That dang recess bell!

[Swamp Girl]

I knew I only had an hour and a half to fish this morning due to a family obligation and that scared me, for it sometimes takes time to find the bass. I guessed well at first, for I went to a shallow corner of the pond and caught five bass there. I started with this one, a thick 16-inch smallie which I hooked on a Kardashian-garish spinnerbait on the edge of the shallow water.

 

 

Then I caught this well-shaped, 17-inch lmb on a chrome Whopper Plopper three feet from the shore.

 

 

The Whopper Plopper then caught this smaller bass.

 

 

And the spinnerbait scored a thick one.

 

 

Then I hooked this medium one, giving me five bass in the first half hour.

 

 

So, I paddled across the pond to my favorite shoreline, expecting more fine fishing, but in 45 minutes, I could only manage this one bass, a skinny 16-incher:

 

 

It was time to paddle back, so I trolled my spinnerbait and crossing the middle of the pond, discovered where they'd been: DEEP! I hooked this one:

 

 

I cast to where I'd caught ^this^ one and hooked vthisv one:

 

 

I hooked one more about 15 inches on the next cast and I made that my final cast, lest I be late. If that dang end-of-recess bell hadn't rung, I would have run up a nice total, but settled for nine, an average of one bass every ten minutes. 

 

Oh, yes, I cast a creature bait for the first time. T-Rigged with a tungsten weight. And I couldn't even provoke a bite. Total failure. They wanted my clownish spinnerbait and Kardashian-shiny Whopper Plopper with the big bum. They wouldn't even sniff at finesse. 

 

[gim]

Recess was always my favorite part of grade school growing up. 

 

[Swamp Girl]

1 hour ago, gimruis said:

Recess was always my favorite part of grade school growing up. 

 

 

I loved recess too, but at my school, there were always two bells, one to begin recess and the other to end it. I heard the second bell, the hated bell. 

[Fishlegs]

Nice job! It's funny how fishing can be so different. I can't get a bite on a plopper, but if the bite is tough I'm pretty sure I can get one on a baby brush hog.

[pdxfisher]

I hate that feeling of racing against the clock while fishing. That always makes it hard for me to enjoy my time on the water. Glad you were able to make a good trip out of it with that limited amount of time! I hope your family realizes the sacrifice you were making to be with them

[Swamp Girl]

33 minutes ago, Fishlegs said:

Nice job! It's funny how fishing can be so different. I can't get a bite on a plopper, but if the bite is tough I'm pretty sure I can get one on a baby brush hog.

 

Yeah, it is weird how it varies from lake to lake, but it also can vary, as you know, from hour to hour, which is what I LOVE about bass angling. There's a locked door between us and them and the combination keeps changing. 

 

30 minutes ago, pdxfisher said:

I hope your family realizes the sacrifice you were making to be with them

 

It was appreciated!

 

31 minutes ago, pdxfisher said:

Glad you were able to make a good trip out of it with that limited amount of time!

 

Thanks, my friend. I found the trip exciting. I cracked the code, then the code was changed, and then I cracked the new code. 

[Swamp Girl]

I got the green light to go fishing again tomorrow morning. It will be a 4 mph south wind when I launch climbing to 10 mph, still from the south, by ten, so I want to be off the water by nine. I'll paddle to the south end of the pond, fish that, and when the wind kicks up, let the wind blow me back to my launch site, while fishing the whole way. 

[Rockhopper]

Not bad for a short period!

[gim]

2 hours ago, pdxfisher said:

hate that feeling of racing against the clock while fishing. That always makes it hard for me to enjoy my time on the water.

Thats me pretty much every time I go. Such is life with a family, dog, house, yard, and a lot of other sh** to do.

[pdxfisher]

1 hour ago, ol'crickety said:

I got the green light to go fishing again tomorrow morning. It will be a 4 mph south wind when I launch climbing to 10 mph, still from the south, by ten, so I want to be off the water by nine. I'll paddle to the south end of the pond, fish that, and when the wind kicks up, let the wind blow me back to my launch site, while fishing the whole way. 

