Rain, Eagles and Smallies. What's not to love about fishing? :-)

So I sweet-talked Dave Bottom into one last smallmouth drift on our favorite
stretch - which has in fact been fishing much slower this year compared to the
last couple, but still is way better than fishing in the living room. The
river had been lowered the day before, the forecast added the rain factor to
the do-we-or-don't-we question, but it was s'posed to be "showers", not a
full-fledged downpour, and there was enough water that we wouldn't have to
portage. So off we went.

We were first at the launch point - and in fact only one other crew decided to
hit the river behind us Saturday. We got Dave's pair of pontoons off and
floating, and he immediately picked up a nice smallie - and I tried to decide
if catching a fish on the first cast within a few feet of the launch point was
a Good Sign or a Bad Omen.

Well, the upper half of our drift has been fishing slower and slower this
season, and this trip would be no exception. No doubt the low water and the
intermittent rain worked against us, as I didn't even *see* a fish between
launch and lunch, and I think Dave only hooked a couple, with both of us
trying pretty much every type of smallie fly in our respective arsenals -
streamers, poppers, sliders, bushy floaters, weighted buggers...The works.

Meanwhile, on a positive note, we were entertained by a couple of the resident
bald eagles, assuming stately poses until we drifted too close for their
comfort and they winged downstream to the next roost. No matter how many times
I see these birds I still get excited. Very cool.

But our catching hopes rested on the lower section to save the day, and we
wouldn't be disappointed, as the big hogs apparently were all wallowing down
in the impound in the last mile or so of the drift. We nailed a goodly bunch
of them each, river smallies ranging between 16 and 20 inches, good jumpers
and full of fight. I think we were both using chartreuse/yellow Sneaky Petes
by then, working bits of structure like sunk logs and the like, carefully
plopping down the fly and waiting for the hopeful result. Down this end of the
drift, we were finding fish in all the places one would look for them :-) A
lot of fun fishing poppers and Petes and having these fish explode under them.

So the drift ended well, and we packed our soggy selves into our respective
trucks, even while discussing plans for the next encounter.

Life is good.

cheers

/daytripper

daytripper typed:
So I sweet-talked Dave Bottom into one last smallmouth drift on our
favorite stretch -
snip

It's always better to end the trip on a high note, eh?
--
TL,
Tim
-------------------------
http://css.sbcma.com/timj

On Mon, 25 Sep 2006 17:29:55 -0400, "Tim J."
wrote:

daytripper typed:
So I sweet-talked Dave Bottom into one last smallmouth drift on our
favorite stretch -
snip

It's always better to end the trip on a high note, eh?

Soitenly! And in more ways than the obvious one.

'round about lunch time, after a drizzly, near-fishless morning, Dave was
giving me the "here's another fine mess you've gotten me into" treatment ;-)

/daytripper

"daytripper" wrote in message

Soitenly! And in more ways than the obvious one.

'round about lunch time, after a drizzly, near-fishless morning, Dave was
giving me the "here's another fine mess you've gotten me into" treatment
;-)

/daytripper

glad you both got into some fish......Old Dave is PO'd at me, but good to
see he can still be gotten out to deal with the serious issues in life once
in a while(he gets real touchy over that political stuff.....)
Tom