Should have been here yesterday

The cliche has been around as long as fishing has been a viable sport. But, yes, we should have been there yesterday. Or was it the day before?

For reasons unknown to fishing guides and boy scouts, the fish weren't on a feed when I joined my friend Pete Greenan on a trip to Charlotte Harbor.

We launched his Maverick HPX flats skiff at Uncle Henry's at Boca Grande shortly after daylight and headed for the backcountry. Our plan was to cast for some large snook that Pete (http://www.floridaflyfishing.com/) had located a few days earlier. He said one of his clients, a former touring bass pro, had caught and released eight slot-size snook on topwater plugs around mangrove islands in Bull Bay.

Gasparilla Sound was calm as we headed toward Bull Bay. A beautiful sunrise greeted us as we neared the mangrove backcountry.

When Pete pulled back on the throttle and eased the skiff toward the flat, it was evident something was amiss. There were no mullet, no stingrays, bait or other life. I cast a topwater plug for about five minutes with no result.

That scenario played out over the next few spots. Finally, off a mangrove island in Bull Bay, we found a few fish. I hooked several, but lost each. I managed a 20-inch red on a Rapala Skitter Walk. That's when I decided to grab the fly rod and cast a Gartside Gurgler.

The fish weren't interested in the fly.

"Something's changed today," said Pete. "I know that we had a front move through. Could be high pressure. It'd different, for sure."

We added a few spotted seatrout over the next couple of hours. We were back at the dock at 1 p.m. and headed home.

"Great day," said Pete.

I agreed.

It's not always about the catch. It's about nature, friendship and fun.

My own private lake

Lake Manatee is a 2,500 body of water located nine miles west of Interstate 75 off State Road 64 in Manatee County

It's a great fishing lake that supplies drinking water for Bradenton and other parts of the county.

I propose the name of the lake be changed. County commissioners should rename it Gibby's Lake.

Reason is that I feel like it's my own private fishing spot. On many occasions, I'm the only angler on the lake. Usually, it's just me, my kayak, fly rods and fish.

Can it get any better?

Gibby's Lake, er, Lake Manatee isn't and easy lake. First timers often struggle when trying to figure the old gal out. But once you put in a little time, you can eliminate slow area and discover productive spots.

It's a fly anglers' dream. Hand-sized bluegill are plentiful. Bass are obliging. In fact, I rarely even target bass. I catch them inadvertently as I cast small poppers or my Myakka Minnow for bluegill.

Shellcracker, speckled perch and feisty channel cats also are willing.

Recently, I've been averaging about 100 fish per trip. One day last week, I caught and released 111 fish, including 102 bluegill, five shellcracker, one bass and three channel catfish (4, 8 and 10 pounds).

I've discovered over the last month that if I paddle to the mouth of Gilley Creek, I'll catch less fish but more quality. Typically, I'll get 20 hand-sized bluegill, maybe a speckled perch, several nice bass and perhaps a channel catfish.

Speckled perch (also known as black crappie) are incidental catches now, but they'll become typical in a month or so as the weather cools. And Lake Manatee specks average 2 pounds. They're great fighters on light fly tackle.

I use a 6-weight fly rod for bass so that I can toss big poppers. For bluegill and other panfish, I usually cast a 1-weight. Top flies are my Myakka Minnow, Aunt Sara's Homely Daughter Nymph and my FLY Nymph.

Slam time in the backcountry

Fall is fabulous for local saltwater fishing. I just love it.

It's a time when fish are hungry and the water is uncrowded. Tourist season is still months away, so there's only a few locals on the water at any given time.

This time of year, I like to branch out and fish areas that I don't get to experience often. Lately, I've been fishing Bishop Harbor and southern Tampa Bay. And I've been doing well. Fishing the incoming tide, I have been getting snook to 28 inches, redfish to 25 and spotted seatrout to 16 on Rapala Skitter Walks and plastic-tailed jigs.

