Best Laid Plans

Yesterday was Luke’s big day to go fishing with Mort and I.  He was hugely excited and went to bed with a big smile on his face the night before.  I knew that the fishing was just  a small part of the excitement.  He was going to spend the night at my parents and then the next day with my cousin’s son, Colton.  The two of them don’t get to see each other nearly enough, but they are great buddies.

My plan for the evening was to spend most of the time still-fishing around the bridge.  I knew that Luke would want to see a lot of fish and this kind of fishing always produces big numbers.  I got an e-mail from my dad when I was at work.  He was letting me know that he wouldn’t be able to fish, but they were still planning on having Luke overnight.  No problem.  Luke and I got to the river by about 4:00.  I figured that he would like to start with a boat ride, so I put him in my lap and headed up river.  When we got almost to the elbow, I cut the engine and started getting my rods ready to troll for some walleye.  Before I could even get them set up, Luke announced that he was “pretty bored.”  I didn’t pay it much attention, thinking that he’d be fine once the boat was moving again.  We trolled around and did a little casting.  We weren’t able to pick up any fish, but I did notice a jointed Storm lure slapping against the shore.  I picked it up and Luke immediately claimed it as his.  He assured me that he’d let Lincoln play with it too.  I hadn’t even mentioned Lincoln.  I was thinking more about fishing with the darn thing.  I relented and took the hooks off for him.  Playing with the lure kept Luke occupied, but he continued to say that he was bored.  I had a pretty good idea that he was just excited about going to Grandma’s and Grandpa’s.  I gave them a call and set up a time to turn him over. 

Luke and I trolled a little bit more while we waited for the grandparents.  We managed to pick up a baby flathead.  It was another one of those gross, blotchy looking ones.  I wonder if they all look like that up to a certain point.  We picked up a smallie just before the grandparents showed up.  I sent Luke on his way, happy as a lark.

There were quite a few boats out when I headed back up river.  I went right back up to the stretch below the elbow, but I had only made one trolling pass before another boat showed up and joined me.  There isn’t very much water there and I was in the mood for some solitude, so I dropped back down to a relatively deep section not far down river.  I hit a couple of my hotspots on the way and picked up a few more smallies.  No size to them.  I trolled until dark and didn’t pick up anymore fish.

For my night fishing, I set up over a hole that was 13 feet deep just up from a big downed tree.  One of my lines got snagged up just about as soon as I dropped it in, so I unhappily cut it and retied.  I was completely set up by just after 9:00.  At around 10:00 I got my first hit.  I set the hook and reeled up an average sized channel.  I had gotten lucky and set the hook up through the bottom of its jaw.  I’d be interested to see just how that happened.  It took until almost 11:00 to hook up with my first flattie.  Just a dink.  It hit on the rod behind me and didn’t move the spool one notch on the clicker.  This caused me to be a little slow to get to it and it ended up swallowing the hook.  I tried that through the gills hook removal method that you sometimes see in outdoor magazines.  It worked nicely.  That little guy is going to have a stomach ache for awhile, but I think he’ll live.  I was still in my first spot when I checked the clock and found it to be after midnight.  I started packing up my stuff when I talked myself into trying one more spot.  I moved down from the elbow and dropped anchor in 10 feet of water on a flat.  Too bad I hadn’t just gone home.  No bites.  I finally pulled up the anchor for the last time at a little after 1:00 and buzzed down river, dreading having to get up for work the next day. 

I don’t know what is going on with the flatties.  Terrible thoughts are going through my head like maybe they have been fished out.  I kind of doubt it because there aren’t too many other guys targeting them.  It is rare to see other boats out after dark.  I do still think that it could pick up.  I’ll blame last night on a cold front and spike in the barometric pressure.  I’ve got some sleep to catch up on before I give it another go.  

Back In Action

Michelle graced me with an extra evening of fishing last night.  After dinner and a little time with the family around the house, I headed to the river and dropped the boat in at about 7:30.  I talked river fishing with a guy who was dropping his boat in when I pulled up.  I think I converted him to a cat guy.

