James River – Huguenot Flatwater – 5-13-2012

Got out for about 2.5 hours today on Huguenot Flatwater. I’ve fished this stretch well over 20 or 30 times and haven’t had much luck. Since I only had a few hours today and needed to get on/off fairly quickly, I just hit it in hopes I’d land a couple of fish.

As I was putting in, a young guy was coming off the water. He said the current was ripping, the wind was pushing downstream as well, and fishing was tough. He said he didn’t catch anything so I wasn’t expecting much. I forgot my Hawg Trough so without hope of catching anything significant, I entered the water care free.

Got on the water and the water was high and fast. I remember a hand drawn picture I’ve seen that Jeff Little drew, a profile view of ledges and eddies and how to fish them in high and low water. That drawing showed fish holding tight upstream in the eddie, so that’s where I concentrated today. Normally there are tons of visible rocks to wedge yourself on and fish off of, today there were only a dozen or so…

First one I come to, I throw a Mann’s Baby Waker in a bass pattern to the rock and started reeling in. No more than a couple of cranks and I get a solid hit. After a nice fight I reel in a nice 17″ smallie, my new PB. Again, nothing to measure by I’m going my estimates of my body parts

Release this fish and now I’m beaming. Hit 2 or 3 more of the visible structure, going with the same pattern but no more hits. On the 4th or so, I beach my kayak, throw out the Mann’s about 15 yards downstream, and start retrieving back to the rock. I get a hit…and it was a doozie. It’s the largest freshwater fish I’ve ever seen in person. I got to set the hook and the rod doesn’t bend…FRACK. The knot failed, friggin Rapala knot. I’ve had that knot fail on me the last 2 outings on larger fish. I know it’s the tier and not the knot…. I quickly grab my finesse rod, with a draggin’ head and a Tiki Craw loaded up with Craw Bioscent. Throw it back in the vicinity of the strike, no more than 10 seconds and my line starts moving…go to the hook and the rod doesn’t bend. SONOFA…this knot failed too. W-T-FRACK. Improved clinch, but it failed too (yes I wet before tightening). I quickly real in, grab a weighted tube hook, throw a green tube on, lather it up with Craw Bioscent and throw it back in the area. This time I let is set for what seemed like 3 to 4 mins and the line starts moving again. Set the hook…FISH ON. I can’t believe the size of this smallie. After a nice fight, I land him. HOLY CRAP, I wish I had my Hawg Trough.

FYI, the inside of the 2012 Ride 135 is 20″. This fish reaches end to end and is also laying over the bump in the middle. I’m guessing this guy went 20.5″ to 21″. Most certainly would have been a Virginia citation. I release the fish and get on about my day.

I catch another dink over the next hour, but not much else. I’m about to wrap up for the day, there’s still 2 visible rocks I haven’t hit. I’m going to leave after these two. On the first one, no action on the Baby Waker. I throw the tube in and let is set for 3 or 4 mins and I think I see hit, but I’m not sure so I don’t set the hook. After 5 or so seconds the line is moving so I set the hook. A nice fight later and I’m estimating this fish at 19″.

Unfortunately, that extra 5 second wait enabled this fish to inhale the tube. It was gut hooked. I’m always iffy on what to do in this situation, just take the fish home or cut the line and hope the hook frees itself. I do what I always do and cut the line and returned the fish as fast as possible (after a couple of snapshots). I hope that guy lives and reaches 20″+. I decide to call it a day on that one.

2.5 hours fished in an area that’s not rare to send me home with a skunk, 4 fish caught and 3 of them went 17″, 19″, and 20.5+”. Pretty good day for me.

All my pics:

https://plus.google.com/photos/102799211425946575386/albums/5742144187400956049

James River Wetlands 9-3-2010

I assumed with the slightly overcast, cooler morning that I’d have some luck fishing. I also fished this stretch of the James 2 weeks ago and had success.

