1983

I know it's 1983 because it's hanging in his bonus room with an engraving, "caught by Neil Joyce 1983".  From '83 until about '93, my bro had the biggest bass in the family (~5 lber out of Kernersville Lake, caught on a spec of worm on a diawa pack ultralight with 4 lb line). I think he went fishing 3 or 4 times total with my dad and I during our childhood and he held the record for 10 yrs! Meanwhile dad and I went on hundreds of fishing excursions. Fast forward to our adulthood, he rarely fishes and only this year started to get into it. I've been teaching him the basics and he's been itching to catch a big largemouth.

We've planned several overnight floats but have been unable to execute them due to poor weather for about 2 yrs now. On our last overnight adventure, his first overnight ('09 on the James river), we had pouring rain from 3 pm on day 1 'til 6 am on day 2. To top it off, our campsite was horrible, I was afraid we were going to be washed downstream all night, and overall the fishing wasn't great.

Finally, the stars aligned. This past weekend we floated a local river and camped on the water. The weather was awesome, the campsite was nice, and the fishing was pretty good overall.

Water temps: ~60F (morning), ~66F (evening)
Ambient: ~40F (morning), 66F (afternoon)

Day 1 - Put in around 10 am with sunny skies and virtually no wind. Fishing was slowwwwwwww. My brother caught the first and best bass of the day on a zoom horney toad (one of his first bass on a soft plastic). We hit every laydown and eddy pool on the way down and I caught 4 bass on 3 different lures (buzzer, fluke, spook).

Campsite - After some mild bushwacking, we had a flat spot for our tent and some driftwood to start our campfire. Apparently we placed our tent in the middle of a game trail. I think 15 deer walked past our tent between midnight and 4 am. When I was able to sleep, I was dreaming of being trampled by a big buck. Thankfully, they steered clear of the tent and left us alone.

Day 2 - After a chilly night, a morning campfire, and bacon & eggs, we pushed off in search of some better fishing. Within an hour or so, the ambient temps were very nice, and again very little wind. We saw 6 doe swimming across the river ahead of us as well as a group of river otters.  Although we couldn't get close, seeing the otters was a rare occurrence.

After we made it past the biggest rapid on the trip, the fishing picked up considerably. My brother tied on a $1 white/blue walmart spinnerbait after getting no action on the buzzbait and other lures. Within a few casts, he landed a ~ 2 lber. I had the same lure in my box and tied one on as well. We each caught several nice fish. He landed his best fish since 1983 (~3 lbs) and I landed a 4 lber. Fish were caught on the bank, off the bank in open water, in sun and shade. We caught no fish on laydowns.

We wrapped up around 2 pm and lugged our gear and canoe out to the truck. Good trip with my brother and a pleasure to see him catch a few nice fish.  Congrats bro!  Looking forward to seeing you land many more.

Dave Schlidt, if you're reading this ... this is the same section we floated last October.  I'm sure you can imagine how difficult it was hauling our gear up to the truck :-)

-Jeff

Good Fish

Stopped by a private pond on my way into work early this morning and fished for an hour or so.  I'd heard there are lunkers in this pond and I found one of them this morning.  This fish smacked my black buzzbait and put up a heck of a fight.  Never jumped or showed herself until I went to lip her at the canoe.  Caught a few others, but nothing close to the size of this big girl. 

NC River Black Bass Slam

There are only a few rivers in NC (that I'm aware of) where you can catch all three black bass species in one outing.  Those species include: largemouth, spotted bass, and smallmouth bass.  During my last trip, I unexpectedly accomplished this feat with some quality fish in two of the categories.

I actually fished on a Wednesday, which is very unusual.  After reviewing the weather forecast, river conditions, work calendar, and vacation balance, I made the decision to make a 2+hr drive to visit a Piedmont smallmouth river I've done well in previously.

I pulled out of the driveway around 5:10 am and launched around 7:30 am.  Conditions to start were a chilly 50 deg with fog and no wind.

I started by throwing a small buzzbait and zara spook.  After a few hours of paddling and no strikes, I decided to switch it up.  I switched to a small spinnerbait that worked well there previously.  I landed one small smallmouth on the spinnerbait.  I also tied on a green weightless senko and landed about 4 small spotted bass in one area, including this guy ...

I continued upstream to a tributary river and found very clear water and mostly shallow water.  I lost my spinnerbait and decided to try a rebel craw crankbait.  I landed a spotted bass and a small smallie on the first two casts with the craw. 

At that point, it was bright sun and in the mid 70's (beautiful!).  I had begun my float back down the tributary to the main river and tossed my craw into a fairly deep hole.  As the lure approached the canoe, I saw two large smallmouth chasing it, but they turned away at the last second.  I anchored up on the opposite bank where I had great visibility of this deep clear hole.  I tied on a weightless white superfluke on my light spinning rod.  On my 4th cast into the this hole I saw a nice smallie zoom right out to the fluke, pause to eye-ball it for a split second, and inhale it.  This was 10 ft from the boat and just awesome to witness.  I set the hook and landed the fish below.  I also landed a tiny spotted bass in the same hole on the fluke after two attempts to inhale a lure maybe half the size of the fish. 

I continued to the mouth of the tributary and tossed my fluke near a deep hole and laydown.  I saw a flash near the lure and thought I had a strike and set the hook.  Turned out to be this nice ~3 lb largemouth!  That was a big, but welcome, surprise.

The rest of the afternoon I floated the main river and tried various lures with few strikes.  As the sun set, I switched to one of my favorite buzzbaits and landed 4 smallmouth, including the one below, my best this year. 

I took out a 5:30 pm.  It was a long day on the water, but lots of fun and well worth a vacation day.  I hope to get out a few more times this fall before the cold weather settles in and all the holiday activities arrive.