I've been keeping my creek chubs on an aerator in a 5 gallon bucket in the basement.  I checked at a pet store and found this magical stuff that neutralizes chlorine in tap water.  It works wonders.  I switch the water everyday and the chubs stay just as healthy as can be for weeks at a time.  I even dropped a few leaf worms in there and found that they had eaten them overnight.  I may just pick up some fish food.  Next it will be an aquarium.  One thing that I did notice is that the fish bleach out after awhile in the bucket.  I'm not sure if it's stress or just because they are stowed away in the dark.  Despite their pale appearance, they are just as strong and healthy after a couple of weeks as the day that I pulled them out of the creek.  All that to lead up to the fact that I had some 2 week bucket bound chubs in the livewell, but most were on the small side and I wanted to start out catching some more bait.  I tried a few different spots about halfway up to the elbow, but nothing was too interested in a crawler.  After awhile I decided that I'd just trade out my 10/0 hooks for 7/0's and fish the chubs.

Remembering the guy who caught the big smallie on  a frog my last time out, I grabbed a bass hook and my Ribbit frogs.  I only had two.  I fished them around a few snags without stirring up anything when I remembered a nice eddie down at Bear Creek.  I motored down and drifted into place even with the creek.  Nothing showed itself in the heart of the mouth, but I got a good swirl when I dragged the frog across that eddie.  I threw the frog again and it got snatched up immediately.  I set the hook and pulled back nothing but limp line.  It must have been a pike.  I stupidly tied on my last frog and dragged it back across the eddie.  The pike pounded it and tore off one leg.  On the subsequent cast it tore off the other leg.  The third time I threw out that crippled frog, the pike grabbed it and once again left my cut monofilament flapping in the wind.  I had a crawler harness on a different pole, so I hooked up a chub and dragged it through there a few times.  The pike ignored it.  I finally decided to tie on a Jitterbug.  On the first cast I saw a swirl about 8 feet away from my bait and then the pike porpoised on it and dragged it down.  It was a 30-incher, but it was pale and skinny as a snake.  I skipped the picture and released it strong.

With the sun setting, I scurried up river and set anchor just up from a huge snag that sits right on the elbow.  It was quiet for a good hour and then just as the moon was clearing the line of trees to the north, I got a hit on one of my rods.  It was a little flattie.  I released it, hooked on one of two rockbass that I had managed to pick up, and dropped it just behind the boat.  It got hit immediately by the twin of my first fish.  I didn't even have that rod back in the water before another rod got thumped and started bending.  This one was bigger, but not much.  I had apparently set anchor over a flathead nursery.  I waited around another hour for mama to show up, but she didn't make an appearance.  I spent one more hour near the bridge, but it was a waste of time.

It's good to see that the flatheads are turning on again.  Tomorrow night Mort and I are taking Luke out.  He and Mort will fish the before dark portion of the night with me, and then I'll get back after the cats.  I brought the kids to the park tonight and loaded up on some big chubs.  Here's to hoping that they get munched by monsters tomorrow night at about this time.

Tuesdays With Morty

Mort and I picked a perfect summer day last week to get back out on the river.  We fished the normal stretch up from the West River launch.  The sky was filled with huge, billowing clouds. They almost looked like they could hold some rain, but we never got a drop.  It was hot when I started out early in the afternoon, but it cooled quite a bit by the time I picked up Mort at a little after 5:00. 

I had committed my alone time to fishing for smallies and walleye.  I ended up spending most of the time trolling for eyes.  I tried a chartreuse Wally Diver and a crawler harness with a Berkley Alive worm in place of a live crawler.  I thought that it would hold up better against the snaggy bottom.  I ran through all of the deep lanes, spending a solid couple of hours plodding my way up river.  I believe that I briefly had a walleye on the crawler harness, but it was gone after a few head shakes.  Not much of a pay off for all of my efforts.  For the sake of being able to say that I had caught fish when I picked up Mort, I spent the last hour drifting and casting for smallies.  I caught 3 or 4 before heading down to the launch to meet him. 

When I picked up Mort, I suggested that we continue the pursuit for walleye.  He was game.  I gave him the rod with the Wally Diver on it and I continued to troll the crawler harness.  I was still letting my line out when he announced that he had a fish.  It turned out to be a 16 inch walleye.  It was the first walleye that we had seen come out of that part of the river in a long time, so we were quite pleased.  I think that I'm going to focus on them a little more throughout the rest of the summer.  I'm starting to hear stories that guys are doing well for them around there. Later that evening we saw a couple of old boys floating leeches along the bridge pylons under slip bobbers.  They reported that they had also caught a 16-incher.

