and run off, but it was teeming with little carp and some small buffalo. The fish were busy feeding near the bank, either rooting in the mud or swimming parallel to shore and plucking food-like items floating near the surface. I made one lap of the pond and caught one carp. On my second lap I spotted a real trophy fish. I missed it on my first try but the second time it couldn't resist the tiny golden nymph I offered. I was thrilled, a carp this small is one in a million!