I actually caught a few fish, and doing something that really DOES matter.

I made it out to the ponds this evening. Yesterday was beautiful and windy, with highs reaching the lower 70's. today was cooler and windy - low 60's I figured the ponds had a chance to heat up since my skunking on Friday, and I was after revenge. I started off on the upper pond, and immediately got into smallish bluegills on 2" grubs. Even though they weren't very big, they meant that the skunk would stay away. Any fish is good fish.



Even the little bluegills are good ones!


We went to the lower pond, and I figured the crappie and walleye might be receptive to the grub. I was half right. I got 5 small walleye, but never saw a crappie. Rounded out the evening with a coupe of gills from the lower pond, and 2 VERY small bass. The sunset was especially nice this evening, too.




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As you read in the blog post title, I AM trying to do something that actually matters to someone other than myself. I recently got a box of baits in the mail from a friend. Details aren't important. They were primarily Lucky Craft's. Now, I love fishing LC's, but I already have a lot of them. then, a phone conversation on Friday made up my mind for me.

I was talking to Mollie Simpkins on Friday. She is a friend from the D.C. area, and she was telling me about her commitment to participate in, and raise money for, her 4th consecutive 3-Day walk for the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Her personal fundraising goal is a mind-boggling (to me) $30,000!!! Feel free to see her story on the following link: http://www.the3day.org/site/TR?px=1298634&fr_id=1472&pg=personal So, while I donate to her cause personally, I decided to do something else - I am running 5 auctions this week on eBay. ALL the proceeds from these auctions will be donated to support Mollie's efforts.

4 of these auctions are for bass / walleye lures, and the 5th is for saltwater big game lures. So I am going to ask all of you reading this for a favor - if you know anyone who may be interested, have them use the following link to view the first eBay auction. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320516045124&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT Anyone viewing the auction can click on the link that shows Seller's Other Auctions to see the others that are running. I'll post the results on here, and anyone who wants to can see the donation after it has been sent to Mollie can see it on her page.

It's only a small gesture, but together all the small gestures can make a difference in this world.

Thanks for your help

More pheasants, and the fishing heats up

This pheasant thinks he's hidden

I had the opportunity to take a few customers to our hunt Club last week for pheasants. It's a great situation when your customers are also friends, and you look forward to getting to spend time outdoors together. We hunted Thursday and Friday. We all stayed at the club on Thursday nite and I cooked, so on Wed I thought I'd try to catch our hors d'oerves for the next night. I hit the pond over lunch. And, of course, I forgot my camera.

I fished for about 45 minutes and landed 9 nice (7" - 8-1/2") bluegills, 3 crappies , including one pretty big one for the pond (about 12"), and 2 walleye - small ones. Order of the day was the usual combination of Cubby jig and weighted bobber on an ultralight rod and 4# test. I filleted the panfish for the next evening.

We had a great time hunting both days. And - the fresh fillets of 'gills and crappie were GREAT! We also had thin strips of fried nilgai and bacon-wrapped pheasant breasts. (A co-worker had been in Texas a week or so ago and bagged a nilgai. I was the happy recipient of some cutlets) A little wine and snacks, and we were good to go.

The reason for the post is 2 fold - to let you know that the ponds in N. Illinois are picking up, at least with the panfish bite. And, I happened to get a picture on the hunt that I really like. It shows the manager of the club in the background, a pointing bird dog, and the pheasant. Can you find the pheasant?? Click on the picture to see it full sized.


Find the pheasant!


I plan to be out and on the water almost constantly from now on. My posts will try to be informative, and will try to keep you all posted on the progression of the fish activity in my area. It's not a blog to boast about the fish I catch, or where I go - I'm much more interested in helping others try to understand their waters.

And - don't forget - springtime is one of the best times to catch fish from the shores and shallows of any water, and is, IMHO, the BEST time to introduce newcomers to the sport. It is the "time of plenty".

Finally, not everything you see in the woods is BEAUTIFUL or PRETTY. On our club, there are always a lot of pheasants roaming free. And, free roaming pheasants attract hngry raptors. There are a LOT of hawks in the area, and they kill and eat a lot of pheasants. How do you know that a pheasant has been killed by a hawk? The hawks eat only the breast meat. So carcasses like this are fairly common sites throughout the property:




The hawks need to eat, too, and they capitalize on the relatively easy pickings of the plentiful pheasants.

Got 'em all - over lunch!!

I haven't been out to my ponds recently - been on the road for work, and when I've been home, it seems like the grass is two feet tall and calling my name. I did walk across the street to my subdivision pond on Sunday evening with my new 2 weight flyrod. I was quickly reminded that a 2 wt. is a specialty rod - not very effective in the wind or if you need to make a cast over 30'. Luckily, the 'gils were close, with a few crappie mixed in, too. It doesn't take much to put a GOOD bend in a 2 wt. rod!

