Memorial Day Fishing

First of, God bless all those that have served and kept this country free!

I got up around 5:30am to prepare to be on the lake by 7am to get in a couple of hours of fishing before heading over to my brother-in-law's house for a Memorial Day cookout.


As I was turning into Jonestown Park I noticed a mini van following me. When I parked, it parked next to me and a guy came out telling me that he was a fellow kayaker and he knew a spot where I could drive the truck to the water's edge to be able to launch quicker. We talked for a bit and he was a fellow member of texaskayakfisherman.com. Nice guy and it was good to talk tackle and kayaks with a fellow kayak angler. He also pointed out a couple of fishing spots I could try. I wished him luck and paddled out to some boat docks across the lake.

About the time I paddled out, a heavy fog set in. I cast around the docks and up against the rocky shoreline. I caught a small bass on a red and yellow seaducer. I later switched to a purple and black crystal minnow. In all, I caught five spunky little bass before paddling back to the put-in to talk with the fellow kayaker before packing up and heading home.

My friend mentioned he had caught a small spotted gar on a bass popper which was interesting. He promised to upload a photo he took on his phone to tkf.com when he wrote up his fishing report.

I enjoyed the short time fishing and also getting the chance to meet a new fellow kayak angler. Hope to fish with him in the future.

Smells great to me

I took a vacation day today from work in order to go fishing. It has seemed like ages since I have been fishing. Since we had gotten some decent rain last weekend I decided to see what the San Gabriel river looked like.

I got to the low water crossing just before 8am and noticed a little algae and the smell of, well, zoo water. You know the smell from the man made streams at the zoos. That smell. No matter, it smells like the outdoors; take it in!

I headed upstream and found some muddying carp and spent what seemed like twenty minutes trying to get a take. Nothing. I moved on further up the river.

I fished above some rapids and eventually landed a small bass. He looked like he had some sort of skin problem as it had red sores on the body and tail. I spent some more time at the pool but nothing. I moved on further up the river.

Traveling upstream I could see lots of silt on the limestone bottom. It seems that the river keeps getting nastier and nastier every year. I recall when the river looked so pristine (and didn't smell like zoo water).

On some flats I found a tailing carp and started stalking it low to the water. I took a shot and my leader touch it. Spooked the carp. :-(

I found a couple other carp in the shallows but kept alerting them and so they would just swim off out of range.

Continuing on I ran into schools of spotted gar. Most less than a couple of feet long though as I paddled quietly I spooked one that was at least three feet long and looked like a fat torpedo. Whoa!

I finally made it to a narrowing in the river and beached the kayak. This area has always been great for bass and catfish. After a few casts I had a bass. For the next hour it was brim and bass at a good pace. I caught more than a dozen bass with a couple over 2 pounds. One of the bass regurgitated a baitfish when I started removing the fly. Smelled good!

That ain't no tongue with eyes mister!

It started getting pretty hot around noon and knowing I had a long paddle and wade back to the low water crossing I headed back out. As I paddled back under the shade of the huge trees along the shore, I would hear the loud buzzing of swarms of bees working the flowering plants. I also saw a large deer dash into the thicket ahead of me. Cool!

Too bad y'all can't smell me now (especially after pulling the kayak out through that nutrient rich black river mud). It smells like I've been fishing!