We spent most of the rest of the evening still-fishing just up and then just down from the bridge.  Mort fished crawlers and I decided to lip hook some smaller creek chubs on a one hook crawler harness.  I figured that the current would spin the blade as it sat stationary at the bottom of the river.  The smallies were hot.  They were jumping on the worms and the chubs.  We caught several.  Most of them were smallish.  Our biggest was a 15 incher that bit on a chub.  This fish really had some shoulders and was built like a football.  It stayed deep like a hog.  I was pretty impressed when I saw that it wasn't a very big fish. 

While we were fishing just down from the bridge, we saw a guy fishing a frog in some slow brackish water that pooled around a small snag.  He threw the frog into the snag and began to steadily bring it back.  When it had just cleared the wood, a big smallie came completely out of the water after it.  She completely missed the frog on her first attempt, but came right back and got hooked up.  The guy said that he had caught another nice one in the very same place earlier in the week.  I think that I still have a couple of those Ribbit frogs.  Something to try.

The flatties are still off, or I have completely lost my touch.  I fished deep water around some beautiful snags.  I used live chubs and cut sucker.  Neither got touched.  At closer to midnight I moved up into the flat next to the snaggy holes looking for some cruisers.  Nothing up there either.  I anchored one last time just above the bridge.  When my third spot didn't produce a whisper of a hit, I finally packed it in.  July has been cruel to me in regards to flatheads.  I've probably just got one more chance to avoid a big goose egg for the whole month.  I may try to get my hands on some different types of bait to better my chances.  I've still got a good supply of chubs, but I'll probably try to get some gills and bullheads before my next outing.  Something's got to work.

The Lull Continues

I’m dying to catch my next flattie.  I haven’t run into one in my last 4 or 5 trips.  They are definitely in the spawn and off of the feed.  The big channels have been pretty active.  I'll run through my last few outings.  

To begin, I’m definitely a better solo fisherman than I am a guide.  I was able to take my sister-in-law’s husband, Evan, out a couple of times last weekend.  They were in from Boston .  Our first night seemed perfect.  It was hot and humid.  We even had some fog rolling over the water.  Evan and I sat up at the elbow for a couple of hours starting at dusk.  There was nothing going on up there so we slipped down just below the elbow into the long, deep run.  After a couple more hours, we finally got a good hit on a live creek chub.  I set the hook on the fish and offered the rod to Evan.  He told me to go ahead and bring the fish in.  It turned out to be a decent channel.  We were shocked and horrified when I brought the fish boat side.  Its right eye was gone and surrounded by bright pink flesh that made it look like it had survived a fire.  My hook had taken care of the other eye.  This poor fish was completely blind.  Evan had a pretty strong reaction to the gory sight which sent me into hysterics.  Underneath it all, I felt bad for the fish.  I did decide to release it, figuring that sight is probably the least important of a channel cat’s senses.  After night one, I hadn’t put Evan onto any fish.  Like with Josh and Elijah, I was pretty frustrated.

We decided to go out one more time a couple of nights later.  A thunderstorm and heavy rain pinned us under the bridge.  I sent 4 lines back as far as I could throw them down river from the bridge.  We didn’t end up with much lightning in our area, mostly wind and rain.  It turned into a pretty relaxing atmosphere sitting under there and watching the rain.  Evan had his iPhone and was showing me funny YouTube videos.  That thing downloaded the videos faster than my Mac at home.  Pretty amazing.  We had a few hits that didn’t turn into anything.  Then my clicker on a rod with a live chub started zinging.  I was paying attention to that rod when Evan announced behind me that he had a fish on.  The fish ended up getting hung up on a log as he reeled it in.  He could still feel it fighting, but each time he pulled the rod back, it would come to a dead stop.  I could picture the fish down there getting its head rammed against a log.  I grabbed the rod and put the reel into free spool, using my thumb to apply just enough tension.  The fish took off down river and freed itself from the log.  Evan was then able to get it to the boat.  It was another decent sized channel, probably just over 5 pounds.  We had a great time together out there, but I really wish I could have put him onto a big flattie or maybe a few more channels.

