Some Exploring Pays Off 2/24/2012

I've been on a mission to find some new streams and sections of streams to fish this year as I'm getting bored with the crowds on The Blacksmith and traffic noise on The Logan. Well, I did some searching on Google Earth last night, and some investigating on the DWR's stream access site as well, and hatched a plan for the sunny day with no work that I was determined to enjoy.

I arrived at my stream of interest around 2:30, but was a little put off by the old beat up No Trespassing sign and fences that I found. Luckily I spotted somebody on the property and chatted for a while. He said I was good to go as long as I stayed in the river. I asked him about fish species and he told me it was predominantly a brown trout fishery.

Well I got suited up in layers of wool, fleece and neoprene and was on my way. Right off I could see that the water was moderately off color, but not terribly high. I decided to go ahead and start fishing with the rubber legged Stimmy and Pheasant Tail Prince dropper that I had left on from The Blacksmith last week. The first couple of inviting pockets brought absolutely no results. I was a little put off by this, but pushed upstream. I spooked a couple of fish in an overgrown run that I wasn't able to fish too well, so that gave me hope. Up ahead I saw a beautiful stretch with a deep run on either side of the river. I started with the left side which stretched a little further downstream. After a few drifts, something took my dropper. It felt nice and solid and doubled my 3/4 wt when I set the hook. It bulldogged in the current, and I figured it was nice brown. Much to my surprise, it was this ugly fatty.



I didn't get any more hits from this pocket, so I moved into position to fish the other side. First cast I had a smaller rainbow roll on the surface and come off. The next cast I hooked this pregnant female bow.



The next cast I got an even better rainbow.

 
I was beginning to wonder if there were any browns in this stream after all. Cast number four brought another surprise, this pretty little cutthroat.

 
Finally cast number five got me my brown.

 

He was absolutely insane. He leaped and tail-walked all over the run. He seriously jumped at least 12 times. The next cast brought another acrobatic brown.



I ended up getting a hit the first 8 casts in a row. I picked off a couple more, and then I hooked into a very nice cutt right on the fast part of the seam. It headed downstream, but my foot was stuck in silt. As I stumbled, the line slipped out of my hand and he was off. Things quieted down, so I switched to a Neon Black Prince. I tied it with peacock black ice dub for the abdomen with fluorescent green ribbing and a UV black ice dub thorax. That did the trick and I was able to catch a few more browns


and bows




on that fly before I decided I had exhausted the run. I ended up getting around 16 hits and landed 12 fish from about an 8 foot stretch of stream. That had me pretty excited for the rest of the day, but unfortunately there was a lot of shallow, channelized blah water up ahead. I had one small brown come up and nail the Stimmy from a little riffle, which was cool for February. Up ahead was a long shallow run, but at the head of it the water dropped down to about 18" deep. I wasn't expecting much, but then this chunky brown clobbered the Stimulator.

 

Soon after another brown, followed by a couple of nice male bows.



They all came up for the dry. The water was cleaner here, so I switched my dropper to a brown Copper John and pulled another brown out of the riffle on it. I ended up with six fish from that riffle. Things really quieted down after that. I caught a long skinny bow out of a deep run on the dropper, but that was all from there. There was some good water that brought nothing. I was beginning to wonder if it was time to head home as the sun had gotten behind the cliffs and maybe the fish were done being active. I managed a couple more small browns on the dropper, and that was it. I decided to give my old honey hole another visit before I left, just to make sure I hadn't missed any the first time around. Since it was murkier in this stretch, and getting dark, I went back to the neon dropper. A few drifts later I nabbed this pretty egg laden rainbow.



I caught a smaller one, and lost another. It was getting pretty cold now, but I decided to make one more cast. I placed it tight to the fast water again, and this time a pretty cuttbow mauled it.



I ended up with 24 fish landed, which I was pretty happy with considering it's February. Half were browns, and I caught 1 cutt, 1 cuttbow, 1 whitefish, and the rest were bows. I ended up hooking around 20 fish out of that one little pocket of water. I need to go back when I have more time and try to find another spot like that on this stretch. I'm glad I took the time to talk to the property owner and add a new stretch of water to my area trout streams. I'll have to start doing more of that.

Total for trip:  24 browns, bows, cutthroat, cuttbow and whitefish

Total for year:  43 fish

Blacksmith Fork 2/17/2012

I was hoping to do some exploring for access to The Little Bear, but cold, cloudy weather made me debate whether or not to even go for most of the day.  I ended up scrapping my plans of exploring hit The Blacksmith Fork later in the afternoon. I didn't make it onto the water until after 3:30. There were a lot of people up there so I ended up fishing a stretch I don't really like. Fishing was okay. I landed 9 browns, 1 whitefish and a cutthroat in a couple of hours. Nothing too exciting.



