Snakes, Cramps and Cannibals...oh My

Scott and I decided to give our NOVA large mouth creek another shot as we’d had such good luck recently.  We put in at 0745 and noticed that the water was 6-8 inches higher than we’d encountered recently and stained from heavy rains. The fishing was slow from the start.  Holes we’d seen bass lurking in were barren. The aloof sunfish bent our poles occasionally, but the unionized bass were on strike.  It’s a slow day when you find yourself casting for sunfish and complementing casts rather than bruiser bass. 

The One Lunker of the Day

Three interesting/funny things did happen; as we were drift-fishing we were accosted by a 3-foot water snake.  Normally snakes stay to themselves but this villian crossed the creek 20-30 feet and came right at us.  We weren’t sure if he would strike or try to jump into the canoe.  I shooed him away with a paddle, but snake-fear is not rational fear and this aggressive fella got our attention.  Last trip I brought my snake-sword…I won’t forget it again.  10 minutes later we looked upstream to see another snake swim VERY quickly across the creek. Hate snakes.  Hate snakes.  Hate Snakes. In quick succession after the snakes Scott hooked a decent sized sunfish only to have a monster Bass strike, clean-off and eat the sunfish right off Scott’s line!  Amazing & ...pretty cool.  Lastly, always one to humor others at my own expense, I got a stomach/rib cramp while floating in the canoe trying to undue a snag.  It was debilitating and persistent, I stretched out prone in the back of the canoe arching my back and trying to relieve the pain/work the cramp out with my fingers, but it wouldn’t go away and I was lucky the canoe didn't tip. As miserable as I was, Scott was safe and sound on a sandbar laughing as one does when their buddy is in agony but in no real danger.  Fishing improved as we neared the mouth and we ended the day with a good haul. The lesson we learned is this creek is fished best when the water is low and the weather constant.

Jack's Vintage Fenwick

Grandfather Livingston's Fenwick

Fritz' mouse

I had two hours Friday morning while Conor was at swim-practice and before our sail so I took out an old Fenwick 6wt Grandfather Livingston had given me just before he passed away in 1992. I believe it was the primary rod he used in his later years, a full-flex fiberglass rod that must have brought him a lot of joy & fish. As I approached the creek I saw a 16-17 incher lurking under a log just to the right of where we hop in.  I moved upstream and tied on an old #4 Green Popper with (Grandfather Livingston vintage ) a black streamer as a dropper.  I flipped the combo 20-inches in front of the largemouth and he rose to the popper as it settled toward him.  He took slurped the popper gently and I set the hook.  I failed to appreciate the difference in flex from a modern mid flex rod (that I usually use) to an older full flex rod and the hook set suffered accordingly, I had him for about 2 seconds, then he spit the hook.  I cast in a different direction for about 5-minutes until my friend trundled back to his off-current bend.  I tried a 2nd cast to him and he rose again to take the popper, this time I set the hook hard, felt it bite (I thought) in his jaw but he spit the popper on his first run.  I pulled in the popper and saw that the problem (one of the problems) was that the hook was dull.  I cut off the rig and put on a mouse imitation that Fritz had tied for me a few years ago.  Instead of heading downstream I headed upstream to check-out the 150 yds before the bridge.  I had thought that the flat water was shallow...I was wrong.  There were 4-5 nice holding areas above the deadfall that normally defines our upstream limit. I fished them with Fritz' mouse and had two 15 inches and several 12 inchers

Mid-sized Largemouth with great green color

clobber it as it rested and twitched across deep water. I definitely won't over look this upstream section again. On the way out I decided to try for the lunker in the bend again and this time tied on a #8 green damsel dropper.  This time the bass rose for the mouse then turned and inhaled the damsel, I set the hook hard and the sharp damsel set in his jaw.  The Fenwick almost completely doubled-over as it strained against the bass and finally won the battle. I thanked the fish as I revived and released him back to his pool...what a wonderful fish and a great morning outing.

One of Those Days 7-22-13

It's always good to be on the water.  Some days are just good, some days great and then every once and awhile you have one of those days you'll always remember.  Today was one of those days.  Scott and I dropped off his truck and drove upstream with Clifford and dropped into the river surreptitiously, we were fishing at 0700.  The water was clear and low, the sky cloudy and the temperature was very comfortable in the 80s.  Scott had not been on this section of the river so I was pleased to show him what I had found and even happier when big, lonely bass hooked up repeatedly.  Scott fished with his Orvis Access 6wt and I fished primarily with my Clearwater 4wt.  Both rods were tested today and proved themselves again and again.  Of the many good sized bass we caught today Scott's first lunker was the day's trophy.  Scott had been sighting for me with his blue popper bobbing idly when the bass we were targeting left the bank-cut I was fishing and headed for Scott's popper.  Scott grabbed his rod a few seconds before the strike and we both watched as the big fella sucked in the popper and took Scott for an E-ticket ride.  {Check-out that first video!} The bite stayed constant for 6 hours!  We took some great underwater pics and enjoyed sighting for one another,

picking spots and putting each other on big bass.  I love cold water species, but when a bruiser large-mouth transforms from a shadow, opens his mouth, flairs his gills and inhales your popper on the surface its one heckeva rush! The fishing slowed down at 1300 when the water opened up and the clouds parted to let in the

full sun, but we had landed around 80 fish the vast majority of which were good sized bass. 

