Bumblebee quest

After looking over the pictures from yesterday's post, and the one's I didn't include, I decided to just let the camera do the work and quit messing around with specialty "SCENE" options. I went back to auto-focus and went after a good bumble bee photo.

I don't know if they are any good, but they were fun to take. My wife thinks I'm nuts for stalking the yard insects, but I like it. There are always some surprising pictures when I download them.

Here are a few from this afternoon's "Bumblebee Quest". And, a few new flower pictures.

Enjoy. And, as always, click on the picture for a much better view.











White coneflower




a cool looking Rubeckia



A little bee in the center of a Rubeckia. We always called these "Sweat Bees" when I was a kid.




Gaillardia, or "Blanket Flower"




Trumpet Gaillardia

This ought to be a post and picture fest about smallmouth bass, but it's not.

I was supposed to be returning from La Reserve Beauchene today. For the uninitiated, Beauchene is one of the absolute best smallmouth waters on the planet. No, you won't get fish as large as May smallies on Lake Erie. But you will get big bass, big numbers, and stay at a terrific resort while fishing beautiful, private water. We've had a reservation for this trip for about 6 months. I've been there once before, about 8 years ago, and can't wait to return. But, alas, some things are just not meant to be. At least until next year.

One of our party of 4 FINALLY got an offer and contract on his house. Naturally, the closing date fell while we were to be fishing. If he changed the date, it would have cost him 10 GRAND, and possibly lost the sale. We negotiated with the lodge and they allowed us to move our deposit to next year. So - no bass for me.


Toad and Gargoyle




Toad

Instead of fishing for my favorite fish on a great piece of water, I got to stay home and literally watch my grass grow. We've had non-stop rain and warm temps, and I've had to cut the grass every 3 or 4 days! THAT part of the yard maintenance is getting old in a hurry. But the flowers are growing, so I take some pictures of them when I see something I like. So if you were expecting bass pictures - sorry. The only ecosystem I've been seeing recently is in my back yard, so that's what you get. I might sneak out Saturday morning for catfish, just so I can post a picture of a fish.


Our lillies have been really nice and colorful this year, so that's what you'll get on today's pictures for the most part. I need to make some shutter speed adjustments to capture the bumblebee's that are flocking to the freshly opened bee balm, but I'll post what I have. Enjoy.








And, finally, my lame bumblebee attempt

More pictures from PA

I had a bunch of pictures from a week ago that didn't make it on to the original post, so I figured I'd post them as "stand-alones". Most are self explanatory; some have captions. Enjoy. And, as always, click on the photo to view it in full size. It really DOES make a difference.


A typical scene on a PA trout stream.










This fawn is less than a week old. A little too far for a good, clear pic, though.

Trout fishing - Finally

It's been way too long since my last post. I've actually done a little fishing in that time, but also had a LOT of work, and just haven't been able to carve out the time to do a post.

(Make sure you click on the pictures to see them full sized)



The cabin - I LOVE IT here!




The view of the creek from the cabin




The big palamino trout just downstream from the cabin


This adventure took place on June 2nd. I got a chance to spend a day back in PA on some trout waters. It's a lot of travel for a day's worth of fishing, but I think it's worth it. When I get back to PA and have only a day, I really need to make a decision beforehand as to whether I'll fish the stocked, larger streams, or spend the day on the tiny, unstocked Class A Wild Trout waters. The stream where the cabin is located is a very popular stocked trout stream. I've had many happy days on this water, and basically learned to flyfish on it. As you can see from the picture, it is a beautiful stream, and has some pretty nice fish stocked in - at least occasionally. The palamino trout in the picture was at least 18", maybe 20" long. Even though there are trout literally a cast away from the cabin porch, inevitably I am drawn to the remote tributaries.



Windfall Creek


This was no different. I spent my one day there on a small feeder stream to a larger feeder of the main stream in the valley. This is SMALL, skinny water inhabited by wild native brook trout. The prevailing wisdom says that if you can get a dry fly over them without spooking them, they'll hit it. It's not about the right fly choice - I fished a red #16 Humpy all day. So, at face value, it really shouldn't be that hard.



Little native brookie

Well, it is. The grass/ tree limbs/ fallen trees limit EVERY cast. Most of your casts are roll casts. Nothing is longer than 30-35'. The best looking plunge pools - the ones with the longest deep water - are actually the toughest to catch anything in. Why? You inevitably spook a coupe of 5" brookies in the tail of the pool, and they madly dash into the heart of the pool and scare the hell out of every fish in the area. I found out years ago that the best, most productive water on these streams is the short stretches of pocket water. Might only be 2 feet long and a foot deep, but the current hides the fish (and you) and they don't spook as easily.