 

10mph is a good day out here  but when it is in the 20s I start to doubt my life choices

 

I liked your analogy of having to constantly re-crack the code of a changing combination!

[Swamp Girl]

32 minutes ago, pdxfisher said:

10mph is a good day out here  but when it is in the 20s I start to doubt my life choices

 

I hail from Washington state and have family in Oregon, so I've seen the gorges you fish. The wind can howl there. The high sides of my canoes and their length means I catch more wind, so I bolt at 10 mph. 

[pdxfisher]

1 hour ago, ol'crickety said:

 

I hail from Washington state and have family in Oregon, so I've seen the gorges you fish. The wind can howl there. The high sides of my canoes and their length means I catch more wind, so I bolt at 10 mph. 

 

The kayak definitely benefits from the low sides and with the rudder and the fins from the drive has pretty good bite in the water. I have fished out of a canoe some in my younger days and even a light wind is tough to manage! Plus my kayak being a sit-on-top is basically a sealed float so when water breaks over the bow it just drains through the drive hole and the scuppers.

 

I see a few canoes out here on the Willamette (where wind is not nearly as bad). I don't think I have ever seen a canoe on the Columbia (for good reason).

 

When I was first deciding on what kind of fishing boat to get I was torn between a pontoon (1-person) or the kayak. Those pontoons are super sails in the wind. They can go down whitewater which is something I can't do in my kayak but they are almost useless on a windy day. I am really glad every trip out I made the right decision way back then

[Swamp Girl]

6 hours ago, pdxfisher said:

 

The kayak definitely benefits from the low sides and with the rudder and the fins from the drive has pretty good bite in the water. I have fished out of a canoe some in my younger days and even a light wind is tough to manage! Plus my kayak being a sit-on-top is basically a sealed float so when water breaks over the bow it just drains through the drive hole and the scuppers.

 

I see a few canoes out here on the Willamette (where wind is not nearly as bad). I don't think I have ever seen a canoe on the Columbia (for good reason).

 

When I was first deciding on what kind of fishing boat to get I was torn between a pontoon (1-person) or the kayak. Those pontoons are super sails in the wind. They can go down whitewater which is something I can't do in my kayak but they are almost useless on a windy day. I am really glad every trip out I made the right decision way back then

 

For sure, every boat has its advantages and disadvantages. I used to write a column for Canoe & Kayak magazine called Rides, where I interviewed paddlers who waxed about why they loved their chosen boats. I learned so much from chatting with them.

 

You clearly understand the disadvantages of a canoe. They're the pudgy kid with the pale skin who might as well wear a shirt with a bullseye on it, given that they're targeted again and again by the Wind Bully.

 

The advantage is that they're floating cargo planes. I can foray into the wilderness with two weeks worth of food, tent, sleeping bags, etc. I've only fished from kayaks a few times and I found them cramped, but then I wasn't fishing from platforms that I'd modified to meet my needs, as most fishing kayak anglers have. 

 

They can also be lighter than a kayak and even the 26-pound canoes are bigger than kayaks. Of course, if a canoe were modified like most fishing kayaks with all those wonderful accessories, it would never weigh 26 pounds. 

 

Advantages and disadvantages. 

[Rockhopper]

I have a nice 17' North River drift boat, and that is one of the most versatile boats you could imagine. But that thing gets blown around like crazy by the wind too. Not exactly designed as a lake/flat water boat though with the flat bottom. 

 

My kayak is just a cheap emotion kayak that I bought at SW for fishing a few of the small lakes in the area that are not boat accessible. For $250 it is 9 foot with a 350lb rating. Does exactly what I need it to do for cheap, and it's light enough I don't mind packing it a half mile if needed to access water. 

 

Our Gorge is insane regarding the wind. It's a freeway for high and low pressures. I live roughly 10 miles inland from the river as the crow flies, and hardly ever have wind at my house. Drive over to the big river at the same time and it can be blowing like crazy.