30/10/09 - Lands End - Match Lake

Weight – 53lb 8oz
Catch – 9 Carp, 2 Bream, 1 Crucian
Weather – Mostly sunny & calm
Water Temp– 14.0c > 14.0c
Match – Open – 3rd overall

The weather dictated whether I would fish Saturday or Sunday, with Sundays forecast for gales and rain. As I write this blog on Sunday morning, looking outside I know I made the right to decision because it’s hosing it down and the wind is pushing the trees sideways.

Today I was going for my 5th pick up on the bounce, but found myself on peg 1. This is only the 3rd time I have drawn here, however recent results from the peg have been disappointing and looking at the results for the last 4 matches, showed between 26 & 36lb.

Carp or silvers? I felt I was up against it today, on what has been a very average peg recently. There was a few carp boshing by the island and under the tree at 17m along the left hand bank, so I decided on the carp, although I did set up a swim in open water, feeding micro pellet for the skimmers.

I started at the bottom the shelf by the island and after 10 mins had a skimmer on corn. In fact that was the only fish I had corn, everything else came to Tony’s soft pellet. Another skimmer and a crucian came from the open water swim, but with it being bright and flat the skimmers didn’t want to feed.

All the while I had been flicking 4mm along the left hand bank hoping to draw the carp from under the tree, as well as keeping the bottom of the island shelf topped up again with 4mm.

The LH bank produced a small carp within 5mins of trying, but other than 1 other that snagged me in the tree I never had another fish from this swim. I was getting indication, but no proper bites. Mike West on 24 was having the same problem.

Half way into the match I only had 2 carp, plus my silvers. I thought about switching feed to caster and trying for some silvers, but I couldn’t see the point, because I was way behind in the silvers pool, so I stuck with the carp. Fabio on peg 3 already had 6 or 7 and I could hear Rod Wootten on peg 6 catching, so I needed a late surge.

I couldn’t get any proper indications fishing down the shelf, the LH bank was proving frustrating, so I started flicking 4mm tight to the island which saw a further 2 carp netted. With 70 minutes to go I was up to 4.

I kept the feed going into the island, but also decided to deposit ¾pt caster, pellet & corn tight into my RH margin. There were carp moving around the island now and I decided to shallow up even further to get tighter across. In the last hour I landed 5 carp, 2 from the RH margin and 3 tight to the island. All of sudden I thought
I might be in with a shout of framing, however speaking to others I started thinking 4th would be the best I could hope for.

The weigh in started in reverse from peg 24, Kev Molton weighed 46lb from peg 18, and Alan Oram had 66lb from peg 16. Darren Roberts 10 carp from peg 11 went 49lb and Rod won the match with 69lb. Dave Wescott won the silvers from peg 5 with 19lb and Fabio’s 9 carp went 32lb (proper squeakers).

So I needed 49lb to frame and I honestly thought I had 40-45lb. My silvers weighed 4½lb, but when I lifted my carp net it felt close to 50lb and decided on 2 weighs. The 1st went 32lb, which meant my remaining 3 carp had to be more than 12½lb and I was really pleased when the needle settled on 17lb.

Overall really happy with how I approached the match. The turning point was taking 2 decent carp from my right hand margin and shallowing up further to get tight to the island. The water temperature had increased to 14c, which probably why the fish didn’t really want to settle on the deck.

Opening day of central illinois goose and duck season pics!

It has been about 5 years since I have been this excited about a waterfowl opener. I actually had a bit of trouble falling asleep friday night and was awake a good hour early Saturday morning. An absolute ton of geese had been working our field all week and I was just excited to get out hunting with some friends and family!

Hunting buddies Todd, Aaron and Matt along with my brothers and my two cousins- Caleb and David (both first time hunters) and I all met at 6 am and set up a nice spread of 3 dozen big feet decoys and 2 mojo ducks out in the field. I knew the geese didnt start flying till about 8:30 am so we brought the mojo's to try and get lucky with a group of early flying ducks. What happened next was really pretty unbelievable.

At 7 am the first group of 4 mallards came right in to our spread, and then about every 5-10 minutes for the next hour we were bombarded with small groups of mallards right and left! We were not anticipating bonus action like this one single bit and actually didnt prepare for it very well either. After the first 3 or 4 groups we were actually running out of shells and rationing and dividing amongst ourselves. Finally Justin knew he needed to make a break for the truck and was able to scrounge up about 50 more shells of various gauges- 20, 12, and 10 gauge so we could stay out long enough for the geese to fly!