The fish hit on a variety of flies. A rubber legged foam stimulator, free living caddis larva, jelly eggs and a golden brown Prince variation.  Sadly the sun came out about five minutes before it went behind the canyon walls.  It was a chilly couple of hours, my wading shoe laces were even frozen when I got back to the car.  It was still nice to get out though.

Total for trip:  9 browns, 1 cutthroat, 1 whitefish

Total for year:  19 fish

A Rare January Adventure 1/5/2012

I hit the Blacksmith Fork yesterday for a couple of hours. I stopped before getting to my usual spot because there was ice on the road in all the shady spots, and I didn't have much time to waste going slow on it. When I got to the river, I noticed there was moose hair on the branch of a tree next to me, and droppings on the ground. Thankfully I never did run into the beast.

Pretty much as soon as I hit the water, the sun slipped beneath the canyon walls, and my balmy day turned chilly. I fished for two hours and caught 8 little browns and missed 3 more. These were pretty typical of the day.

 

I caught all but one on a little Prince variation that I recently made up. I started with a uv brown head and olive brown body, and later switched to a pheasant tail coloration with peacock ice dub for the head, and pheasant tail ice dub for the abdomen. They seemed to like that one a little better. I switched to a dry dropper as I found most of the fish in shallow riffles and pockets, and I didn't like the way the indicator rig was presenting to them. I picked a size 10 foam hopper for it's buoyancy and visibility, and to my surprise, a fish inhaled it and all that was showing was the head of the fly. That was unexpected for January. Things really picked up at the end with 3 fish in the last ten minutes, and the biggest, a behemoth pushing 12"

(the camera got bumped to scenery, hence the blurry pic).














Sadly it was time to leave for work.

Nothing spectacular, but considering it was early January in Cache Valley, it was just amazing to be out on the water catching some fish. They also fought really well for their size and the cold water. Several even went airborne multiple times.

Total for trip: 8 Browns

Total for year: 8 Fish

Remembering 2010

So I haven't posted on here for at least half a year.  School found me and took over my life.  I'm not even going to attempt to post a detailed account of every fishing trip since my last post,  but I felt it would be best to just post some highlights of the year.

Against all odds, 2010 will likely go down in history, (at least in my little life), as one of the most monumental fishing years I will ever experience.  Winter just didn't want to release it's icy grip on the area.  We had snow in May and low temps in the 30s until the end of June.  Bass were still pre-spawn during the latter part of that month.  That's just crazy.  The first week of August I began nursing school and between class, clinical, work and homework, I was putting in 18-20 hours of work a day.  We had a hard frost the first of September, though early October brought temps in the 90's.  Despite the tumultuous times, everything came together for an outstanding year. 

Many records were broken and many goals were accomplished.  Some of those goals were ones I had decided on at the start of the year, but many of those went unmet.  Probably the largest milestone was finally catching (and surpassing) 2010 fish in the year 2010.  I came up with this idea back in the year 2000.  I got to somewhere in the mid 1800's that year, but illness and an early winter thwarted my plans.  Shortly after that, I moved to the city and didn't end up fishing much.  When we moved to Cache Valley, my passion for water and the things that swim in it was renewed.  In 2009 I tried again.  I stumbled into the upper 1800's, but it just wasn't to be.  I thought there was no way I would even have a chance in 2010 with school looming.  I wasn't even going to try, but as the numbers of fish caught grew, a little part of me believed it was possible.  I was able to get Thursdays off from work for studying, but those ended up becoming my fishing day.  After class I would hurry up to Idaho, my car packed with gear and have at it.  Oddly enough, though I wasn't using that time to study, the stress relief that my excursions brought me led to higher grades in the end.  When the early frost came, I feared it would be snowing by the end of September, but instead we enjoyed a lengthy Indian summer well into October.  I never thought I would be nailing good bass on my 8wt with popping bugs at dusk while people were visiting spook alleys and corn mazes.

Then it ended.  Cold soaking rains descended, followed by cold, crisp, bluebird days as I sat in the 1800's once again.  The lakes began to turnover.  The vegetation was dying back.  But I was so close.  The third week of October, my wife was out of town on business, and I had a free day from school.  I returned to a favorite water for numbers of mostly small bass.  If I wasn't going to catch quality, I was going to at least try and make my goal with little guys.  The water was in the low 50's, and the warm and sunny morning was soon replaced by a churning gray sky and wind.  I wasn't expecting a hot bite, but I was pleasantly surprised.  I began fishing small jerkbaits and caught a lot of smaller fish as I expected.  But then more and more larger fish began to show up.  The fish were still up in the shallows, hiding amongst the last dying clumps of vegetation on a large flat.  I had just gotten a couple of Lucky Craft lipless cranks that I was eager to try, but I thought it was too cold for them.  I tied one on any way, and first cast a good bass hammered it.

