
Yep, just another day on the pond for this girl. At this point, casting into trees is expected; it's not a matter of if it will happen, it's a matter of how often and how many lures I will lose. This little topwater frog has seen more hang time than Michael Jordan and keeps coming back for more. Thank goodness for rubber boots and a shallow pond shelf, or we may have parted ways for good yesterday. Its buddy, hanging in the oak at pond #2, wasn't so lucky.
I hadn't fished this pond since I was a little kid, setting bank poles for catfish and flipping bobbers for bluegill with grandma. It was the first pond my family built, damming up a steep ravine to make a teeny slice of heaven so good the fish can't be tempted to bite. It was just me and the wood ducks for a good two hours while I experimented with a half dozen lures and baits in my bag. Dad swears there are monsters in there, but the only fish interested in my goods were the three small bass infatuated with a soft crappie lure. But I tied on a heck of a wacky worm, so that's a resume builder.
Even though the fishing wasn't great, the scenery was out of control and it was hard to pull away to move to the big ponds. Thank goodness I did, because the big bass were biting hard and I pulled in four fatties in quick succession--not a single one less than two pounds and one weighing 3.5#. It was a nice enough fish that my friend, who generously offered to do some backseat fishing/heckling for me in the evening, dove in to snatch it up when the crayfish lure pulled free at the bank. No slabs for the freezer (mainly because learning to fillet is still on the to-do list), but I blame that on fish that were just too big to butcher. Dang!
Fish count: 7 bass, biggest: 3.5#