About Me

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Raleigh, NC
Born in Richmond, Virginia, grew up in Kernersville, North Carolina, and now reside in Raleigh. I attribute most of my fishing prowess to my father, who took me fishing often as a child. We would regularly do float trips on the James River in Virginia, which is where I learned to love canoeing and river fishing. Unfortunately, my father has passed, but he lives on through my passion for chasing fish from my canoes. I intend to pass this love for fishing and the outdoors onto my children and can't wait to share these experiences with them. I currently have 4 canoes: Customized Old Town Guide 119, Customized Mohawk 16 Royalex, Coleman Scanoe, and 12' Indian River Solo.

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Jacky New Year!

Jacky, as in Jackass, is one of the many nicknames so gracefully and lovingly given to me by my wife.  I take it all in stride.  I've been called much worse and I'll gladly take any nickname which allows me to escape some of the home duties and go fishing on a regular basis.  So, this one is dedicated to Lauren.

The weather was beautiful today, very unusual for January.  Also, I couldn't wait to get out and use some of the new gear I received for christmas (again, thanks Lauren!). Unfortunately, none of my usual fishin buds could make it. I struggled with where to go, and settled on one of favorite rivers.

Apparently I made the right choice on where to fish. I put in on this small piedmont flow around noon and water temp was a chilly 46 F. Air temp was in the 60s with partly cloudy conditions. I wasn't expecting much considering the water temp.  I decided to troll a rattletrap and just paddle for a while.

I started out trolling one 1/4 oz cordell spot Black/Green/White color. Within ~20 minutes, I thought I was snagged on the bottom as my reel was zinging. I grabbed the rod, and it pulled back. I soon realized it was a monster chain pickerel (a.k.a. Jack or Jackfish), by far my personal best. I didn't have any of my "stuff" out to land this fish and fumbled around to get my grips and pliers out. I finally got it to the boat and hoisted this beast in for measurements. 4.25 lbs and 26.25" long, just barely meeting the "Trophy Fish" minimum in the fishing regs. What a way to start off the new year, and this was just the beginning!



I continued trolling, now with two cordell spots (one 1/4 oz and one 1/2 oz) and landed a few small largemouth on the larger lure. I parked in a few spots and threw the rattletrap and landed a couple more bass, 4 in total, biggest pictured below. Lost one a little bigger at the boat. 


On my way back to the launch I trolled one of the cordell spots and a rapala rattletrap in baby bass color. I landed one nice crappie, which made its way into the cooler. I ran into a few other kayak anglers crappie fishing and they were on a hot hole. They encouraged me to anchor up and cast jigs. I ablidged and proceeded to land several nice crappie on a chartruese / pink head curly tail jig. The guys handed me a few more crappie they were catching and I filled my little cooler with 8 10-12" crappie. I thanked them for the fish and advice, and continued on my way.

About half-way back to the launch, the trolled rapala got nailed and it was another big pickerel. This one was ~3 lbs and 22.25". Check the belly on this one.



I threw the jig here and there looking for a few more crappie, but that was it. I wrapped it up around 5 pm and headed home. Great day and I hope a sign of things to come in 2012.

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