Rodger's Smallmouth Pond

I met with Rodger Tuesday, and it was windy, cold, and rainy. He has a 5 acre pond stocked with Smallmouth Bass, Hybrid Bluegill, Bluegill, and Redear Sunfish. The smallmouth bass have been growing up to about 3 lbs which is very typical for ponds around central Illinois, but we have a plan set up to help turn those smallies into plumb footballs.

Smallmouth wont typically grow much larger than 3 lbs on a diet of bluegills, because their mouths do not allow them to eat big enough bluegills to grow any bigger. They can hunt down and eat fathead minnows, and 3 inch bluegills all day long, but will not be able to gain weight unless they eat bigger meals and dont have to excercise as much. If you had to run a mile every time you wanted to eat a small meal, you wouldnt gain much weight either.

Also I think the smallmouths in his pond are reproducing too fast and they are all competing for what limited food is available. Our plan is to tag and relocate all of the skinny smallmouths regardless of their lengths to make room and more available food for the big mommas! We are also going to be adding more appropriately sized forage for the smallies to eat. Golden Shiners and Yellow Perch are longer and more slender than bluegills, and are much easier for them to eat! We have some Jumbo Perch Broodstock coming in just a couple weeks!

Here is a pic of an average male smallie from the pond. It is a very nice fish, but could be much fatter!

Busiest Week Ever

This was perhaps one of the busiest weeks ever, and I actually think this is going to be the norm for the next 6 months, seeing as we havent even started our normal pond maintenance and applications yet.

Justin, Allen, Josh, and Lee spent the week building docks, a deck, installing a fountain, and shipping out products. Our online store sales of lake products are picking up almost at a rate too fast to keep up with, and seems like I cant get the boys out the door before 10 am. Last year Justin alone could get the shipments done everyday by 8 am. We are starting to get some big orders coming through as well. One gentleman from Louisianna purchased $6,000 worth of pvc fish structures!

Anyhow, I had my week already full with On-Site Consultations and Electrofishing Surveys, and had a couple of fishing practices with the Peoria Christian High School Bass Fishing Team during the evenings. Then friday was the Bass Fishing State Sectionals and our two teams did really well! Our first team was one fish short of reaching the podium, and our second team had 3 fish in the boat before most teams had their first fish. Once the wind picked up though, their pattern went dry and never landed another fish.

This week I met with Rodger Moon at his Trophy Smallmouth Bass Lake, Ravina on the Lakes about keeping their main lake looking like a million bucks for all the weddings and receptions this year, Ed Kirby about keeping algae under control in his backyard pond, Larry Gerdes for an electrofishing survey and complete management plan for his pond, and Joe Yobbka south of chicago about keeping his pond free of curly leaf and american pondweed. I am planning on writing about these pond visits, because some of these are pretty cool projects!

I currently have 3-5 On-Site Consultations or Electrofishing surveys lined up for every week for the whole summer, and that is in addition to everything else we have going on. I obviously wont be able to be in the office much this season, so I hired Marci Cox as our Office Manager. She is a bookkeeper/accountant extraordinaire and is whipping our office into shape faster than I could of ever imagined! Can you imagine stepping into an office that has been organized and managed by 2 outdoorsman for the last couple years! The biggest mistake we have made so far is not hiring Marci about 2 years ago.

Anyhow, it is Sunday afternoon, the Cubs are whooping up on the Cardinals, the Bulls are hanging in there with the Celtics, and I am just relaxing in the air conditioning for the rest of the night! Not too often you will ever catch me inside during a 75 degree afternoon in the middle of turkey season, mushroom season, and spawning season!

24/04/09 - Winterbourne Duck Pond

Weight – 17lb 0oz
Catch – 26 Bream, 2 Hybrid, 1 Common Carp.
Weather – Mostly sunny, but cool. Strong southerly wind.
Water Temp– 14.5c > 15.0c


At last the revision is over, the exam was yesterday and I’ll get my results in 6 weeks.


I organised a day off to go fishing with Mark on the Kennet & Avon Canal at Devizes to hopefully catch the resident tench & bream. Unfortunately being a canal to get the most from it, an early start was required, so the alarm was set for 4.30 and the car was loaded up the night before.


To be honest I really didn’t want an early start, because I felt wiped out from the exam and revision. So when I was woken up by a text from Mark at 2am saying he was ill (some dodgy sushi the day before), I was disappointed because Devizes offers some great fishing. However on the other hand I welcomed the opportunity for a lie in, assuming I could get back to sleep, which I couldn’t!


So I thought sod it, might as well go fishing. Mark had some of my bait, so I only had pellet available and I didn’t fancy driving too far.



Decided to fish the duck pond again, because I wanted to see if the carp were still around. Tactics were similar to last time and my only concern was, would only fishing pellet effect my catch?