Hidden Largemouth Gem

Upstream from walk-in

 

Note ~ nice rocky bottom

I spent last evening looking through maps of the tidal Potomac looking for likely spots that are accessible with a little bush-waking and sense of humor.  Having found three likely spots I set off at 0700 to check them out and scout for future outings.  The first two spots disappointingly turned out to be behind gates aboard Fort Belvoir.  The last spot exceeded my expectations and after dropping the jeep into 4-wheel drive I found a parking place off the beaten path and conveniently just far enough away from some no-trespassing signs.  I found the water in great shape and was pleasantly surprised to find that it meandered enough to have deep holes and cut banks with many different poppers from small blue gill poppers to larger size 6 bass poppers.  I also tied on several bugger type droppers and had luck with all.  These largemouth were far slower than I had thought, they would slowly rise to poppers when annoyed but were (of course) far slower the the abundant pan-fish.

Much of the fishing was sight-fishing so if I saw a blue gill about to take the popper I'd try to lift it away.  Of the 7 good sized bass I caught I probably saw 5 of the takes. I fished today with a 5/6 wt travel combo given to me by my friend John Caldwell.  When I go back to this water I'll probably go with a 3 or 4 wt to make those many sunfish more thrilling.

Sight fishing both exciting and frustrating

Furlough Fishin 7-15-2013

Conor with 1st Bass of the Day

Conor and I were looking to target large-mouth so we loaded up Clifford and hit the water on a Potomac feeder recommended by Scott at 0900.  It took us about 25 minutes to find the channel Scott had noted and then we paddled upstream for another 20-min or so as the creek began to feel more like a wooded river and less like a tidally influenced feeder.  In retrospect we should have continued upstream even further as that's where the best fishing turned out to be, but the tide was flowing out and the paddle upstream as the creek narrowed was no joke. Our furthest point up-stream was marked by a large tree trunk spanning the creek from right to left 2/3 of the way across the river and an old duck blind just beyond it. 

Yellow Perch!

The creek here was sandy and curvacious with good channeling and holes along the banks.  We immediately caught +13 inch bass for 30-minutes or so as we were in a hot area. This hot area last about 150 yards and then petered out as the stream widened and swallowed.  We continued to pick up the odd fish and Conor caught a yellow-perch to boot.  Thorough the day we had success on a yellow-jacket popper in size-8 fished off a 5-weight, a white popper in size 6 fished off my 6wt and a yellow beetle-spin fished on an ultra light spinning rod.  Along the way we saw numerous marauding bass in the hydrilla, ospreys and bald eagles.  We were off the water by 1300.  All and all a good day but me lesson was to go upstream even further!

What Orvis guys do when they're not working...

John and I were both off today so we did what you'd expect Orvis guys to do.... we went fishing.

John had his Access 9' 5wt.

.... it worked well.

Using mostly Booglebug Poppers, and occasionally adding on a Woolly Bugger as a dropper, both largemouth bass and scrappy bluegills put plenty of bend in the rod.

John with a nice largemouth

In one particular stretch, John pulled out 6 bass on 8 casts!

I had some decent luck as well using my Access 9'6 wt.

A size# 4 blue popper seemed to work best.  The bass were holding in classic "fishy"water --- in & around logjams, undercut banks, weed edges, deeper runs.....







Between the two of us.... more than 25 bass and 35 panfish were caught.... and released. 

Largemouth with attitude!

Kanes Creek Scouting Trip 8 July

Entrance to Kanes Creek

Scott was fishing Pohick Creek with John today so I tried to match the water (as he described it) in Pohick Creek and found Kanes Creek off Belmont Bay.  The put-in is at the 'car-top-launch' in Mason Neck State Park. I put in rigged up with 6wt and turned immediately to the left for the 1/2 mile paddle to Kanes Creek.  The tide was heading out at enough of a clip to sway the aquatic grasses and the sun was high at 0930.  There was decent structure on the Mason Neck Side and I only through in a couple times as I was trying to get to wadeable headwaters of Kanes Creek. Unfortunately the further I paddled up the creek the heavier and higher the hydrilla came and the canoe started slow in the weed.  With the tide still heading out I was fearful of heading too far up the proverbial

Bald Eagles Nest in Kanes Creek

creek as I didn't know if I could get back out. The furthermost I got up the creek was about 3/4 of a mile to twins signs saying, "No Trespassing, Sensitive Wildlife Management Area" as I headed out of the creek I called Duber to see if he had any suggestions as Scott indicated that he had fished here before.  He said that he had had success on the Mason Neck side of the mouth hitting the structure along the bank. I did the same and saw several large bass in cuts in the hydrilla and several monster snakehead but the sun was high and the fish were not interested in my size 6 white, black or blue poppers.  As I floated with the tide out of the creek I ran into one nice Large mouth who was happy to play.  It was a good scout trip, but with the heavy, choking weeds this was not the wadeable water I had hoped for.

