Old Faithful

It turns out that I picked a pretty tough day to try out the bayous.  Despite the fact that the weatherman was calling for windy and cold weather this past Friday, I took the day off of work and headed out early.  For the sake of full disclosure, I should admit that I got lost on the way to the launch.  I got off at the Nunica exit and headed south.  I was looking for a stop sign where I would turn right onto Leonard.  That stop sign didn't exist, so I flew right by my turn.  I knew something was wrong when I crossed the river.  I eventually figured it out and arrived at the launch at daybreak.  No harm, no foul.

The current was swift and the water looked pretty dirty.  I knew it would be because we've had rain recently.  Still, it was really pushing hard past the dock and I wondered if I'd have trouble getting the boat back on the trailer.  There would be time to worry about that later.  I messed around in the river for awhile, trying a jig and minnow for walleye.  It seemed fruitless with all of that dirty water flying under the boat, so I headed down to the bayous.  On my map, it looked like I'd have a little bit of a ride to get to them, but Stearns was just down river.  Next is the small Millhouse Bayou which I tried briefly.  Pottawatomie is the third of the 3 spots that I tried.  After a brief run through Millhouse, I went back up to Stearns where I spent most of my day.  It's a long, narrow piece of water with a few small bays.  The 30 mph winds were blowing directly across it, so fishing was difficult all day long.  Boat control was impossible and I was frustrated enough to determine that I will definitely save up for a bow mount trolling motor next year.  It's just too much of a handicap to go without.

I won't spend a lot of time talking about my first day on the bayous.  It didn't go very well.  I fished everything in the tackle box plus live chubs under a bobber.  All I had to show for it was a 14-inch bass and another similar size bass that came off at boatside.  The pike were non-existent.  My initial response was that I'm not going to bother going back.  Further reflection on the cold front and powerful winds has lead me to believe that it is still worth trying.  I hit a bad day.  Next time out I'll take advantage of a more stable weather pattern and hopefully find some feeding fish.

It turns out that the day wasn't a total loss thanks to my old friend the channel catfish.  After I was worn out with the bayous, I anchored just up and across river from the launch.  The current was a little slower here and I was sitting in about 7 feet of water.  I cut a chub in half and put each piece on a 5/0 kahle hook.  It didn't take long to get a good thump on one of the rods.  I didn't hook up, but I was encouraged.  A little later I was on the phone with Mort telling him about the woes of my day when one of my rods jumped to life.  With a quick, "Fish!  Gotta go!" I hung up on him and grabbed the pole.  The fish felt big, but maybe it was the current.  I got it under the boat and went into a flathead like stalemate.  It held bottom for quite awhile.  While I was fighting that fish, another fish brought my second rod to life.  I saw that it had hooked itself, so I loosened the drag a little bit and finished the battle with the first fish.  When it finally surfaced, I could tell right away that it was much bigger than the channels that I see in my section of the river.  I netted it and left it in the net at the bow of the boat so that I could go after channel number 2.  This one came in a little easier and luckily I was able to grab it without a net.  The first fish ended up weighing in at 11 pounds and the second one weighed 7.  Not a bad 15 minutes.  After I got my picture and both fish back in the water, I called Mort back to fill him in.  I got several more hits in that spot over the next hour or so, but I couldn't hook up with anything.  They kept stealing my bait which made me wonder if it was just turtles.

While I was impressed with the channel cat fishing in this section of river, I wasn't thrilled with the number of boats and people that were around.  The park with the launch was absolutely packed with cars well after dark and there were a couple of boats flying around the river with obnoxious kids yelling and generally being rude.  I sound like a crotchety old man, but it just wasn't the solitude that is such an important part of my fishing experience.  It did end up being pretty tough getting the boat back on the trailer.  The current was pushing the boat against the PVC guide so hard, I feared that it would snap.  Thankfully, it held and I concluded my trip with everything in good shape.  I'll hit those bayous again, but I think my next trip is going to be to Deer Creek Park for more of those huge channels.  I'm going to see if Mort wants to come with me.  This is a quiet section not too far up river from where I fished on Friday.  We should be able to get the monster fish and the all important solitude all in one spot.  Sounds like heaven.

Scouting Trips

With the exception of a brief interruption this past weekend, we've had the longest stretch of sunny days that I can remember in all of my 36 Marches.  Thanks to my mom offering to have Luke overnight one night last week and Hayden overnight one night this week, I found myself with a couple of nice days where I only had 2 kids to tote around.  Since I can only fit 2 in the back of my Jeep with their car seats, I jumped on these opportunities to check out the lower end of the Grand River in neighboring Ottawa County.  My first trip took me along the north bank of the river, checking out launches on the side roads off of Leonard Street.  On my second trip I checked out the south bank and got a pretty good look at a couple of my prospective bayous.

I brought Hayden and Lincoln on my first outing.  From what we can tell so far, these two are just about exactly alike.  If they weren't my kids, I'd call them spazzy.  No, you know what?  They are my kids and I can't think of a word in the English language that better describes them.  Case in point; one of their favorite things to do together is scream back and forth.  They take turns yelling in one another's faces, getting louder and louder until I'm able to loosen my clenched jaw and yell, "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU TWO?!  KNOCK IT OFF!"  I'm a calm guy, but when these two are in full swing, they can really get the old man's right eye twitching.  So, with the terrible twins in the backseat and a lot of miles and time to be logged on the road, I knew that things might end up getting pretty hectic.  I promised them McDonald's after we checked out a couple of launches.  I also brought Hayden's Hannah Montana CD along to keep her entertained.

