Saturday, July 25, 2009
North Cadron 7-25-09
My cousin, Evan and I went float fishing today. We tackled the long but usually productive section of the North Cadron from Highway 65 down to Highway 285. This float is 10 miles long, but the water was flowing stronger than it usually is in July due to the three inches of rain we got earlier this week. The problem is, with rain and rising water levels comes mud. The water was awfully muddy today with visibility being about 12". I know the bass probably don't mind, but it seems that they just have a much harder time finding your lure in these conditions. I've read that the reason it's harder to catch bass with muddy/high water is that they are already gorging themselves on the suddenly plentiful food supply washed from the banks. I don't know if this is completely true, but the fishing seemed a little slow. All told, I caught between 15 and 20 and Evan caught about 10. I caught most of the bass including the bigger one on a Zara Spook. I just felt that the fish could home in on all the commotion, even if they weren't particularly interested in feeding on topwater. I had a lot of short strikes, and several of the fish caught were come-backers that missed the bait the first time, but came back for more. The big bass missed the lure four times before I finally hooked up with him.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Black Fork Cadron Fishing Trip
A nice little bass that hit a 1/8 ounce spinnerbait.
Yesterday, the weather was warm and sunny. The two days previous were even warmer...up to 75 degrees which is rather warm for late February. I figured this might mean the bass were moving up the side creeks in preparation for the spawn. Last year, on March 1, my dad and I fished the Cadron Creek where the Black Fork and the East Fork intersect near the town of Holland. In just a couple hours, we caught 40 bass. Most of them were on the small side, but they were all chunky, healthy, and pulled like a team of mules. Our hands were literally worn out by the end of the afternoon.
Well, they weren't stacked in that spot yesterday like they were a year ago. But I did manage to catch four pretty bass in several hours of fishing. If nothing else, I got to try out the new kayak (Ultimate 14.5 from Native Watercraft), and enjoy paddling around a bit.
The water thermometer said the water was 57-58 degrees pretty much everywhere I paddled, which is just about warm enough for the spawn. I'm guessing that the next warm spell and possibly full moon will put them up in the feeder creeks like cordwood.
Just like typical Arkansas weather, the temps were in the mid-seventies, daffodils and pear trees are blooming, and today it snowed all day. At least I got out while I could.
This is where most of the bass were caught.
The biggest bass of the day came on a little bit larger spinnerbait. This was the only female caught. The other three were males.
Yesterday, the weather was warm and sunny. The two days previous were even warmer...up to 75 degrees which is rather warm for late February. I figured this might mean the bass were moving up the side creeks in preparation for the spawn. Last year, on March 1, my dad and I fished the Cadron Creek where the Black Fork and the East Fork intersect near the town of Holland. In just a couple hours, we caught 40 bass. Most of them were on the small side, but they were all chunky, healthy, and pulled like a team of mules. Our hands were literally worn out by the end of the afternoon.
Well, they weren't stacked in that spot yesterday like they were a year ago. But I did manage to catch four pretty bass in several hours of fishing. If nothing else, I got to try out the new kayak (Ultimate 14.5 from Native Watercraft), and enjoy paddling around a bit.
The water thermometer said the water was 57-58 degrees pretty much everywhere I paddled, which is just about warm enough for the spawn. I'm guessing that the next warm spell and possibly full moon will put them up in the feeder creeks like cordwood.
Just like typical Arkansas weather, the temps were in the mid-seventies, daffodils and pear trees are blooming, and today it snowed all day. At least I got out while I could.
This is where most of the bass were caught.
The biggest bass of the day came on a little bit larger spinnerbait. This was the only female caught. The other three were males.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Hair and Feathers
This winter, when warm summer days on the creek seemed so far away, I really delved into fly tying. I started this new obsession (as April would call it), last winter so that I could teach a class on basic fly tying at our summer camp session at Camp Caudle. We direct two weeks of youth church camp every summer with our best friends Lee and Andrea at Camp Caudle just outside of Dover, Arkansas. Anyway, I tried to get into this new craft as cheaply as possible since I really didn't know how 'into' it I would get.
So, I purchased some cheap (relatively) fly tying tools...the vise, tiny scissors, bobbin to hold the thread, and the oh-so-cool sounding hackle pliers. I opted not to purchase a bodkin, which is a straight pin stuck into a dowel rod costing $8, nor did I buy a lot of premium feathers, fur, and such. Instead, I browsed around Hobby Lobby and found that their feathers were on half price sale! I got a jumbo sized bag of some of the most ridiculously tinted feathers I've ever seen for about $4. Turns out, a year later, that bag is still at least 90% full, and I let my tying students use all they wanted.
I found a great website www.warmwaterflytyer.com that shows a lot of patterns to tie for bass, and other fishes that lurk in warm water as opposed to the cold water trout, and proceeded to learn the basics of tying my own flies. Those first creations were pretty pitiful looking, but several of them actually caught a few fish.
This winter, I spent a little more money on proper fly materials (thread that doesn't come in a little kit for reattaching buttons when travelling, and feathers that don't look like they belong on a Mardi Gras costume), and honed my skills in spinning deer hair.