Mainely Mackerel

After having been largely skunked on our charter Henry (in particular) was not ready to give up the ghost and the prospect of landing a striper within a stones throw of our cottage was to much. Henry rented an 18' Whaler for the day on July 3rd and we hit the water at 0600 with some tips from locals as to where to target.  After some failed casting and scouting...eureka the fish finder lit up with fish just as the York River opened into the Atlantic. Henry caught the first Mackeral on a 6" minnow w dual trebles. The lure was about half the size of the fish! We decided that action with these feisty fellas was much better than casting practice and fished them for about two hours. After another fish on his medium heavy inshore spinning rod Henry ditched it and joined me and fished primarily with my TFO 11.5 6/7 switch. I had added 15' of 90 grain sinking line so it took the tandem clouser rig I right down into the fish.
We steered circuits over the fish at  idle speed so the flies settled about 2' under the water in a slow troll. I used an old Orvis streamline 904 8wt with a shorter 60 grain sink tip and it did the job just fine.
Between the two of us we probably caught 30 mackerel and only stopped as lunch and family called. Later that day Henry did catch a 28" striper on a 6" white sluggo thrown into a bait-all just off shore from our Cape Nettick cottage. He was thrilled and Izzy and Liz were with him for the catch. One of my lessons learned for next year was to bring more rods to account for larger stripers and smaller mackerel. A 5 at would have made those mackerel (tuna family) feel like monsters.

Summer Bassin' on Poppers

After having some success the previous day and with knee surgery 6 days on the horizon, I jumped at the chance to do some more bass fishing with my friend Ryan this morning.  We started wading about 8:30 a.m. and were soon into lots of fish.  Ryan was using an Orvis Clearwater 865-4 and I had an Orvis Access 906-4 SW in hand.  We were both using poppers -- size #6 white for Ryan and size #4 blue for me.  It really didn't seem to matter as the fish were aggressive.

We caught lots of small largemouth bass in the  7-10 inch range.  Though small in stature, they fought and jumped like citation size bucketmouths. 
We also landed a few dozen feisty and beefy bluegills that really could put a bend in both our 5 and 6 wt rods.

The fish were lying in all suspected locations.... logjams, undercut banks,  deep runs.  It's nice when you think a fish should be in a certain spot, make the perfect cast, and are rewarded with a hookup. 

... that happened a lot today.

These bass were the first Ryan had caught on a fly rod.  It was pretty exciting watch him quickly pick up the casting and the techniques needed to hook up and land these fish.

..... as I like to do, when it was time to pack it in and call it a morning, we both had to catch a fish on our last cast. 

I saved my best for last. 

All told, we caught well over 50 fish today with about 20-25 largemouth bass between the two of us.

A Good Day!

Stripers or lack thereof!

Conor, Henry and I met Capt Dave Guerard at Wells Harbor on June 26th for our annual striper charter. The tides were at their astronomical extreme and we had to jump out of the boat to lift it out of the harbor at low tide.

Leaving the harbor between the two jetties we immediately saw striper working bait about 10 feet off the southern jetty. I hooked up on my 4th cast and Henry quickly thereafter. The fish were smallish, about 20 inches and we thought we were in for many more so we worked them quickly and didn't take great pictures. Little did we know that these would be our only stripers for the day. My hookup came on a 7 inch pencil popper and Henry's on a 6 inch sluggo. After leaving the channel we proceeded to hit structure and rips up the lemme bunk and back with only a few follows and sightings. We has a great time but of course were disappointed not to have had better luck. I was particularly disappointed that conor did not get on any fish. 

Big bass at Pohick Bay

Whenever you have the proverbial "fish on" on your first cast, often times it's a bad omen, and you can go hours waiting for that next strike.  I've been down that road too many times.  But when you have "fish on"after the 2nd and 3rd casts... it usually means you've found something and an awesome day is in the making.  Such was my outing on Pohick Bay this morning.

Using size #4 poppers, I was targeting big bass. Over the course of about 3 hours, I brought to hand about 10 largemouth -- all well over 2 pounds.

There's one behemoth with a blue #4 popper that I never brought to hand, but suspect he was north of 5 pounds.



I shot some video, but it resembles a fly fishing video meets the Blair Witch Project.  More work to do on that front.

Not the same fish !