Love these natives!



Tough to be stealthy here

I've never been able to pinpoint the allure of these tiny trout . I've caught hundreds, if not thousands of them in PA and NY, and have caught a total of 2 over 10". My fishing partners all think I'm nuts for chasing with them, but I love 'em. They're beautiful, and they're SUPPOSED to be there. They just belong.


I caught a bunch of fish on this day, all small. My weapon of choice for these streams is a 5 pc., 6'9" Winston 3 wt. LT rod. A small box of flies, some dessicant and floatant, extra tippet material, and you're ready to go. And, of course a camera.



Fallen tree


I saw some interesting things on the roadless valley I fished. As I was walking out, I saw a female grouse ahead of me on a dirt road and, as I neared her, she put on a terrific "crippled bird" display. She would come out in the open, drag her wing in the dirt, call to me, and try to lure me away from where I was standing. I had heard about this, but never seen it personally. There was obviously a brood of chicks nearby. I saw the grass move, and smiled as I walked toward the hen. After she "lured me away", she flew back to her chicks. Very cool.



Grouse on a dirt road - sorry for the blurry image



I also saw something that I've never seen or heard of. I welcome ANY AND ALL comments as to this behavior. I was walking and noticed a bunch of butterflies ahead. That's not unusual - there are a ton of butterflies in these mountains, mostly along the creeks. But as I neared, I saw that they were on an old, not-quite-stripped deer carcass. Why would butterflies gather on a deer ribcage??? Did I miss the evolution chapter where they became carnivores?



Butterflies on a deer carcass




More "Carnivore Butterflies"


I stopped along the stream that this tributary feeds into as I left. It is a stocked stream with a fair amount of natural reproduction, too. A pile of stocked rainbows were stacked up under a small bridge. Even though they were very picky in the gin clear waters, it just wasn't the same as fishing for wild fish. I watched them for a while and left. On the way back to the cabin, I saw 2 Eastern Box turtles on the road, which I "assisted" on their journey across the road. Then I came upon a less gracious turtle crossing the road. He wasn't nearly as happy as the box turtles to let me help him along his way!



2 visible trout below the bridge on Cross Fork Ck.



A snapper crossing the road

Living in Illinois is OK, but when I return - even briefly - to the mountains, be they PA or COL, I remember how much I miss them. Short of moving, I really need ot figure out a way to spend more time in the mountains.

Bass on beds in the ponds

The kids fishing the pond

Well, the time of plenty is coming to a close. Many of the bass are on their beds on the upper pond. While I can tease / torment them into biting (most of the time) I prefer to let them alone and got on with their spawning. I like catching them just before they go on beds, but that time has passed for this year.

I took my son and his friend Josh out to the ponds this evening. We had been out there 5 weeks ago and Josh was very excited to go again. I wasn't sure how the fishing would be, but we went anyway. Better to fish than not to fish.



Joey's biggest bass


I let the 2 boys do the fishing while I looked for fish and unhooked some for them. They started off pretty hot, with each catching a few right away. Then, it just got tough. WI had them fishing 7" Bubblegum colored Zoom trick worms, because you can get a lot of action out of them, and you can usually see the fish eat them.



Josh's best bass


That was the bait the bass bit for them this evening. I threw a spinnerbait, too, and had 3 or 4 on, but didn't set the hook on them - I was prospecting to see where they were. The pond is getting very weedy now, and it is not an easy task for the kids to fish without getting weeded up on every cast. But they both caught very nice sized bass tonite.



Another one for Joey

We ended up on the lower pond and caught a ton of egg-filed, pre-spawn gills. A handful of crappie came in, too, and I got 5 walleye on a 1/8 oz. maribou Roadrunner. A couple of trout were hooked, and it was a good evening to be out.

The only thing that was not so good is the damned cottonwood trees - they are dropping their namesake cottony crap, and it gets all over the line and lures.

Oh yeah - saw 3 snakes and a muskrat. A good evening to be out.

What a difference a week makes

Well, my previous post detailed the effects of cold rain and falling temperatures. It is NOT a good recipe if fresh caught fish are on the menu!

The past week has remained cool, but is warming. And there has been no rain, until today. Even today's rain is a steady, warm rain and will probably be good for the fishing.

The bass are getting back to their previous positioning, but still are not quite as aggressive as they were prior to the shutdown. However, it seems like the bigger prespawn bluegills are moving shallower and are aggressive. They are still bunched up, so you have to move around to find them, but when you do, there are probably a bunch of them around that area.

Crappies are still shallow on the ponds - I thought they would be off the shallow structure by now. Everything is biting a little better each day.

