4/22/16 Sneak Peek

I got out last night after work. I had an unbelievable night of fishing. I was trying for Pike but ran into a pattern for Smallmouth that I absolutely had to capitalize on! I don't have much time to share a full post as we are packing to go on vacation today. Here's a sneak peek of some of the awesome video I got. You'll just have to wait until I get back to see it!

4/17/16 It Never is Quite How You Imagined It

Sunday was another absolutely beautiful day. Even better, was that Kelly also had the day off. After getting some working done around the house, Kelly agreed to come with me and fish a Northern Indiana river for Pike. While loading the truck up Kelly just happened to mention that I should grab the first aid kit. It's always a good idea to have one when fishing for Pike just in case you happen to get cut by their teeth like I managed to do two years ago. The decision to take the first aid kit would be a good one for an entirely different reason. The drive up North was pleasant and the weather was amazing! I can't believe how much of a difference a week came make sometimes! We arrived at the river about 1:30 in the afternoon and began unloading the canoe. In the blink of an eye I had a freak accident. While walking down the boat ramp, a stick jammed into the top of my shoe. Not sure how it happened but it happened. Anyways, I picked that foot up to shake it loose. What I didn't realize is that my other foot was standing on mud. I immediately slid and fell. I had my two rods in my hand and in an attempt to not damage the rods or reels I ended up hitting my knee HARD onto the concrete ramp. It quickly started gushing blood. It must have been weird to Kelly to all of a sudden look up and see me sitting on the ramp clutching my knee. We luckily had the first aid kit and we were able to clean out the gashes and apply band aids to get the bleeding mostly stopped. This incident could have ended a trip before it even got started. It is becoming pretty clear to me how important it can be to have first aid kit with some basic supplies when going on even short trips. Not long after we were on the water, the fishing started to pick up. I got two small Pike within just a few casts of each other. After that the action was fairly consistent for the next few hours. Kelly had about a dozen strikes and follows but never did end up catching any fish. She seemed very frustrated and I wasn't sure what else to tell her. She was doing everything right but was just unlucky when it came to actually hooking up. At least the action kept her interested throughout the day. I did end up catching 5 Pike which is a pretty decent day in anyone's book. They were all relatively small with the largest fish being approximately 20 inches in length. I know there are much bigger fish in this stretch. The numbers of fish we saw was pretty encouraging though. We caught all of our fish on Rapala X-Raps and large two-blade spinner baits. It was a fun day. I just wish Kelly had gotten to catch at least a few of the fish that she had chances at catching.

4/16/16 Lucky Number 13

The weather and water levels were finally cooperative so my dad and I decided to fish the Lake Michigan tributaries in hopes of finding some late spring Steelhead. It was easy to tell that we were a little late on getting up there to fish as we only saw approximately 20 fish in 4 different bodies of water. I did however manage to catch my 13th and smallest Steelhead to date. I caught a small but aggressive male fishing a spinner behind one of only two pairs of spawning fish we spotted. It came from out of nowhere and just absolutely demolished my spinner. He was pretty roughed up but was still a fun fish to catch. After I released that fish, my dad came extremely close to catching his first Steelhead. A nice fish chased his spinner but turned away at the last minute. He was literally inches from getting one. It was a beautiful day to be out and I feel fortunate to have even gotten one fish. The season is pretty well over and this warm weather will quickly bring it to a close. The better news is I got to spend a whole day with the old man. You can't beat that in my book.

4/10/16 Spring Brown Trout

This past weekend was pretty strange. The weather was really not very nice. I really wanted to get the kayak out but it was just not going to happen. When I woke up both days, there was fresh snow on the ground. Saturday was a high of 36 and 15-25 mph winds. Sunday looked better but was going to start out well below freezing. I decided to sleep in and check the weather in the morning to see what if anything I was getting myself into. It was still supposed to be relatively windy but the temperature looked much better. The forecast for up north was a high of 52 and occasional rain showers. I thought to myself "I can handle a little rain as long as it gets into the 50's" So with that, I headed north with my waders and a light weight spinning rod to fish for trout. Within minutes of arriving, it started to rain. It NEVER stopped the rest of the day. It also never got above 40 degrees. The weather was generally very miserable. Fortunately the fishing was fantastic and I brought a ton of very nice Browns to hand. My best was probably around 15 inches and I had several 12 inchers as well. I was catching them on small spinners. I pinch the barbs down on the trebles. It makes it much easier on the fish and unhooking the fish is pretty quick and easy most times. You lose occasional fish this way but the pros outweigh the cons. All Trout streams are catch and release only from the first of the year until the end of April. Also remember that most Trout streams are closed to fishing from April 15th until the last Saturday in April when "Trout Season" opens.

4/1/16 If You Can't Beat the High Water, Join It!

The weather continues to be a problem for fishing. There has been more than enough rain in the last month to keep most rivers too high and muddy to fish and it has been extremely windy most days when I had chances to go. The silver lining is that when rivers are too high and muddy to fish, there is a creek within 25 minutes of my house that has decent whitewater to paddle. The whitewater is pretty small with mostly class 1 with a few class 2 rapids at higher water. This type of creek is pretty rare in Indiana. It has a hard rock bottom with lots of rock ledges, plenty of big boulders, and some very neat cliffs along it's course. It is also unique because it is the only designated catch and release section of water in the state for Smallmouth Bass. We went down on Friday after work. The creek was a little lower than the first time we went this spring but still had plenty of fast moving water to practice catching eddies, ferrying, and just a little bit of surfing. It was fun night to be out. This crazy weather has to end eventually!

Three Rivers Fly Fishing / Fly Tying Show

Now that the show has gotten a lot closer, I just wanted to post this flyer one more time. Last years inaugural event was awesome. We had a lot of great vendors, speakers, fly tyers, prizes, and raffles. This year also looks like it is going to be a great event. If you missed it last year come on out this Saturday!