A couple of days later, Michelle and I were trying to figure out our week and when I could work in a trip.  In the meantime, she went to do something with the kids and some friends while I waited at home for a guy to show up to buy my weight set.  He drove into the driveway at a little after 7:00 and Michelle called me just a little later.  She suggested that I head out that night.  Time to scramble.  I threw some things together and then went to our creek to see if I could catch some bait.  I caught 2 nice sized chubs on a worm and then a couple of little ones.  I then switched to salmon eggs and caught one more little one.  I didn’t have much, but it would have to do.  I ran up to the river, forgetting my camera and one of my cat rods.  I got to the river at close to 9:00 and decided to spend my first hour trying to get some bait.  It was a struggle.  I only managed one big rock bass and a smaller one that had swallowed the hook. 

With my late start, I decided to fish the deep water just above the bridge.  I started out with the healthy rock bass, one of the big creek chubs, and then one of the small creek chubs hooked through a nostril on a #6 hook.  I was hoping to maybe stumble into a walleye.  It took awhile to get anything going, but the big rock bass finally got hit.  I’m not sure what grabbed it, but when I reeled it in it had a munched head with one blood red eye bulging grotesquely from its face.  I decided to lop off its head and fish it as cut bait.  Just as I was about to cast this line back out, the little spinning rod with the small chub on it just about got pulled into the water.  I  grabbed it and set the hook on a heavy fish.  I knew that it was a channel.  This was confirmed when it rolled up to the surface back behind the boat.  With a medium spinning rod and 8 pound test, I took my time with this fish.  It probably went around 6 or 7 pounds.  That #6 hook was much nicer to this fish than the 8/0 was the other night.  I released it with barely a scratch.  I neglected to mention that I had caught one other channel before dark.  It was maybe a 4-pounder that hit on a ball of worms.  I had one more big minnow get crunched before the end of the night, but I didn’t set the hook on any more fish.  The going is tough right now.  I’m praying for the spawn to end.

Fireworks Are Bad for Fishing

My family spent Saturday celebrating the 4th at a parade in the morning, the in-laws' lake during the day, and a late night at the Kentwood fireworks.  We topped it off with our own little private display in the backyard at close to midnight. 

On Sunday we had a picnic at my parents'.  It was there that Josh said the magic words . . . "You going fishing tonight, Matt?"  He and Elijah were wanting to go after some river cats.  I was all for it.  I ran it by Michelle and got the green light.  I picked up some white suckers, caught a half dozen chubs, packed my gear and headed to the river at around 8:00.  Hoping to get a few suckers and rock bass, I fished with worms while I waited for Josh and Elijah.  I had a surprisingly tough time getting anything going.  They soon showed up with stories of raccoons in their garage.  A family had moved in and Josh wasn't sure how he was going to get them out.  We didn't have much time before dark, but we managed to stir up one sucker before heading up to get set for flatties.  We sat at the elbow for close to two hours with only one hit on a live chub.  It was the aggressive bite of a channel.  It got away with my minnow.  Just up river from us, there was a small party going on.  The people were setting off some pretty big stuff.  Not far down river, another party was doing the same thing.  The night was alive with huge booms and flashes.  Josh and Elijah were having a pretty good time watching the show.  I was beginning to cringe because I was starting to think that this had a lot to do with the lack of action.  I think that those huge percussions were keeping the flatties holed up in their snags.  Could still be the spawn factor, but the fireworks definitely weren't helping.

At a little after 11:00, we headed back down river to fish the flats below the bridge.  I tried everything down there from live bait to cutbait to dipbait.  Nothing.  I was sick about it.  I really wanted to put these guys into fish.  All I could say was that we'd do it again.  Elijah was pretty quiet during the trip.  He's more of a run and gun fisherman.  He likes throwing lures and switching baits often.  This waiting game must have been tough for him, but he was patient.  Hopefully there will be a big pay off for all of the waiting next time.  Josh promised him a late night trip to McDonald's so he had one more thing to look forward to when they hit the dock at a little after midnight.

I usually enjoy irony, but it was cruel to us this night.  I went back up above the bridge after I dropped them off and caught a big channel on a live chub within about 10 minutes of saying good-bye.  Josh probably wouldn't even believe me if I told him.  This thing ate a huge chub and got hooked up on a 10/0 hook.  I expect to catch flatties on these hooks, so it's pretty rare for me to stick a channel with one of them.  The wind really picked up after this.  I hung in there until 2:30, but I didn't get bit again.  I was hugely frustrated when I finally motored to shore.  I owe those guys one.