Most of the action has been taking place in the shallows along the northeast side of the harbor -- partiularly around the numerous mangrove islands. The fish are hanging out around mullet schools and off the tips of the islands.

When that action subsides, I like to paddle out into southern Tampa Bay and fish a couple of sand bars that offer fabulous sight-fishing for redfish, large jack crevalle and shark. On one outing, I caught and released three reds to 28 inches in just 10 minutes. I've also been catching spotted seatrout to 18 inches, bonnethead shark and pompano to 4 pounds.

I haven't seen any tarpon, but it wouldn't surprise me if I encounter one soon.

As the weather and water cool, this area is going to heat up.

26/09/09 - Lands End - Match Lake

Weight – 26lb 8oz
Catch – 6 Carp, 5 Perch, 4 Rudd
Weather – Sunny & warm
Water Temp– 14.5c > 15.0c
Match – Open – 10th overall

With 17 anglers, Mike decided to peg 1 side of Speci Lake (25-32) as well as Match Lake.

Its funny how certain pegs get stuck to hand, whilst other pegs you cant get close to. I hardly draw pegs 1 & 24, but cant keep away from the top end (pegs 10 & 11), so I shouldn’t have been surprised when I opened the card to see peg 11 staring at me.

Mark was unhappy with peg 31, until I told him I would swap it for mine. Anyway I took his casters, which took a little pursuding, to add to my own and hoped for a day catching chub tight to the island.

15 mins before the match the "wave machine" (well that’s what Tony calls it) started. A pot of caster & 4mm pellet went in on the island & I started on double caster, waiting for the chub. After an hour it was obvious there wasn’t many silvers about, but I did notice carp responding to the feed. So a switch 6mm hair rigged pellet resulted in a couple of carp, but the fish weren’t taking the bait properly and a switch to paste resulted in a couple more carp.

This was turning into a frustrating match, because I could see carp moving around but getting them to take the bait was proving challenging. At the half way stage my 4 carp, from what I could hear & see was doing OK, so when the wave machine turned off I was hopeful I could catch properly. Unfortunately the session just become even more frustrating. The carp were coming to the feed, but wouldn’t take the bait.

As well as hard pellet & paste, I tried caster & expander, but it didn’t seem to make a difference. Mike was on 13 and was having the same problems. To be honest I stuck with fishing the island a lot longer than I should have, because I could see the fish and was determined to make it work.

In the end the better weights came from the other end of the lake, where there was a slight ripple.

As for Mark, he won the match with 99-6, which included over 10lb of chub, all on expander to the point of the island, although he said he had to scale down to get bites, despite the carp having their backs out of the water.

Charters, Money and Fish

So here is the low down on what has happened with my charter business. Here in Fiji it is only proper to go and ask permission to fish in a villages waters. As you saw in earlier posts I did this with a couple of villages already and all was fine. In fact on even asked me if I would help look after their waters, I said yes of course. So after many attempts to meet with the chief of Na Waisomo, Raviravi and Lalati, one person by the title Tui Raviravi, he agrees and gives me about 2 hours to get out to Beqa island where he is. We arrive there and present our Yanqona. We explain our intentions about running a guiding opeation and how it will be catch and release and so forth. Tui Raviravi then sits back and says, lets get right down to business, we want $5,000.00 dollars upfront and for you to write a letter of intent. After I pull my jaw up off the floor I tell him that is a lot of money and I need to think about it. Truth being, there was nothing to think about. No way! $5,000.00 for what? Why? What are you going to do for me? Well the answer to those questions is a resounding, Nothing. So Tui Raviravi and his entourage says they will let me think about it for a week and then call me for another meeting. They never call and I decided I will hold off on the charters for awhile. Too bad, but I will focus on my tackle shop and fish for myself and friends.

Now onto a fishy subject. We got out on the water the other day and it was a beauty of a day. Rosie wanted to go and do some bait fishing with her aunt Adi and sister Lou. So off we go, out to the reefs to drop anchor and bait. Now for those that know me, they know I hate bait fishing, mainly because I suck at it and I seem to catch the fishes house a lot. This day proved to be no different. My first fish was a cracker of a fish.