So the ducks kept a coming and Todd's dog woody did an amazing job at fetching every singe one of the 23 mallards that came tumbling down! After burning through the reserve shells over the next half hour, the ducks finally quit coming and we all had about 5 shells left each for the geese. The ducks were just a bonus! We just knew the geese would be coming over the horizon any minute and this was shaping up to be the hunt of a lifetime!

Well, 8:30 came along and sure enough here comes two geese right from where they were supposed to! They came in to our spread like clockwork and pretty much landed at our feet. Caleb and David put the hammer to them and Justin finished one of them off with his single shot 10 gauge! The anticipation of several more small groups of geese was building! Adrenaline was pumping, we were hooting and hollering and just felt like kings (more like legends in our own minds), but we were flying high and just knew the best was yet to come!

Anyhow 9 am comes along and the air temperature starts feeling just a bit cooler and the wind starts biting just a bit. Still no sign of the geese anywhere. 9:30 comes rolling around with no sign of geese and stomachs start rumbling along with the much colder temps! By 10 am and no sign of geese the adrenaline and excitement is pretty much gone, it feels about 20 degrees colder than at 7 am, and the reality of our daily obligations starts setting in. We figure that once we pick up the decoys and are halfway to the trucks that the field will literally fill up with geese, but just couldnt wait for 'em any longer. We snapped some pics and then headed out to install an aeration system for a client.



Noah is definitely my son. He just absolutely loves fish and animals- dead or alive and is not afraid one bit to pick em up! Its always great to show Brook these kinds of pics later in the day and watch her reaction as she goes and washes his hands and changes his clothes!



I checked on our field several more times in the afternoon and was just amazed that the geese never did fly at all. Not even in the evening! They must have taken a day off and boy did they choose a good one to sit tight and hunker down. Oh well, were gonna be waiting for them in the morning! I just hope they fly before church starts, otherwise I might not be hunting again for awhile if I'm late.

Galway Bass - Part 1

After a couple of evenings scouting and fishing, and after much treking I came upon an ideal looking spot. After an hour of casting, the lure was hit by a solid fish right where I would expect to find one, things were about to get interesting.. As the fish was getting closer I had to get down off the boulder I was casting from to tackle the fish in four feet of lively surf over a field of smaller boulders so typical of the Galway shoreline. As the fish came to me it was pushed towards a handily placed boulder and I managed to gently pin it to the side of the boulder with my left hand, rod in the right hand, I then realised I was stuck for my next move? This was a fish I was determined to land, my first Galway Bass and not a common thing according to local knowledge. The only thing to do was abandon my expensive rod and reel to the surf giving me a free hand to complete the capture which I duly did, getting a good soaking in the process.
The fish weighed in at a fraction under 6lbs and was humanely dispatched for the table, well P&T's table to be precise, and then it was off to locate rod and reel. After ten minutes of wading and searching things were not looking good and I was starting to feel more than a little foolish when, finally I spotted the the lure and hoped the rod was not too far away, the braided line had snagged on the very last growth of Bladderwrack before deep water and certain loss, a narrow escape.

All's well that ends well.

To be continued..........

Galway Bass.

Great action, report to follow.........

Interesting and Large Bass Experiment

If I had a top ten list of favorite things, I would have a tuff choice in the middle of the pack choosing between Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and a new Fish stocking experiment! I just can't ever seem to get my fill of either.

Anyhow, enough of the nonsense as I try to make it through the rest of this yet another rainy day. This interesting pond that we electrofished for Pat Mcsherry last week was not necassarily meant to be a fish stocking experiment by design, but falls into that category by default. I have been researching and fooling around with different stocking combinations of low density predators with high density forage and Pat's pond just fit the bill perfectly.

Based on a foggy memory and some observations we estimated that the pond had a huge fish kill about 4 winters ago. The pond is very fertile and simply produced more fish biomass that summer than it could support through a harsh winter and the biggest fish simply suffocated to death. As the fish started dying, their decaying bodies only used up more and more of the available oxygen under the ice and pretty much all the fish died. Well to make a long story even a bit longer, all of the smallest fish in the pond found enough oxygen to survive the rest of the winter.