Just goes to show that even after things shut down, they DO come back. Just give it a chance

Why you need to "strike while the iron is hot"

Over the past few weeks I've tried to detail the progression of fish activity on the local ponds as the largemouth get ready to spawn. I'm sure it gets a little boring and repetitious to read about catching 10 nice bass over lunch, getting a bunch with my son and his friends, ... It actually can get a little monotonous catching all these fish (Well, not too monotonous, but the suspense is missing from these jaunts, and that is a big part of the unknown). So, why do I continue to go out so often and catch what may be the same fish on the same patterns?

2 reasons: 1) Because I simply love to fish and don't care what I'm catching, and 2) because, inevitably in nature, weeks occur like last week, and put an end to your patterns and teh behavior of the fish.

Last week we got 2+ inches of cold rain overnight on Wednesday. Our local rivers and creeks flooded. The ponds, which are spring fed, turned the color of chocolate milk. And the fishing came to an abrupt and complete stop.

That's right - the ponds shut down. On Friday, over lunch, I spent the better part of an hour on the upper pond (the one full of largemouth and 'gills) throwing spinnerbaits and Senkos. There was about 3" of visibility and the water was cold. I got - NOTHING. No hits, no swirls, nothing. I didn't really expect much, but I had to try.

This is why you have to strike when the iron is hot. The weather can change everything overnight. And, in my experience, the weather changes in the Spring of the year are more dramatic and have a greater effect on the fish than any other time of year. So, when it is good, and the water temp is stable, and the natural progression of spring is moving along nicely - get out there as often as you can. You never know when Mother Nature will deal you a hand that will put any successful fishing on hold.

I'll be interested to see how long it takes for the bass in the ponds to return to their previous level of ferocity. I'll keep you posted, as I should be able to get out a few times this coming week.

Any fishing is better than no fishing at all

On Wednesday I had the opportunity to fish with an old friend who had moved to Wisconsin not too long ago. Ken has fished everywhere, and he and I have spent some time together in Canada fishing a number of years ago. We decided to hit Balsam Lake in western Wisconsin and see what would happen.



The largemouth were all about this size. Note the 4 layers of clothes as I tried to keep warm.

Now, neither of us had ever been to this piece of water before in our lives. So we did it the old-fashioned way - got a map and asked people. We ended up catching about 15 small largemouth bass and a half dozen small pike. The bass wanted a 1/4 oz. chartreuse spinnerbait and were definitely relating to wood. In addition to the spinnerbait, fish were caught on a 1/8 oz. jig with a 3" grub, and a Suspending Rogue. Pike were scattered. Water temp was 53 - 54 - still pretty cold. The day was pretty miserable - cold, windy, occasional drizzle.



Cold, nasty day ahead


BUT - we caught fish, spent part of the day outside, and, as we said frequently, caught our favorite fish - the one's that wanted to bite. We also saw 2 separate pairs of loons, and 2 eagles. the loons were pretty spooky, so the picture had to be taken on zoom, and is kind of shaky.



Loons


Any fishing is better than no fishing!!

Fish Pictures

Warning - this might end up being the post where my blog "Jumps the Shark"

I've said repeatedly on this blog that I wanted to expand my photography experiences and post them on here. Wait - actual photography is what you see on a couple of the blogs on my Blog List - A Focus on Nature and Hannibal's Animals jump to mind. I merely take pictures. I don't have professional grade cameras, or filters, or anything but a new-ish compact camera. But I still like to take pictures and post them on this blog.

The advances made recently in digital cameras - and by recent, I mean the past 5 years or so - are mind boggling. My first digital that was better than a disposable was a Canon 6 mp Power Shot. It had a few scene modes available, and took pretty decent pictures. My current camera is a Samsung TL 220 12.2 mp camera that has so many features I'll never figure them all out. Trying to get my hands around the functions I will use is why I've been carrying the camera along on every trip to the ponds (when I remember). Plus - I like looking at other people's photos in their blog posts, so I put some in mine too.

One feature I've always admired but have never really used much is macro-photography - taking focused photos from 1" - 5" away from the subject. Since fish are "my thing" I thought I'd try it on them first.

As with all the photos I post, you can click on the photo and see a larger version. I think this will be necessary to view these pictures. on a personal note, I really like the way they came out. There is a lot of subtle coloration on them. So, without further ado - UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL WITH THE FISH FROM MY PONDS.


Crappie







Bluegill






Largemouth Bass







Walleye







(The walleye cheek looks like it has gold dust on it!)


Assuming I don't get bombarded with comments like "You're an idiot -what were you thinking???", I'll continue doing this type of thing as I catch more species to photograph. Pumpkinseeds and Green Sunfish should be soon. Ah hell - I'll probably do it even if no likes it but me. After all, it is my blog!!