Left Them Biting

I had to be home by 12:30 to relieve my wife for her afternoon plans. I wanted to try a section I've scouted, but never fished. It's 1.5 hrs from my house, so I wouldn't have much time to fish.

I'd heard there were crappie in this section. Saturday night I loaded a small cooler with ice, rigged up my lighter spinning gear, grabbed one baitcaster, tossed the small jigs in my box, and loaded the car.

I woke up before the 4:30 alarm, I assume due to the anticipation of new water. I popped in my contacts, grabbed my keys and breakfast and slipped out the door.

The moonlight was low and it was a cloudy morning. Around 5:45 I pulled into the gravel lot and parked under a street light. The dark surroundings of the parking area were a little creepy. I unloaded my canoe and gear by the riverbank, turned on my head lamp, and pushed off upstream toward the first set of rocks. I paddled/drug/walked upstream about a half-mile before daybreak. At first light, I started throwing a spook in flatwater near laydowns. My second cast gets blasted by a largemouth. It's the only bass I'd see for the next 2 hours. The next mile, I'm trolling a jig and tossing a bettlespin, trying to catch a crappie in the flatwater. I can't buy a bite from the target species. I do land a few sunnies and soon go back to bass fishing.

As I approach my target area for the morning, I switch the lure on my baitcaster to a small sebile swimbait. On the first cast, I catch a small bass. 2nd cast in the same hole, another bass. I proceeded to land 8 out of this one hole before moving on. Most of the bass were short and fat, like these ...




I work my way upstream in the shallow water and I'm catching a bass on nearly every cast or every other cast, but they're all fairly short. I switched to a larger sebile magic swimmer to try and entice the larger fish. Same results, lots of hungry fish, but nothing too big.

I find one pool below a rapid and catch at least 25 standing in one place. It was nuts. This area produced my best fish. I think this was number 21 or 22 from this spot ...




I turn around at ~10 am to head back. The catching continues on my return and then my 10:15 phone alarm goes off. I still have at least 1 mile to go including some serious rocks and ledges, so I had to boogie and the leave them biting.

I only caught one small crappie, but that's ok ... the 40+ bass will do

Summer Striper

I got a taste of the salt with my friend and colleague Chris down in Wilmington. 

It was a long and hot day.  We came up short on the reds, but landed a few decent striper on flukes and spooks within sight of the USS North Carolina.  Good Times!

Three's Company

Today was the day to fill out the 3 seats in my "custom" Mohawk. My son, oldest daughter, and I squeaked out 2 hrs on the pond this morning, and dodged the storms and most of the rain.

She was a little timid at first about joining us in the canoe before we launched. Once we pushed off there were no worries. My son was in the back and did his own thing, fairly well too.

Between the pee breaks, snacks, and playing with worms and fish ... I caught 4 small bass on pop-r. Kids caught a mix of bluegill, shellcrackers, and bass on worms from the backyard. Probably a dozen overall. Good times had by all. Daughter's bass came on a worm speck hanging beside the canoe while I was fishing for a new worm. That Shakespeare Scooby Doo rod has to go, it's terrible.

Wish I could get them this excited about cleaning up their toys!

Take a kid fishing!