Luckily the day was awesome and we were having fun.

We caught all sorts of fish. From small to really small.

We had a great time with lots of sun and laughs.

Tight lines

Albino Golden Rainbow Trout for Sale

I have a limited number of golden trout available for sale this fall. They average about 1-1/4 lbs and cost $100 per 10 of them.



They are the most awesome fish to add to a pond for the cold open water fishing and especially winter ice fishing months. They make just an awesome bonus fish to catch while out icefishing. They are very aggressive and readily eat small rapalas, jigging spoons, minnows, and wax worms through the ice.

Check out this video from last season ice fishing trout in illinois. The golden trout gets caught at about 5:20 in the video.





I also have plenty of rainbows available as well. We stock 1000's of them in small ponds and lakes across central illinois for Ice Fishing Bonus'. Typically they will live until the 3rd week of June and grow to about 3 lbs each by then, but this year due to the cold summer we had tons of lakes and ponds carry their trout all sumer long. Our average carry over trout is 4-5 lbs, but we have several of them grow to over 7 lbs in just one year!!! It is unbelievable how much these fish will eat and grow.

State Record Longear Sunfish!

Electrofishing a huge lake near Champaign, Illinois last week we came across a huge population of longear sunfish. The largest we captured was 6 inches long and that my friends is an Illinois State Record for Longears!

Longear sunfish are absolutely beautiful:

Zeppelin Blimps

Yesterday evening my friend Greg and I went out on the lake to chase a few Hybrids. We pulled into my first spot and saw a few splashes but nothing too promising. I caught a nice Kentucky and a small mouth. We moved on to the next spot and nothing. On our way to the third we could see the splashes from 500 yards away. We pulled up into them and starting getting into them immediately. All the fish we caught were nice fish. Doc is a guy who likes to sit down when he fishes,so he landed his first hybrid sitting down. It was extremely funny. We stayed out a couple of hours and saw fish almost the whole time. Man do I love Greer's ferry.

Birthday Girl

Yesterday was my Moms birthday. For Mother's day I had given her a gift certificate to fish for a day. She brought her good friend Anne, who had never fly fished. We put in and ran up river to one of my favorite little gems on the river. It was a beautiful boat ride in the fog. We had the river to ourselves. No other boats! Mom got into them pretty quick and punished them. She brought in several gorgeous browns. Once I got Anne dialed in, she starting catching quite a few fish too! We took a great lunch break and watched the geese squabble. After lunch, we started working our way back to the ramp catching some nice fish in the rising water as we drifted. It was really cool getting to take my mom fishing on her birthday. I think she and Anne will remember it forever!

Chiky and Fred

Jamie and I did a group trip with the guys from Memphis Pizza Cafe on Tuesday. We had a good bit of water left over from the night before, but it posed no threat! It was a nice partly cloudy day. My two guys, Chiky and Fred had a blast. The bite was pretty constant all day. They jabbed jokes at each other all day. Fred caught the first brown and was talking about having all the skills, when Chiky came back and caught four browns almost instantly! It was pretty funny. This picture is one of the nicer browns we saw that day. The fall fishing is starting to get cranking with more and more browns showing up. I think its going to be a great season!

Waterford action.......

Electro Fishing Lake Audits and Pics

Here are some pics from shocking some lakes and ponds the last few days. We will be doing a lot of traveling over the next few weeks performing Full Lake Audits and Electrofishing for BIG lakes and pond across the state of Illinois.

We are pretty much booked solid for the rest of this season, but get your favorite fishing lake, club, campground, etc signed up for next spring!!

John Sauders Pond Pics:




Lake Wildwood Fish Pics:

Wilmington Recreation Club pics:

Redear Sunfish Stocking program to combat zebra mussel infestation has been working!