And then the next cast, and the next cast, and the next cast.  

This kept up for some time when I realized I needed to go check in with work.  It was supposed to be a slow day, so I was hoping they wouldn't need me and I could just run back to the lake and finish things off.  I was so close now, I couldn't miss now.  Unfortunately, work needed me after all and I hightailed it back to Utah.  I had caught 107 fish in just a few hours.  I only needed 54 more fish.  With the way they were hitting, there was no doubt I could have made it that day if I hadn't had to leave for work.  I made up my mind to head back the next morning, rain or shine.  Luck was once again on my side as the sun was actually peaking out as I drifted out onto the pond.  Things weren't as fast as the day before.  I was catching fish on the jerkbaits, and a few on the lipless cranks, but not like earlier.  Still, if I kept at it, I was probably going to make it.  Most of the fish were on the smaller side, though I did manage this fatty,

my biggest from this reservoir, and on my ultralight no less.  Clouds began to move in with wind and chilly temperatures.  My time was running out, but that weather shift got them going.  They were pulling off the flat and really concentrating on the outside edge of the drop, but once I found them, they began hitting the Lucky Crafts again.

Somewhere in there I reached my goal.  It wasn't a monster if I recall correctly, but what a fish.  I couldn't feel my legs anymore and it was beginning to drizzle.  Still, I knew this was the last time I would be bass fishing for half a year.  I got out and walked the shore, alternating between small jerkbaits and an LV100.  I picked off some smaller bass, but nothing grand.  The rain was beginning to intensify, but I lobbed out a few more casts.  To my surprise, I caught 2 or 3 decent rainbows my last few casts.  I made it back and packed up my car just as the torrent arrived. 

I ended up making it out for some stillwater trout fishing a couple of weeks later

bringing my final number to 2049 fish for the year.

In addition to this achievement, I finally beat my old best largemouth record of 18".  I set that record back when I was maybe 13 or 14 on Lake George in upstate New York.  I tied it on several of the northern Utah and southeast Idaho waters during the past couple of years, but I was never able to beat it.  In 2010 I caught a bunch of 18" largemouth,

 3 at 19",

and one at 20".

I don't know how long it will take to beat 20" with the short growing season here, and with the draw downs these little irrigation reservoirs experience, but I'm going to keep trying.

I also finally beat my old best smallmouth record, which had stood since that same trip to upstate New York back in the early 90's.  I only beat it by a 1/2", but I did it on a light spinning rod and 6lb test as October burned around me.

That same day I also got into some very aggressive walleye.  They were up against the shoreline rocks and obliterated my little jerkbait.

I had never caught walleye on a hardbait before, and I had never seen one tail walk before that day either.  That little perch colored Lucky Craft was definitely a star performer last fall catching that big smallie, walleye, lots of largemouth, perch and rainbows.  Not surprisingly, I have accumulated a bunch more over the winter in preparation for the coming spring.

In the spring, when the rivers were blown out, and the Idaho bass ponds weren't quite ready, I kept myself busy slogging along the shores of Cutler Marsh with a sack of carp meat and plenty of circle hooks.  I ended up catching my best channel cat.

It wasn't a monster, and it wasn't the ten pounder I'd hoped for, but I still had a lot of fun wrestling her in.  I also learned not to lip larger cats like a bass.  They clamp down hard enough to draw blood.

Another highlight was a short trip to Wyoming just before school started.  I was able to spend a few hours on the Grey's River, and caught several large Snake River Cutthroat,

they were my best yet.  It helped heal the wound of the big one I had lost on The Snake because of a bad knot a year prior.

Another first was finally catching two fish on the same lure.  I have to say two fat 14" smallmouth can really put up quite the fight when they gang up on you.

I was pretty mad at myself for forgetting to bring my camera that day, but to my surprise, the first fish of the day the next day ended up being two fish.

2010 is going to be a hard year to beat.  Now that I've done it, I'm not going to try so hard to catch 2011 fish this year.  So I need to think of some new goals.  I never did catch a tiger musky on the fly, so that is something I'm going to shoot for this year.  I got fed up with how crowded that lake has become and didn't want to fish there, but with it being just down the street from my home, I'm going to just make myself go there until I succeed.  I also didn't make it to Willard Bay to try for wipers, and I didn't catch any giant walleye from The Bear in the early spring.  So those are on my to do list once again.  Overall, I think this year I'm not going to worry so much about goals and just enjoy the time outside when I can get it.  Quite honestly, at the moment, with the ice fog heavy in the air, I would kill just to be outside on a sunny 40 degree day catching ugly whitefish.

