It was a cloudy day today so I went over to my local river thinking
there might be a good BWO hatch. Instead of a hatch I found a river that
was about two feet above normal levels. I met a guy there that was
throwing a Rapala and we started talking. We bull****ted about different
places we fish and he mentioned a small local pond that held some big
Browns. He told stories of hooking Browns of 10 pounds. He was heading
home and offered to show it to me with the proviso that I release the
fish and that I don't tell anyone about it. I was more than skeptical but
what the hell. The guy was friendly and seemed like a nice guy. When we
got to the pond, he took off for home. I took a look at the pond and
thought the guy was crazy. I had driven by the pond probably over a
hundred times and never gave it a thought. All the ponds that size I had
fished in the area held only tiny, stunted Bluegills and a few Carp. The
water in such a small pond would get too warm in the Summer to hold
trout, but since I was there, I thought I'd give it a try.

A picture of the pond: http://www.crystalglen.net/Fishing/Image13.jpg

I first took a look at the outlet which is directly down the bank in the
above picture. To my surprise I saw a Brown of about 14 inches just off the
shore. I looked more closely and saw a BIG fish out about ten feet.
I tied on a damsel nymph and made a cast. As the nymph sunk, the big fish
turned and took a casual look at the nymph, but as the fly approached, it
slowly swam off, taking the smaller fish with it. The pond now had my
interest!

I started walking around the pond. The first area I came to was deep and
I was unable to see the bottom or any fish. I threw around 10 casts through
that area with no response. I moved on a bit and came to a shallower
area where I could see the tops of the extensive weedbeds. Then I
started seeing fish. There were a couple groups of fish cruising within
sight. The fish in the groups were in three pretty distinct sizes. The
small fish were about 12 to 14 inches. The next size were in the 20 inch
range and there were two VERY big fish. I cast the damsel out and as it
sank, one fish moved about ten feet to take a look as the fly sank. It
didn't like the fly and swam off. I retrieved the fly just fast enough
to keep it over the weeds but whenever it approached a fish, the fish
slowly swam off. The next few casts were the same, a fish would show
interest as the fly sank but wouldn't take and would move away as I
retrieved the fly. I started changing flies going down in size. Same
routine, interest while the fly sank but it was rejected when it sank to
the bottom and the fish continued to avoid the retrieved fly. I was down
to my last trick and it was about time for me to get back to work. I
tied on a dry and added a dropper about two feet long. The dropper
arrangement would keep the fly above the weeds. I put on a size 18 PT on
the dropper.

The fish had cruised some and my first cast ended behind the group of fish
and was ignored. On the next cast, one of the medium sized fish swam
over and inspected the nymph. I just let the fly lie there and the fish
continued to look. After what seemed like a couple minutes, the dry was
pulled under.

I hooked up and the fish fought well including a couple jumps. Luckily,
it didn't bull into the weeds and I landed it with the fly just barely
hanging on by a small tag of skin.

http://www.crystalglen.net/Fishing/Image2.jpg

Nice heavy fish. Time to go home. Great find, I will be back.

Willi