That's More Like It

The river has come down to a depth more close to normal.  Knowing that the fishing would probably be good, Mort and I picked a day to fish last week.  He had some projects to finish up around home, so I had a couple of hours to dink around by myself out there.  I tried still fishing for about 45 minutes with small live chubs that I had trapped.  Nothing showed any interest.  I then tied on a parrot pattern DT 6 and went to drifting and casting.  I picked up half a dozen smallies, pulling most of them from just off of the bank.  The final fish was a nice 16-incher that came off of a shallow run with scattered small boulders.  These smallies aren't monsters, but they sure are fun to catch.  They hit hard and fight harder.

After I picked up Mort, we tried a little more casting but the bite seemed to be off.  We decided to still fish with crawlers.  This bite was steady.  We had our best luck just down from the Northland Drive Bridge in the middle of the flat.  We caught several little smallies and some suckers.  I had plenty of creek chubs in the livewell, so the suckers were spared.

I dropped Mort off with enough light to head back up river and get set up.  I went to my favorite spot just up from the elbow and dropped in 3 live chubs.  After a few misses, I finally set the hook on a heavy fish.  This fish was on the middle rod.  I tried to sneak it under the line on the rod to the left, but it swam right through it and started peeling line off of the clicker.  I managed to bring it boatside and free it from the other line before too much damage was done.  As a matter of fact, that rod got hit by another good sized fish as I was weighing my first fish.  By the time that I got to it, the fish had run me under a log and snagged me up.  I had to cut that line. 

Stopping to take a look at the fish that I had landed, I noticed that it had a blue zip-tie in the dorsal fin.  There must be someone else who regularly fishes for flatties out there who is curious to find out if he is ever catching the same fish twice.  I've thought about tagging my fish for this very reason.  Pretty smart way to do it.  I looked to see if this practice is mentioned in the regulations book, but I couldn't find anything about it.  I'm not sure what I think about it.  I probably won't bother with it, but maybe.  I caught one more nice channel out of this spot before trying the run just down from the elbow.  I had two lines deep and one thrown up on top of a shallow run.  By this time of night, nothing seemed to be cruising the deep water.  I got 3 or 4 good hits up in the shallows, but each time my minnow was torn off of the hook.  Figuring that it was just a channel, I decided to bag it and call it a night.

The flattie was my best so far this year.  At 18 pounds, it fought a little more like some of the bigger fish that I've caught.  When it hit it yanked the pole down and didn't let it come back up.  That's about the prettiest thing that I can see when I'm in the middle of a dark river.  I'm hoping to top this fish soon and I'm hoping to do so multiple times this year.  Backing off to once a week will make it tough to keep up with the numbers from recent years, but I think I'll do okay.  Time will tell. 

A Little Redemption

I spent most of the day yesterday fighting to keep my eyes open.  Work was tough, donating plasma was tougher.  Ignoring conventional wisdom, I blocked out my need for sleep and headed back out to the river at around 7:30.  I put in at the launch in Ada off of Fulton Street.  It's probably a little over a mile up from the Knapp Street launch that I have been using most recently.  This is a new launch to me and I liked it.  I headed down river towards the islands where I have been picking up my fish.  As I passed a few other islands on my way down river, I had a thought that coming back up in the dark could make for some tough navigating.  I planned to just take it slow and keep the spolight handy.  I tried fishing some of those islands, but they just had shallow flats behind them and didn't seem to have as much potential to hold fish. 

When I got down to the island where I've been doing most of my fishing, I decided to drop anchor just off to the side of the island and a little up from the bottom point.  The current was a little more swift than I had figured and I still had some momentum going from motoring downstream when I dropped the anchor.  I dropped it right under a big downed log and just about took a header over the front of the boat when it violently jerked to a stop.  Thankfully, the boat and I were no worse for the wear once it whipped around and settled with the stern facing down river.  I tried to fish, but I knew that I had some work ahead of me to get that anchor out so I pulled in my lines just about as soon as I dropped them.  With my lines in, I went to work on the anchor.  I grabbed the rope and jerked the anchor up and down, hoping that this would shake it free.  All it did was make the front of the boat bob and dip.  My next trick was to start the motor and slowly move upstream.  Keeping the boat pointed directly upstream, straight towards the rope, I started at idle speed and gradually increased the power.  The anchor popped free just as slick as could be.  I was pretty relieved that I wouldn't have to figure out how to fish without an anchor.

