PA Vacation Chronicles

[Functional]

Welp, wife's family (I guess mine too!) vacation is in the Poconos this year and we drive up Saturday. We'll be staying until Friday evening I believe and the house has access to 2 small "lakes" (I believe private to the community). I believe the main one I'll be fishing is only 1.5 miles long and I'll be in a 10' kayak. Figured I'd start a log of the adventures! 

 

I'll be limiting myself to 2 rods below. I'll be bringing along some 12# red label in case it's needed on the braid rod. 

-Diawa 7'3" Kage MH-F: Lews speed spool w/ 30lb (maybe 40?) Pp slick

-Shimano 7'2" Expride MH-F: Diawa tatula SV w/ 17lb defier armilo

 

Packed light in terms of tackle, small Plano filled with jigs, tiny Ned rig kit, spinners, chatters, frogs, a jerkbait, medium diving crank, wake bait and a walking bait. An assortment of plastics and a small weight/hook box. Probably could have slimmed down more on color choices but I could fit it in my bag so it's coming. Bobber and tiny hooks for the kids.

 

 

Any way,  more of a journal for me to see how a Yankee turned d**n Yankee does back up in a northern lake! May drop in the susky for some smallies and attempt a musky if I can get the green light from my wife for the day! 

[A-Jay]

Good Luck

A-Jay

 

[Bird]

You've been planning ?.

Hope you have great weather and successful fishing but most of all....an enjoyable time with family.

[Functional]

Ok. For a series of reasons I only got out for about 3 hours today and got completely skunked. Was super windy and made it hard to fish slow. Was running a chatterbait, spinner, frog and swim jig hoping to at least get a hit to drop the anchor and pick apart an area. Storm was blowing all around so possibly contributed to the shut down bite. Worked a jig, creature and senko around and under docks too with zero nibbles. 

 

Learned there is about 3 layers of weed/open from the shore working out. Also got a tip down by the overspill was productive for one guy. Not a soul out fishing except me and the other guy so we got our pick of areas. 

 

Tomorrow I plan to hit the over spill and see how she goes. 

[Functional]

Kept the skunk off! Not the way I wanted but more in a minute. 

 

Was greeted by this guy first thing in the morning. Tons of them running around here getting me excited for bow season next month. 

 

was on the water by 9, nothing earth shattering but with 5 kids and 9 adults it's been tough to get out earlier. Day was 90% of the time overcast with a light wind, started chilly at 65deg from a cold front and a storm rolling in this evening through tomorrow. Hit the overspill and a lot of shoreline like this: 

Chatterbait, swim jig and horny toad with zero luck. Threw on a 4" zoom super fluke with a 3/32oz belly weighted hook and was at least getting nibbles (suspect blue gill). I'd hit all the transitions from hard bottom to soft, clearings in weed growth and and weeds that jutted out from the typical with no luck. Got blown into the shore switching from a jig to a wacky rig and decided to fish the paddle tail from deep to shallow and hooked into my only fish....a tiny pickerel. 

worked that strategy and even went further off shore to try and get deeper weed patches but this was all the lake gave me. 

 

Talking to one of the community workers he said it's not really big on bass and they stock it with trout routinely but it's been known to have bass, pike, pickerel and blue gill. My hopes aren't too high now but I'll give it one more day before I start branching out to some other ponds/lakes. I hate having a body of water beat me. 

 

Open to suggestions if yall have any!

[Functional]

To close this out...

 

Fished the last day and caught 2 more pickerel. Hit some isolated lily pad clumps and pulled them out. 

 

After the PA vacation we went to my inlaws in NY for a bridal shower for 2 days. I was sitting around and my wife just says "why dont you go fishing here?". Not sure why but I never even thought of it, so in 10 minutes from that I was on my way to a 150 acre pond I used to fish growing up. Only got to go out for 3 hours but pulled in 11ish fish. Kind of lost count around that 10 mark but it was definitely over 10. All small but it was nice knowing I didnt lose all my skill ?. Also proved to me that my Keitech FATs are basically a 1 and done plastic on small fish, went through a pack and half in those 3 hours.

 

2 odd catches I've never done in my life. I had a bad wind knot get reeled back up into my spool (braid) and I didnt catch it, had a horrible birds nest and picked it out, stripped line until it was fresh and cut it. I must not have gone back far enough because on my next hookset the line snapped. Saw the fish jumping because it was tangled up in some pads so i started to row over and noticed my line sitting on the top of the water. Pulled it in and pulled the fish and my lure up on the other end! Not 10 minutes later the exact same thing happened only the fish wasnt hung up in pads. I had to chase the tag end of my line to catch the swimming fish! Pulled it in and had a fine release. After that I put the rod down and now im picking up new braid for it today. It was only 1 season old 30lb PP Slick. Thinking of going to 40lb this time.

 

Anyway, was hoping to have a more eventful log of this but here we are. Still a good time on the water and vacation with the family. 

[Swamp Girl]

Thanks for the report. It's tempting to only share those fishing trips where we boat big bass and those fishing reports are fun for sure, but I also appreciate the fishing reports where the bass bested us too. Kristine Fischer is one of my favorite YouTube fishers. She wins lots of tournaments and she loses LOTS of bass, which she always shows. I feel less alone when I see her lose so many big bass. So, when I go out and catch one bass, I share those near skunks too.

[Functional]

@ol'crickety she is by far my favorite as well and quite honestly the only one I still watch. She puts her little plugs in with the baits she uses but its a quick mention IN her story and the bait isnt THE story. Really interesting to watch her fish and her strategies.

 

I was due for a good skunking, I havent had a "bad" day on the water in over a year so I can live with this. Agreed on seeing both sides, not everything works and you learn from it. My take away is when my nephews couldnt pull a bluegill out of the lake with worms and a bobber that should have been my que to pick up and find another pond ?. They fished for 3 days off 4 different docks and only pulled 2 fingerling trout. 

[Swamp Girl]

25 minutes ago, Functional said:

Really interesting to watch her fish and her strategies.

 

I like her excitement when she boats a big gal AND her sadness and frustration when she loses one. I feel like she does. I'm all in when I win and all in when I lose. 

[Susky River Rat]

Welcome to PA and it’s over fished small lakes. You want to for sure hit the susky if you get the chance.