Anyway, over lunch today I got out to the ponds I've been writing about . Weather is cool and a little overcast. The pond was as clear as I've ever seen it - easily 4 feet of visibility. Maybe the loads of rain we've had all spring washed the usual crud out the overflow?? Gills were shallow, and I saw more than a handful of largemouth cruising the banks, right on the edge of where the water was too deep to see bottom. [This always seems to be a "magical" area, whether its 1 foot down or 10 feet - wherever you can no longer see bottom seems to be a zone where fish cruise. Try it in your water!] I caught a few 'gills right off the bat near the overflow. I went to the end of the pond where the deeper water comes up quickly to a mud flat, and caught 4 small walleyes in 5 casts with a Beetle Spin. Cool . Still, I was seeing more fish than I was catching. It was time to quit fooling around. Out came the Cubby Mini-Mite and the weighted bobber. (NOTE - the rod I had along was a 4-1/2' UL spinning rod)

I've extolled the virtues of the Mini-Mite / weighted bobber combo in the past, but it never ceases to amaze me. I fished a brown Mini-mite about 4' under the bobber and, after I found the depth they were holding at, caught fish constantly. I got about a dozen gills, 4 crappie, 4 largemouth - 3 small, 1 about 14" - , a 17" very healthy rainbow trout, and, on my last cast, a channel cat that I weighed at 6 pounds, 2 ounces. The rainbow came from about 6' of water; the cat was 4' down over 15' of water. Everything else was in 4' - 6' of water.

When I fish these little jigs, I use a simple technique: cast out and let the jig settle under the bobber. If there is any wave action, I'll often just let it sit and let the waves impart the action to the jig. Then, reel in about a foot of line fairly quickly - you want the jig to rise toward the surface on the retrieve of the line. then - stop. let the jig "swim" back down. Let it sit for a few seconds - 4 or 5. Repeat. Practice in shallow water where you can watch the action of the jig based on the retrieve you make. I PROMISE you it works.

I got all 6 available species of fish - bluegill, walleye, largemouth bass, crappie, rainbow trout, and channel cat - in my pond over lunch today. I'll take that over the usual diner food any day!

(Of course, I left my camera at home. I REALLY need to get another camera and throw it in my car, just for these occasions)

Wolfy

The local ponds are on fire!!

Well, at least they're on fire figuratively. There has been some stabilization of the recent weather, and the fish have been eating. I love this time of year - the fishing is really pretty good all day. Bluegills are drawn into the warmth of the shallow waters along with the bass. Low light finds active crappies. And, as I showed in an earlier post, one of my favorite ponds is stocked with rainbow trout, and they are shallow as well. You truly never know what you'll catch. But you're pretty much assured you'll get something. I fished over lunch yesterday and had a terrific time. Spent 40 minutes on the water. My go-to lure this time of year, as it always is in the early season, is a Cubby Mini Mite suspended under a weighted bobber. It was literally a fish per cast. Tally when I left - 21 'gills, 3 crappie, 2 largemouth, 3 walleye, and 1 BIG rainbow trout (around 20"). Perhaps the most memorable part of the lunch hour was when a pretty big largemouth took a big swipe at the bobber!

While I love to get the periodic "fish overload", it is absolutely the best time of the year to introduce new fishermen to the sport. I have a few people at work that I'm trying to get out over lunch. Also, one guy at work has a couple of girls - ages 7 and 10 - who really got hooked on fishing last summer. Pardon the bad pun. They'll have a ball for the next 2-3 weeks, or until the water heats up too much. I'll continue to fish ultralite with tiny baits for about a week, then switch over to topwaters and spinnerbaits for shallow prespawn largemouth. There will be a lull in the action after the spawn, and then the channel cats heat up along with the water temp.

Now is truly the time to Take a Kid Fishing. And don't just limit it to kids - take your neighbor who hasn't fished since he / she was a kid. Introducing - and re-introducing - fishing is the mission of Angler's Legacy. Read more about the Angler's Legacy at the following link. I took the Pledge year's ago - it's fulfilling for all parties involved.

http://www.takemefishing.org/community/anglers-legacy/home

By the way - in my haste to get outside and fish, I've been forgetting my camera. Sorry - no pictures. I'll take it along tomorrow and try to post a lunchtime photo essay. I've also been feeling rather philosophical about my recent forays to the ponds - I feel a rambling, bare-my-soul to the world post coming on in the near future.

Get outside and fish!