cheech
10-22-2007, 06:47 PM
"OK... Curtis, if the motor dies, I want you to crank the trolling motor down and put it at 100%. Stay in line with the wind..."
We decided it would be a good idea to hit Scofield for two days this weekend. The fishing was excellent, and adventuresome, but the catching was marginal. We arrived at the butt crack of dawn on Friday to the sight of Doug S. landing nice tigers right off the bank. Upon further review, there were a ton of tiger stockers, and the BIG tigers were crashing them onto shore (That is a sight to see BTW). Herb and Jed arrived and pulled out a bunch of fish from the dock. We launched the F/V and cruised over to the "honey hole." We were equipped with sonar, anchors, Mother in Laws, and a bag full of grilled brats that would later become lunch. We fished high, low, fast and slow, and nothing really to account for it until we found some more stockies further down the bank. I lobbed a Suegra Muda (translation Mute Mother in Law. which is pretty much the same as the mother in law, just a little bit better.) into the pod, and got a tug. It wasn't a stocker though. It turned out to be a fat 20". We fished and fished and fished and fished.... Nothing much until we found a pod of smaller fish that would readily eat pretty much anything. You could have lobbed a flaming turd in there and they would hve eaten it. Sherriff had them eating his indicator, but didn't have any dry flies on hand. I also threw out a big ol nasty EP fiber minnow that had to have been 4 inches long. I had a few swpies, one legit strike, and nothing else. The fish eating that minnow were seriously huge. I sight fished the whole thing, and it was the most fun fishing I did all day. Curtis fished the blob and wrangled a nice rainbow, but for the most part it was a slow day.
Lesson learned: Try fishing leeches to fish that are gorged on minnows... have fun.
Small river is on the way home. "I bet they will eat a streamer." One of them did.
Lesson learned: Some fish eat streamers.
The next day we met up with everyone's Random Hero. Ryan B. (BTW, this dude can fish...) We strapped his toon to the boat and we were off to the other side of the lake where the fishing would hopefully be much better. We dropped him off and headed back to launch the boat. The newer outboard worked well to get us over there. Not the best, but well enough. We messed around with the weeds etc, and I hooked one while we were drifting. He came unbuttoned and I wouldn't feel the tug again that day. Curtis nailed a nice Tiger 19" up against some rocks. At this point Ryan is catching fish fairly consistently (more than us at least). Wind is picking up at this point and we decided to head to the ramp and fish near it. I learned a lot about the wind that day. 14 foot boats are not ideal in it. I did my best to stay right in line with the wind, and it worked for a while, but there came a point when we had to turn broadside. That lasted all of 3 seconds. Cutris about dumped over the side, and I didn't have any control of the boat at this point. I headed straight for shore, and didn't care if we killed the boat against the rocks. Curtis puts the troller down, but too late, we got rocked agianst the rocks and it pretty much ripped the trolling motor off and broke the motor mount in half. Curtis jumps out and lands the boat. I quickly follow and we pull the boat as far up shore as we can. Ok, we are on private property at this point, but we were in no way going to get the boat back into the water. Long story medium sized, we walked all the way back to the van/trailer and drove it through very well posted property to get to the beach with the boat. Winched the boat up onto the trailer and off to find Ryan. We found him napping in a wind free corner. Of course, the fishing picked up right when we left.
Lesson learned: Wind sucks.
Time to hit matties to redeem this crazy weekend.
We decided it would be a good idea to hit Scofield for two days this weekend. The fishing was excellent, and adventuresome, but the catching was marginal. We arrived at the butt crack of dawn on Friday to the sight of Doug S. landing nice tigers right off the bank. Upon further review, there were a ton of tiger stockers, and the BIG tigers were crashing them onto shore (That is a sight to see BTW). Herb and Jed arrived and pulled out a bunch of fish from the dock. We launched the F/V and cruised over to the "honey hole." We were equipped with sonar, anchors, Mother in Laws, and a bag full of grilled brats that would later become lunch. We fished high, low, fast and slow, and nothing really to account for it until we found some more stockies further down the bank. I lobbed a Suegra Muda (translation Mute Mother in Law. which is pretty much the same as the mother in law, just a little bit better.) into the pod, and got a tug. It wasn't a stocker though. It turned out to be a fat 20". We fished and fished and fished and fished.... Nothing much until we found a pod of smaller fish that would readily eat pretty much anything. You could have lobbed a flaming turd in there and they would hve eaten it. Sherriff had them eating his indicator, but didn't have any dry flies on hand. I also threw out a big ol nasty EP fiber minnow that had to have been 4 inches long. I had a few swpies, one legit strike, and nothing else. The fish eating that minnow were seriously huge. I sight fished the whole thing, and it was the most fun fishing I did all day. Curtis fished the blob and wrangled a nice rainbow, but for the most part it was a slow day.
Lesson learned: Try fishing leeches to fish that are gorged on minnows... have fun.
Small river is on the way home. "I bet they will eat a streamer." One of them did.
Lesson learned: Some fish eat streamers.
The next day we met up with everyone's Random Hero. Ryan B. (BTW, this dude can fish...) We strapped his toon to the boat and we were off to the other side of the lake where the fishing would hopefully be much better. We dropped him off and headed back to launch the boat. The newer outboard worked well to get us over there. Not the best, but well enough. We messed around with the weeds etc, and I hooked one while we were drifting. He came unbuttoned and I wouldn't feel the tug again that day. Curtis nailed a nice Tiger 19" up against some rocks. At this point Ryan is catching fish fairly consistently (more than us at least). Wind is picking up at this point and we decided to head to the ramp and fish near it. I learned a lot about the wind that day. 14 foot boats are not ideal in it. I did my best to stay right in line with the wind, and it worked for a while, but there came a point when we had to turn broadside. That lasted all of 3 seconds. Cutris about dumped over the side, and I didn't have any control of the boat at this point. I headed straight for shore, and didn't care if we killed the boat against the rocks. Curtis puts the troller down, but too late, we got rocked agianst the rocks and it pretty much ripped the trolling motor off and broke the motor mount in half. Curtis jumps out and lands the boat. I quickly follow and we pull the boat as far up shore as we can. Ok, we are on private property at this point, but we were in no way going to get the boat back into the water. Long story medium sized, we walked all the way back to the van/trailer and drove it through very well posted property to get to the beach with the boat. Winched the boat up onto the trailer and off to find Ryan. We found him napping in a wind free corner. Of course, the fishing picked up right when we left.
Lesson learned: Wind sucks.
Time to hit matties to redeem this crazy weekend.