Late May Pond Fishing

Here's a photo dump from the past week of pond fishing during lunch break.  Lost a bass that was around 8 lbs yesterday off a popper.  Fought for two minutes and then he had a good run and my tippet popped.   Besides that, it's been pretty normal pond fishing.

Some Fly Tying.

Been pretty busy with work, MBA, and packing to move in the next month, but was able to mess around with the a bass pattern I've been wanting to tie.

I found out I am very low on cicada patterns, so I need to get tying a little more.  Hopefully this weekend I can hide from my priorities find some time.

Opossum

I know this isn't fishing relayed, but thought I'd share this story.  I'll start out by saying I hate opossums.  Heard of the aftermath of a possum breaking into a barn and eating all the heads off a litter of kittens, not to mention how destructive they can be.  But yesterday I was driving to work and saw a dead opossum in the road and a bunch of little dead possums around it.  I caught a glimpse of a little fur ball still moving so I turned around.  Found that one opossum was still alive but wouldn't be for long as it's a fairly busy road.  I picked it up with a bag and carried it to the woods adjacent to the road but he started back to the road towards the other dead opossums.  So I put him in my Jeep and went to work until I could figure out what to do with him.  Found out from some reading that a opossum can survive on it's own at a 1/2 a pound and that was about where he was at.  Instead of giving him to a animal rescue or animal control, I decided to just let it go in the woods next to a pond I frequent on lunch breaks.  He took off pretty quickly and I think he'll be fine.  Like I said, I hate opossums, but this opossum was pretty cute (for now). 

Hope everyone has a good day.

Pond Wanderings.

Still waiting for the big females to recover from the spawn.

Thanks for reading.

Spring SNP Camping Trip

I try to get one full weekend of fishing in the spring and one full weekend in the fall.  This spring I decided to take the weekend before I start Grad school and camp up in the SNP.  The weather was going to be sketchy, but I decided to carry through with it anyways.  Got up to Big Meadows around 7 pm after work, just in time for the rain.  I set up camp quickly (too quickly)  and got a fire going to cook some brats.  I knew by the way the clouds were coming in quick I didn't have much time so I just wrapped the brats in tin foil and threw it in the fire.

 

 

And they didn't turn out too bad.

 

 

Well the rain picked up and I called it a night early.  About an hour into the rain the thunder picked up and it was a pretty bad storm.  Being on the top of a mountain didn't help either.  The lighting didn't really bother me, it was the strong winds that did though.  After three hours of laying wide awake in the tent that was being blown around violently, I decided to just sleep in the Jeep.  It was a pretty crappy night sleep to say the least.  Here's a picture of what the tent looked like in the morning.  Note I said I set up camp too quickly because of the rain and I didn't tie down the tent good enough.

 

 

After fixing the tent I got coffee going and some bacon.

 

 

Then it was off to stream #1

 

 

 I was supposed to hike down the trail a quarter of the way and then take a drainage ditch down to the stream.  Ended up passing the drainage ditch and when I realized it I decided to just hike the whole trail down to the main branch of the river.  The hike down was easy, the hike out was all up hill and took a couple hours.  Wasn't really worth hike considering the fishing was sub par, there was an easier way to get to this river then the route I took, and only caught one decent brown and a couple dink brookies.

 

Came back and decided to cook up the steak after the hiking I did.

 

 

The night sleep was a lot more enjoyable.  Started off the morning with some bacon pancakes and coffee.

 

 

On the drive to stream #2, I saw my first wild black bear.  He was about 10 feet off the road when I stopped and I took a couple pictures and carried on my way.  Pretty good sized bear too.

 

 

On the hike to the stream I just happened to look down at my feet and noticed a funny looking stick on the path, and then I saw a tongue flicking out and stopped about a foot from it.  It was just a garter snake, but I would still prefer not to get bitten.  I moved him off the path so no other hikers would step on him.

 

 

Fishing at the stream made up for the fishing I had yesterday.

 

 

I hooked a giant brookie in the pool below but he came off after a short fight.  I cast back to the hole and caught this little guy.....

 

 

Big brookie of the trip

  

Quick Lunch

 

It was a good trip and a nice way to begin what will be a busy end of spring and summer for me.  Thanks for reading.

Stream Revisited

I took this past Monday off work since I had a crazy week last week and revisited a stream I fished a couple weeks ago.  I fished to a substantial waterfall and decided to turn back since I was solo.  Well, it's been bugging whether or not there is brookies above the falls, so I decided to wait till everything in the woods came alive to make the hike around the falls.  That stream is definitely a fall/winter stream with the tough access and bush whacking involved.  Water levels were great and there were bugs coming off the water like crazy and the dry fly action was constant all day.

Foggy start to the day.

Stonefly

My favorite shot of the day.

This guy had an interesting tail.

Close up of his tail.

So you get an idea of the tangled mess I was fishing.

Picture of the falls.  the two trees are good sized trees and should give you an idea of the height and steepness.

Had to actually hike downstream 50 yards and up the side of the mountain to get around the falls.  Fished the next ten pools and came to the conclusion that there is no brookies above the falls.  Same too because the section above the falls is nicer then the section below.  A bucket transportation may be due in the near future.  The fact that the trout can not get above the falls is testament to the size and steepness of the falls.

Instead of messing around anymore with this stream, I hiked out and went to another stream near by to kill a couple hours I had allotted for the above falls section.  Here are the pictures from stream two.

Nice sized brookie on a dry.

Fumbled fish shot.

Thanks for reading.