Doug Oberhelmans Fish Pictures. This is a lake we have been stocking heavy with northern pike, tiger musky, and walleye in order to combat the infestation of carp, gizzard shad, and yellow bass. It is working, and the LMB are getting fatter and larger (albeit not quite as many of 'em):

Leisure Times Pictures:

That is definitely the end to a very eventful week! I am stuck in the office all day today trying to catch up on voice and emails and write up some reports before our next round of electrofishing kicks off at 5am Monday morning. Next week we are headed to Shelbina, Mo; Fiatt, IL; Lisle, IL; and the Quad Cities for electrofishing surveys and also gonna squeeze in a Sonogram for our little bun in the oven as well as attend the Lyle Finch Memorial Clay Pigeon Shoot that benefits the Easter Seals. Then on Saturday we are taking a family guided fishing out at the lake that they purchased from the PCS benefit auction. About next sunday I will have another round of really cool fish pics for sure!

Senior Citizen Fishing Trip at The Fishing Park

Before heading off to the Pond Boss Conference at Big Cedar Lodge, we took some residents at the Skyline Drive Nursing Home out for a fishing trip at the Hooked on Fishing Park

Everyone had a BLAST! We are looking forward to our next fishing trip with these guys for sure!!! I will let these couple pics finish off the rest of the story.

Pond Boss Conference Update

We headed down to Branson, Missouri on Wed morning for the Pond Boss Conference and Expo. When we got to Branson we checked into our log cabin and then headed for the Bass Pro Shops on the white river!

Over the next few days we listened to some incredible fish and pond experiments and case studies, hung out with a lot of good friends from all over the country, ate tons of food, did a seining demonstration on the Big Cedar Pond, Fished a tournament on table rock lake, and hit up the Bass Pro Shops in Springfield on the way home.

A more detailed account of the conference along with many pics can be found at http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=183880#Post183880

OH yeah, let me just say that the Big Cedar Lodge in Branson is quite simply AMAZING!

Islay Day 2

After our excellent day previously i was buzzing to get up early and fish the Laggan for the Salmon, waking Woody up at 5 oclock was no good as he had been dramming, we had a quick 'you ready for it youth' and we fell back asleep..

We woke up around seven and chucked the gear in the van, 7 weight line ect and heavy tackle.. Peter had more gear than you could ever imagine, a rod for every situation.

We drove across to the other side of the island in 30 mins and arrived at the Estate, we took a stroll down to the rivers edge and our hearts sank, with the dry spell the river had come down even lower than the day before and was looking down to bare bones, we had to decide weather to flog it all day or leave it until later in the week if we had rain.. its probably the first time i prayed for any rain..

Thats the problem with Salmon fishing, you need to catch it right and your in a good chance of a fish but today was a no go...

We decided to head off to loch Gorm where i had loved it the previous day, i was no bothered about the river Laggan as these wild lochs had got a hold on me.

We arrived at Gorm and fished in different spots than the day before, the weather was overcast with a slight ripple which looked top conditions, we struggled on the dry and the wets, it was early in the day and it was obvious that these fish were not on the feed and a evening session on these lochs is the way forward.

Waterford

I'm in Waterford, South East, Ireland with work for the week and looking forward to fishing later in the week.

The weather is calm after a big blow so it could produce some good fishing.

Will let you know how it goes.....

Fun with Dad

So if you guys don't know, I have my dad to thank for my passion of trout and the river. I caught my first fish when I was two years old. We have fished together my whole life. Yesterday afternoon the river was running two units and the sun was shining. Not ideal streamer conditions, but we wanted to give them a whirl. I convinced dad to take his boat. I think that within our first five casts, we both had Fish On! We fished for a couple of hours and caught several nice browns. We both missed several as well. I brought in this 26 inch toad! It was such a rush to have this monster come up out of the water 4 times! He was like a baby tarpon. It was awesome! It was a real treat to get to do what I love most with my dad, catch big browns on streamers.