Now, spinning deer hair on a hook is a pretty complex, and incredible process. Deer hair is apparently hollow, so when you bind down a small bunch of it on the hook shank and tighten down on the thread, the hair will flair out 90 degrees from the hook and spin around it. After spinning subsequent bunches and compressing them tightly against each other, you can then trim the wild edges off with a super-sharp razor blade to make pretty much any shape you want. Mostly, though, I try to make it look like a frog, mouse, or something else a bass just may think he should eat...after all, a fly shaped like Windson Castle wouldn't be very effective, and would probably be a nightmare to try to cast in the wind.
So, here are some of the flies that I am most proud of. To be honest, it'll be a little difficult actually using these to fish with since I take the better part of an hour to make one of these little boogers. Practice, practice, practice.
The "Dredger" is weighted so it works to catch bass on the bottom.
Here is my crawdad imitation. This one is made mostly of rabbit fur.
I made this little weighted fly out of hair from a dusting brush that I had sitting on my table at the time.
The "Bottomhugger"
This flat fly is supposed to represent a small sunfish.
The ol' deer hair mouse. Can't wait to try this out come summer.
Does it look like a locust? Well, it's supposed to.
A more conceptual crawdad representation.
I'm really looking forward to seeing a bucketmouth inhale this frog fly.
The "Woolhead Leech"...yes, the head is actually made of a clump of wool.
I also learned that by stacking a spinning different colored deer hair, you can make some pretty cool patterns like this tadpole. The head is actually compressed hair even though it looks like a solid material.
This is probably my favorite fly that I've made, unfortunately, it rides upside down in the water, and doesn't dive the way I had hoped. Live and learn!
An old-timey red and white popper bug.
Another popper.
The "yellow head"
Supposed to work a lot like a tube lure, just made with feathers and rubber legs.
This is an adaption of the "wooly booger", and is called a "wooly grubber" with the grub tail.
I'll let you know how successful these are this spring and summer. I took them on the Cadron Creek a couple weeks ago and only caught one on the "Dredger". Should get better as the water warms up.
So, I purchased some cheap (relatively) fly tying tools...the vise, tiny scissors, bobbin to hold the thread, and the oh-so-cool sounding hackle pliers. I opted not to purchase a bodkin, which is a straight pin stuck into a dowel rod costing $8, nor did I buy a lot of premium feathers, fur, and such. Instead, I browsed around Hobby Lobby and found that their feathers were on half price sale! I got a jumbo sized bag of some of the most ridiculously tinted feathers I've ever seen for about $4. Turns out, a year later, that bag is still at least 90% full, and I let my tying students use all they wanted.
I found a great website www.warmwaterflytyer.com that shows a lot of patterns to tie for bass, and other fishes that lurk in warm water as opposed to the cold water trout, and proceeded to learn the basics of tying my own flies. Those first creations were pretty pitiful looking, but several of them actually caught a few fish.
This winter, I spent a little more money on proper fly materials (thread that doesn't come in a little kit for reattaching buttons when travelling, and feathers that don't look like they belong on a Mardi Gras costume), and honed my skills in spinning deer hair.
Now, spinning deer hair on a hook is a pretty complex, and incredible process. Deer hair is apparently hollow, so when you bind down a small bunch of it on the hook shank and tighten down on the thread, the hair will flair out 90 degrees from the hook and spin around it. After spinning subsequent bunches and compressing them tightly against each other, you can then trim the wild edges off with a super-sharp razor blade to make pretty much any shape you want. Mostly, though, I try to make it look like a frog, mouse, or something else a bass just may think he should eat...after all, a fly shaped like Windson Castle wouldn't be very effective, and would probably be a nightmare to try to cast in the wind.
So, here are some of the flies that I am most proud of. To be honest, it'll be a little difficult actually using these to fish with since I take the better part of an hour to make one of these little boogers. Practice, practice, practice.
The "Dredger" is weighted so it works to catch bass on the bottom.
Here is my crawdad imitation. This one is made mostly of rabbit fur.
I made this little weighted fly out of hair from a dusting brush that I had sitting on my table at the time.
The "Bottomhugger"
This flat fly is supposed to represent a small sunfish.
The ol' deer hair mouse. Can't wait to try this out come summer.
Does it look like a locust? Well, it's supposed to.
A more conceptual crawdad representation.
I'm really looking forward to seeing a bucketmouth inhale this frog fly.
The "Woolhead Leech"...yes, the head is actually made of a clump of wool.
I also learned that by stacking a spinning different colored deer hair, you can make some pretty cool patterns like this tadpole. The head is actually compressed hair even though it looks like a solid material.
This is probably my favorite fly that I've made, unfortunately, it rides upside down in the water, and doesn't dive the way I had hoped. Live and learn!
An old-timey red and white popper bug.
Another popper.
The "yellow head"
Supposed to work a lot like a tube lure, just made with feathers and rubber legs.
This is an adaption of the "wooly booger", and is called a "wooly grubber" with the grub tail.
I'll let you know how successful these are this spring and summer. I took them on the Cadron Creek a couple weeks ago and only caught one on the "Dredger". Should get better as the water warms up.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)