We left the driveway happily bobbing our heads to "Hoedown Throwdown," but by the time we got to "The Climb" we found ourselves stuck in a traffic jam in the middle of downtown Grand Rapids.  As I stared at the rusty bumper of the old Ford van in front of me, I got sucker punched in the back of the head.  "Gungy, Gawgy."  That's Linc-lish for "Hungry, Daddy."  Shoot!  I was in such a hurry to get going I threw the kids in the car without giving them their normal after nap snack.  I had also packed like a dad.  I chucked a couple of diapers and a box of wipes on the passenger seat.  Never gave food a passing thought.  "Hayden, try to distract Lincoln for me."  "I can't, I'm hungry too."  Oh boy.

After about 15 minutes in the parking lot on 131, we finally got rolling.  With the car  moving once again and some new scenery in front of them, the kids luckily forgot about food for the time being.  It was tough going on Leonard until we put a little space between ourselves and the city.  It eventually transformed into a winding 2 lane country road.  We could occasionally see the river down in the flooded valley to our left.  After about 25 minutes on Leonard, we found the first launch.  Deer Creek Park is just west of Lamont near Coopersville.  It's basically some green space, a parking lot, and a launch.  The whole park was under water.  We could only see the tops of the handicap parking signs.  The kids weren't even a little impressed.  Still, I had an idea of how long it would take to get there from my house and I'd now be able to find it in the dark if I decided to head out early one morning this spring.  This will be my spring channel cat spot.  Mort and I are hoping to get into some of those fish that push 20 pounds when they make their run up from Lake Michigan.

With the kids begging to go to McDonald's, I pushed west towards the bayous and let them know that it wouldn't be too much longer.  The drive to the next launch was quite a bit further than I had anticipated and I was starting to get a little tense.  Lincoln was absolutely starving and had fallen into repeatedly asking where Mommy went.  Hayden was done with Hannah Montana and fixated on getting a happy meal.  I finally found the launch that I will use to get me to Pottawattomie and Stearns bayous.  It turns out that it's very near the Nunica exit on I-96.  I'll go after pike and bass in these bayous and see if I can figure out walleye in the main river channel of this area.  The launch is upriver from the bayous which isn't ideal.  I generally like to fish upriver from where I launch in case I have problems with the motor.  If I'm upstream, I can always float back down to the launch.  Still, I'm looking forward to getting in our boat and exploring this section of the river.  I'm thinking an early April trip is in order.  Maybe I'll throw in a couple of rods, some crawlers, and a tub of dip bait.  I did finally get the kids to McDonald's and they once again returned to their happy, spunky selves.  Despite my dumb dad stuff, the trip went very well and I got one step closer to putting my spring fishing plan together.

I had a feeling that my outing with Luke and Lincoln would be relatively stress free.  I fed them before we left and I threw in water bottles and additional snacks for the road.  Luke is a big Four Seasons fan, so we traded Hayden's bubblegum pop for some oldies but goodies.  131 was cruel to us again.  Someone had dumped a load of empty plant flats in the left lane.  Even though these things are just about as thin as paper, people were almost coming to a complete stop as they weaved through them.  196 and Lake Michigan Drive were all clear.  When I got out past Grand Valley, I jogged over to a road that runs right along the river.  From east to west the name of the road changed from North Cedar Drive to Green Street to Mercury Drive.  I found a couple of nice parks with launches, but they were quite a ways up river from the bayous.  I eventually wandered over Stearns and then Pottawattomie bayous.  Looking at them on a map, I pictured them as isolated and surrounded by desolate wetlands.  Both have homes on them and are in a pretty populated area.  I won't be quite as alone as I'm used to on the river, but if the fishing is good I won't mind.  I'm curious to see what kind of boat traffic and fishing pressure this end of the river gets.

We hit a park on the way home.  It was pretty windy and cold, but the boys had fun walking a trail and then playing on the playground.  On the way home "Walk Like A Man" played.  When it was done Luke said, "Hey Dad, you need to walk like a man, okay?"  I chuckled and said I'd do what I could.  He said, "No, you really need to walk like a man."  More chuckling, "Okay, buddy."  After a little pause I said, "Hey, wait!  Why are you saying that?  You're being funny?"  He remained completely deadpan.  "No, Dad.  You walk like a girl."  Not long after, another song started and Luke joined in, "Pretty as a midsummer's morn, they called her . . . Dad!"  How did Luke get so smart and where did he get such a smart mouth?  I always thought with my general love for the outdoors and my tendency to shave maybe twice a week that I had a certain rugedness about me.  Apparently I have some work to do to toughen myself up in my boy's eyes.  He later told me that he "was just trying to be funny like you, Dad," so that made things better.  I've got to hand it to him, he kind of had me going.  I didn't know that he had the aptitude to kid like that.

Nothing is stress free when it involves a couple of preschool age kids, but my scouting trips went very well.  I have a better picture of this new section of river and I know right where to go to get on it.  Time will tell  if my efforts translate into fish.  I think they will.  I can't wait to make that first cast.