Taming the Tempest

06/16/2010

After the success of my previous trip, I was eager to throw another $5 into the abyss.  The drive to Clifton was sunny, calm and pleasant.  As I dropped my fees into the tube, a bit of a breeze billowed up.  I was disappointed by this new development, but it wasn't the end of the world.  As I drove the mile or two up the dirt road to my favorite new spot, I was horrified to find the trees dancing violently and whitecaps on the lake.  There was no way I would be able to fish from my tube in this.  I was really wishing I'd saved my $5 and stayed home to mow the lawn.  Since I'd already spent the money, I decided to try sticking it out for a bit and wade fishing the trees again.  I caught a couple of smaller bass on the old trusty Slug-Go, and then I hooked what I initially thought was a foot long bass as it tail walked toward me.  Rather quickly I realized that it was a large crappie.  Unfortunately it escaped while I foolishly tried lipping the beast, so no picture.  I fished for bass a bit longer, scoring a few more smaller bass and losing one good sized one.  I had actually brought my ten foot crappie pole with me, so I decided to give it a whirl.  I dabbled my jig amongst the woody vegetation and missed several fish before catching this whirling dervish:

 Shortly after I managed to land a crappie, though a smaller one.

Around this time, the waves were nearly coming over the tops of my waders, even in the forest.  I decided I'd had enough, so I tossed my rod in the car and took off for the river.

When I arrived I found the wind was a lot calmer there.  I stopped at my usual first spot and tossed out a pink X-Rap.  I jerked it violently past some shoreline vegetation and this little bugger shot out and nabbed it.

 I noticed a mat of vegetation and debris at the tail of the run, so I tried drifting a Slug-Go beneath the canopy.  I had several hits before landing this little chunk.

 I caught a few more further up snapping a tube quickly across the bottom, and then the wind hit even worse than it had been in Clifton.  I fought it for a few minutes before giving up for the day.  It was lucky that I did as shortly after leaving the canyon, a wall of rain and hail pummeled my car, forcing me to pull over for about 15 minutes.

Final Tally:  5 Largemouth Bass, 2 Black Crappie, 1 Bluegill, 6 Smallmouth Bass

Year Tally:  350 Fish

And So it Begins

06/09/2010

The weather was threatening once again, so once again I avoided the slippery clay path that leads to C Pond.  I had really only fished out by Clifton once before, but had left me curious for another try.  I drove north and was happy to discover that the drive wasn't really any longer than the one to my "Old Faithful", and was equally thrilled that the rain stopped and the sun peeked out.  I donated my $5 to the Evil Ones and set out for a spot.  I found a pull off with some nice openings in the flooded trees to allow my passage. 

I fished along the deep edge of the submerged timber and did quite well for largemouth fishing with Slug-Gos in watermelon and sort of a green pumpkin with silver holo and peacock green flake.  Most fish were around a foot in length, but some larger fish to around 15" were mixed in.

These were some of prettiest bass I'd ever caught.  I just love their distinctive markings.  With only about forty minutes left to fish, the wind and clouds finally returned, chasing me back into shore.  I put away my tube but decided to try wading in amongst the trees.  I scored several more fish this way.  I glanced at my watch and muttered something about one more cast.  My bait plopped down into a pocket in the brush, and as my lure sank I noticed a slight twitch of the line.  I reared back and realized I was dealing with another class of fish entirely.  I wrestled the fish through the jungle (I'm very impressed with the new Yo-Zuri Hybrid Ultra Soft line, great stuff) and eventually landed a nice fat 18" largemouth.

I snapped some pics, released her, and was on my way to work.

Final Tally:  25 Largemouth Bass

Year Tally:  336 Fish

Letdown at L Pond

06/02/2010

So it's been a great long while since I made a post here.  Things finally warmed up and I'd really rather spend my time actually fishing than writing about it.  However the fates have smitten me down with a vigorous case of the poofruits, and now here I sit, trying to remember a month and a half of fishing trips.  I will forgo my usual meandering prose (or at least try to) and just get down to the real meat of the outings.

After finding shallow bass at "The Usual Place"  that were eager to eat Slug-Gos, I thought I would check out C Pond for some of it's larger bass.  However it had rained all night and was threatening a repeat performance that afternoon.  The road to C Pond is slick, so I opted for smaller fish and a safer venue and go to L Pond.  As I was getting set up a mom dropped off some lunatic children to try swimming in the 60 degree water.  They didn't last long.  60 degrees should have invited some good bass action, but sadly it was a rather meager day.  I caught 16 largemouth and 1 rainbow.  I did take a few from shoreline brush on Slug-gos, but they also hit spider jigs, small Diawa cranks and a small Bass Pro Shops XPS lipless crank.  Some passing storm cells kicked up and brought cold, cloudly, windy weather.  Overall it was a pretty dismal day, and seeing as the fish were all under a foot, I didn't feel it worth pulling out the camera to capture any of those 17 moments.

Final Tally:  16 Largemouth Bass, 1 Rainbow Trout

Year Tally:  311 Fish