As the session progressed, I caught mostly on the waggler, but the fish weren’t really turned on to the pellet and I was fairly certain that if I had a few maggots I would have caught much more. So I finished a little disappointed, particularly after last weeks session.


As for those carp, the 1 I caught only weighed a pound. A walk around the pond tells its own story. Being only shallow, the water colour used to be is very coloured with the carp churning up the bottom, but now there is a certain clarity, which suggests the volume of carp in the pond isn't as it used to be.



The pair of Canadian Geese pictured have 7 very young chicks. I wondered whether they were on some sort of sucide mission, because they seemed to think the road was an extension of the pond, stopping traffic on a couple of occasion as they wandered around. At one point I had to get up and usher them back to the pond.

High School Boys Bass Fishing Practice

Took the Peoria Christian High School Boys to the Fishing Park for a little tune up before the state sectional at Banner Marsh on Friday.

It was freezing cold and rainy, but on the water instruction and technique critiqueing was a must before the big day. I didnt think we would catch any fish, but we did manage about a dozen bass, 8 bluegill, and a HUGE rainbow trout.

Here I am showing the boys what it is going to take to win this tournament on friday. Just look at that beautiful black bass:

Jake and Keith did a great job catching everything but bass:

Did a Little Trout Fishing Over the Weekend

Spent Saturday working at our Lake in Norris, and took a little time off to take my Uncle Spark and 2nd cousins Eddie and Dr. Bobby Meister fishing.
They caught 2 walleye, 9 trout, and 7 largemouth bass fishing off of the dock. Just kicked back and had a great time! Blue Fox spinner turned out to be the hot bait for the day. Here is a pic of Bobby with his first trout of the day:

I took a few casts at some rising trout on the far end of the lake while working on the lake siphon system and landed a beautiful 3 lb rainbow trout! No pics though and no witnesses either.

Sprouting Wings

The AF crew has flown the coupe! After spending all week polishing up the bus full of goodies, it was time to take it for a spin. The magic bus made the journey to Melbourne and was back home in time for Sunday’s episode of AF. They couldn’t wait to share pictures of the Mogan Tour with the Mogan Maniacs.

The Mogan Tour rolled in Melbourne on Saturday. The AF Crew chatted it up with shoppers that stopped by “The Lodge” in Dick’s Sporting Goods. Blair gave seminars and showed off the new AF Zone end cap which houses all of the sponsor gear that helps him fish like a pro. The AF team loves seeing Mogan Maniacs show up and snapped pictures with the Shelly Clan. The tour bus travels to DSG on Gulf Center Dr. in Ft. Myers on April 25th . Come out to see us and don’t be left out of the zone.

Capt. Blair got his Permit and this week he’ll be “Wreckin’ Tampa”. Capt. Chad Manning takes Blair offshore to get wrecked by some Permit outside of Tampa Bay. Put a blue crab on a Lazer Sharp circle hook and hang on! Get your fix this week on SunSports with AF airing Friday @ 2pm, Sunday @ 7pm, Monday @ 9pm (bonus show), and Tuesday @ 6:30am.

Survey says? In efforts to keep in contact with our peeps (another senseless bird reference), we have added a Poll to the front page of the AF site. Periodically, the questions will change and your answers matter. We want your 2 cents! Who knows, add enough pennies together and you make change. This week’s question: What is your favorite color pattern?

The Mogan Man wants YOU! Addictive Fishing is recruiting new members for the Mogan Militia. Join the growing army of AF supporters on MySpace & FaceBook. Check out the latest pictures from the Mogan Tour, keep tabs on Blair during the Redfish Cup, and meet up with other Mogan Maniacs. While you’re there, post your recent catch or just tell us what you think of the show. Make sure your friends are a part of the coolest group on the web and watch the hottest show on the tube. Send this to 10 friends and you will catch a Mogan on your next fishing trip. Do it! It really works!

Double B in the niz-est!

River Dove Ellastone

Went to Ellastone last night for a few hours, Dave (squire) had been in the day and said it was quite hard going,
On arriving the weather was hot and bright but no fish were really rising, just the odd rise now and again, As the light started to fade the river errupted with fish rising all over the place, managed to take around five fish to the dry, most were taken on a grey duster and the dhe, all were quite small but i hooked a out of season grayling that was huge, (see picture), I unhooked the fish in the water and never picked her out so photo was taken holding her upstream, taking a mark off my rod the fish was just over 14 inch long!! I would say it was over 2 lb, I am not a grayling man but this was the largest one i have seen and it looked a old fish..
I also saw some big rainbows leaping out last night but failed to hook one, its seems only Dave can catch them this year!!
Another good night for me on the dry and may fly is still to come...

Thanks Glen