Launched from the James River Wetlands and fished predominantly between that point and downstream to where there small set of rapids begin at Powhite. I started off throwing a craw patterned Mann’s 1-Minus, Culprit brown 3″ beetle, and a spinnerbait. Within the first 20 minutes, I get a large short strike on the 1-, as I’m lifting it out of the water for another cast. I threw a bunch of stuff back into the same hole, but couldn’t coax the guy to hit again.

Continued to fish for the next 3 hours, saw lots of cats and carp, no SMB. I didn’t get a single nibble…nada. I switched over to the bait that was on fire last time I fished this stretch, a bleeding shad 1/2oz Rat-L-Trap, thinking that would turn the bite on. Continued to fish and still got nothing.

Starting to get frustrated and time is running out on me, so I head back towards the put in. There’s a deep trench that I decide I would troll the Trap along one of the edges as I paddle back. As I turn the kayak along one of the edges, I notice the line go slack. Pick up the line and start reeling in. Fish ON! Well, not for long. One jump and my Trap is thrown. Damnit.

Continue to fish a bunch of more rock formations with no action, I hit my last hole for the day. First cast of the Trap and a SMB explodes on the surface as soon as the Trap hits. I start reeling and he hits…FISH ON! It’s not a big fish, but sizable enough it would salvage the day. After about 15 seconds of fight, he launches into the air and throws my Trap. Double DAMNIT.

Paddle back to the put in dejected and skunked.

GPX Link

James River Smallies 8-14-2010

Wife woke me up at 6:30am giving the me the kitchen pass (starting at 8am) to go out and fish this morning. Spent a good bit of time getting my tackle ready as it was all loaded up for largemouth fishing, but was on the water by about 9. I parked in the Pony Pasture parking lot and used my wheels to portage .2 miles down to a decent place to launch. Water temps were 83F and there was an intermittent (but sometimes strong) breeze blowing from the SE. Water was slow and low today and made fishing easy. Air temps maxed out at 90F and was humid as hell.

The water is really low right now, the lowest it’s been in quite some time. Take a look at this picture of a large boulder, you can see the stain of the water.

I had 4 combos setup for the day: wacky rigged 4″ watermelon w/red flake Yum Dinger (eventually switched over to a Wave Tiki Craw 3″), Pearl White Super Fluke, Rebel Pop-R, and a 1/2oz White Bleeding Shad Rat-L-Trap. The morning started slow. After reading a lot of Jeff Little’s posts on KayakBassFishing.com (and I just finished up his book), I saw a collection of foam in an eddy after a set of rapids and remembered some of his suggestions on these.

I fully expected to catch something here, but I didn’t even get a nibble here and I cast everything I had into it. I finally got a small nibble from a small fish and tried to chase him down for 10 minutes. He ended up stealing my yum dinger so I switched over to a tailhooked Tiki Craw.

Finally hooked into what would be the smallest fish of the day, about a 10″-er on the Trap banging across some rocks. It’s a dink but the skunk is off!

Right next to where I catch the dink, I spot a nice deep hole in between 2 sets of rapids. The water is calm here so I’m hoping to get into something. I throw my Trap to the far side of the hole and start bringing it back to me. I get a nice hit and the fight is on. It’s a sizable fish! After a solid, long fight (felt like 5 minutes, was probably more like 90 seconds) I put a 16″ fish into the boat. The fish had a battle wound or a sore on the top of its head, I took a picture of it, you can find it linked at the bottom of the page.

I fish all the structure I can at the furthest most downstream section of Pony Pasture, so I start to make my way to a set of rapids just on the upstream side of where Powhite Parkway crosses the James. My first 5 casts here and I hook into 2 more ~14″ smallies. I think I’ve found a hot spot but then spend the rest of the next hour not catching a thing. I decide to call it a day and paddle back to the launch.

In all, I land 6 Smallies, with most being between 13″ and 15″. No real big ones, but decent sized. I sure do love Smallie fishing, they put up a great fight. All caught on the Trap, either banging rocks or pulling the crank over a deep hole from shallow water. Didn’t get any action on any of the other lures. Here’s a vid of one of the releases:

The entire album of the day

GPX Track