The day was just perfect for fishing on the pond.  A little too warm for some people but not for me and the fish.  A couple of days of sunshine can warm the water and whet (pun intended) the appetite of the fish.  And, sure as bass love frogs, they were foraging for them.  I  was five o’clock in the  afternoon when I set out and  the first thing I tried was my tried and true Zoom Trick Worm…no luck, not even a tick .  Then the chartreuse spinner, the same… not a tick.  O.K., try the Yum Craw…not a tick.  Well, what next… go to the fly rod. 

I inserted the top picture to show you what kind of day it was and  to give you and idea of where I thought the fish might be…in the shade… at least until the sun was nearing the horizon.

As I was taking all the beauty of the day in I was listening to the croaking of the frogs…then an idea came to me, of course, the newly hatched frogs will be what the bass are after!  And was I right!  The first bass I caught on the above popper was a good 4 pounder, but in my excitement I set my camera on scan instead of the on position and of course the picture didn’t come out.  Well next time…

I managed to catch 3 more bass from 12” to 14” in that spot along with several really nice bluegill.  I usually use a number six popper so that if there are any larger bluegill in the area that I’m fishing, I can hook up with the bluegill too.  These bluegill are in the 9 – 10” range and their mouths can accommodate a #6 hook. 

I moved on to the eastern end of the lake and decided to use the fly rod to work my way back.  Maybe, when I get back to this area, the fish will have settled down.  This was a good move.

On my way back I managed  to catch five more bass as shown above.  There’s nothing like fly rod fishing like this, I love it!

Today I worked on cleaning my lines and replacing tippets, I managed to lose  a  couple of fish and one channel cat chewed up one of my black wooly bugger flies really badly and twisted my leader very badly as well.  I also noticed that a couple of my fly lines were sinking so, I cleaned them up too .

I decided my next time out will be a repeat of this last trip so, I baited my fly rods accordingly with different poppers and of course my tried and true black wooly bugger.  And, by the way, I purchased my poppers through “Discount Flies.com”  They have a great selection of affordable poppers.  The one shown above is a” Betts “ popper.

some time ago, the” Arbogast “ Co. , the company that makes the “Hula Popper” , made a 1/32oz Hula Popper.  It was one of the best poppers that I had ever used for bass and bluegill.

Then, they stopped producing it!   Why?  It was a great lure!  I wrote them but I never got an answer. 

Tight Lines

Jim