A creature of habit, I decided to head down and fish the clump of wood at the top of the island closest to Knapp Street.  I picked up a few smallies and rock bass with a crawler on one line and got bumped a few times on the cut chub on the other line.  I finally sank the hook into the fish on the cutbait.  It acted more like a flattie than a channel.  It gave me more of a solid, strong run than the flippy-floppy, spazzy fight of a channel.  Sure enough, when I got it next to the boat I could see that it was an ugly little flattie.  He was all blotchy and had one messed up eye.  Mine wasn't the first hook that he'd tangled with.

I slipped down to the bottom of the island and dropped 3 live chubs in.  I used two huge chubs on 10/0 hooks and one smaller chub on a 7/0.  I thought that this smaller rig might give me a better chance of getting the hook into some of the small fish that have been stealing my bait.  It didn't pan out right away.  That rod got rapped 3 times hard and my minnow was gone.  With just a little light left, I headed back to the bottom edge of the productive island.  Fishing all live chubs again, it took a little while for things to get going.  I finally got a good hit on one of my rods, and then a few others.  The hits were all isolated by several seconds and I didn't get the rod load that I look for before setting the hook.  When the rod sat still for a few minutes, I reeled it in and found that the fish had bitten the front half of my minnow completely off.  I threw this rig back out with a fresh chub and pretty quickly got a more solid bite.  I grabbed the rod and set the hook on another smallish flattie.  Shortly after 11:00 that same rod got hit and I reeled in a nice 8-pound channel.  At midnight I finished off the trip with a 10-pound flattie.  Steady action and some solid hooksets made for a good night.  Some big fish would have made for a great night, but I had a feeling of satisfaction as I pulled my anchor for the last time.

Picking my way through the islands in the pitch dark did prove to be  pretty tough.  I allowed myself to get sucked into a narrow side channel that was only a couple of feet deep at the top just before it rejoined the main channel.  Thinking that I was clear, I increased the throttle and then realized that I was very close to hitting a tiny island that had collected some wood.  If the river stays up and I keep fishing this section, I imagine that I'll get familiar enough with it to navigate it with my eyes closed.  For now, I better take it slow and keep that spotlight burning.

I got to bed at around 1:30 in the morning.  Sometime during the night our youngest got into bed with us.  That woke me up, but I didn't stay awake long.  At 5:00, Luke went into the living room and turned all of the lights and the TV on.  I had to get up and send him back to bed.  Surprisingly, I feel pretty good today.  I'm not having to fight to keep my eyes open.  Still, I'm planning on heading to bed early tonight.  Luke and I are heading out tomorrow.  I'll drop him off with Grandma before I night fish, but I'm going to work on getting him into some decent channel cats while he's out with me.  Time for the boy to take the next step.  (Note:  I had to go home from work sick the very next morning.  I've committed to Michelle that I'm going to slow it down.) 

Mr. Bigshot

One fall evening a couple of years ago, I was at the launch dropping my boat in when another boat pulled up to the dock from the river.  I noticed that the guy was someone that I had known from church when I was a kid.  He and my dad knew each other quite well.  I did the "remember me?" thing and asked him if he fished the river much.  He said that he didn't, but was just giving it a try.  He hadn't caught much.  I took this opportunity to brag about how I had it mastered.  I went into all of the fish that I've caught, made sure to tell him of the several 20+ pound flatties I've hauled in, talked like an expert about tackle, bait, and tactics, and generally probably wore the guy's ear out.  I followed up my droning with a slip, an awkward arm flapping attempt to get my balance, and then a  plunge into the cold river.  After he made sure that I was okay, I could see him fighting pretty hard to keep from laughing at me.  I'm guessing that as soon as he pulled away he got a full eyes watering, belly shaking guffaw out of it.  I can hear him telling his wife when he got home, "Hey, you remember that Matt Elyea kid?  Yeah, he didn't turn out too well . . ."  I'm pretty awesome.