There were 1000's of small fish that survived the winter kill and absolutely no large predators to eat them. So many that the fish became instantly stunted, as they all competed for the same tiny peices of available food. That basically set the stage for a very low density predator/high density forage situation. When we electrofished this pond, it was completely full of tens of thousands of small crappie, tiny bluegill and little bullheads. The problem was they were all adult fish with huge eyes like this one.
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While there definitely was not a natural balanced fishery at hand, what we did find was just about what I told Pat to expect, I kept telling him that we were going to come across a handful of nice big bass as we were dialing up scores of adult midget fish. Small bass would survive the fish kill as well, and a few of them would make it big enough fast enough to avoid the huge stuntedization of the rest of the population. Then they simply would have as much to eat as they could ever desire! When we did start to find some bass, I didnt expect them to be quite like this: morbidly obese! Look at the size of their mouths in relationship to their bodies.

The average bass in this pond is 18.8 inches long with a relative weight average for the lake of 125%! The biggest bass we sampled was 20.5" and weighed 108 oz. with a 138% relative weight. A typical 20.5" LMB should weigh 78 oz.

You can actually learn quite a bit about LMB by observing this sort of scenario. I have electrofished and analyzed well more than 100 lakes and ponds across the midwest this year and can tell you this- If you want to truly grow big bass, you can do that much easier and faster by stocking just a few per acre and harvest them like crazy if they even think about making babies!

This may sound strange to many, but the average ADULT bass in Illinois is 12 inches long. If you wait until next year it will still be 12 inches long and if you let it grow up the year after that, its still going to be 12 inches! Many lakes and ponds will grow their original stocked fish well past 12 inches due to limited competition, and the first year class after that may hit 14-15 inches, but the large majority of their offspring will not grow much past 12 inches due to the increased and compounding competition, unless they are harvested, preyed upon, or naturally thinned down.

Huge Fat Bass and Bluegill

Today was probably the last electrofishing survey of the year! A cold front is moving in, along with yet another 1"+ rain, and that will just about put an end to electrofishing. We still have 4 aeration systems and 5 windmills to install, about 10,000 walleye a few hundred muskies and northerns, and that will pretty much wrap up our entire season until the lakes freeze up enough to start drilling holes!!!!

We shocked Oberhelmans lake and Pat's pond yesterday. Check out these pictures!

Then today we squeezed Jared Obrien's new pond in at the last minute. His new pond is completely full of 9-10 inch bluegill that are absolutely beautiful! Not too shabby for picking up a property with an exising pond! I expect great things from that pond over the next couple years!!

Seeing the future and catching fish.

The other day I received a link to a site that gives you the best fishing days according to moon phase and tidal predictions. It said Sunday the 25th of October would be no good for fishing. Being my only day off to fish I decided it did not matter I was still going out. Sometimes you have to buck the trends.

The wind is blowing like hell (25-30) and the tide is starting to fall.

With Captain Charlie at the wheel and Rosie at the stern and myself on the bow, we start the routine of casting and retrieving.

It is not long before I hook up to the first fish. It gives a good accounting of itself and soon is in the boat for it's picture.

From Oct 25 Serua reef

It is hard to tell but it was a pig of a Bass. Very fat and strong.

Soon after Rosie hooks up on a Bass also. A little smaller but a nice fish none the less.

Sorry no picture of that one, she declined.

She then followed the bass up with a nice Bluefin Trevally.

From Oct 25 Serua reef

I then proceeded to get rocked by another big Bass. Although I managed to get my lure back it won its freedom.

Things go quiet for a little bit then I hook up on something different. This time on top of the reef. I see the flash of white and then my line pulls tight. As the beast shoots through the water I am still wondering what it is. Then it exits it's water home to show off its aerial prowess. Low and behold it is a Greater Barracuda. A big one at that. After a spectacular display out of the water Rosie leaders it into the boat for a nice photo session.

From Oct 25 Serua reef

With a smile like this you better watch your fingers.

From Oct 25 Serua reef

All in all we did 4 for 5 in a two hour session.

Not bad for a day that was supposed to be bad for fishing.

I don't think I will be going back to that website.

Tight lines