Well, my fall fishing has been booming so far, from fishing the Little Juniata River isonychia hatch on the fly rod and catching some nice trout (including a 20 inch rainbow), to hitting the lakes and finding ample bass, pan fish, and some nice catfish.
There is one story worth sharing. During the first part of September, I heavily fished Sayer’s Dam, which is one of the lakes I am most familiar with. I caught some nice smallmouth in the two to three pound range, over my favorite deeper structure, mainly the roadbeds and some of the artificial boxes.
However, after Hurricane Irene, Tropical Storm Lee, and the resulting front, water temperatures dropped from the mid 80s, into the mid 70s. I continued to fish the deeper water, but after awhile, the “plenty of nice bass” turned to “a few small pan fish,” eventually to nothing at all. It was frustrating, but it meant that the fish were likely moving into shallower water for fall feeding, kind of pre-spawn/ spawn-like conditions. In shallower water, the fish are often easier to find, since it is a matter of picking and choosing cover that looks good, rather than trying to match the location and depths of fish on sonar. Also, I wasn’t fishing any exotic baits, just plastics, such as Senkos, white jigs, Gulp baits, and black and white tubes.
Anyway, the Lower Green’s Run (the area around the main bridge) section of the lake is very rocky, and has some of the best structure for this type of fishing. So last Thursday evening, I launched there, and headed for the bridge area. Within ten minutes, I caught a decent sized large mouth in the 12 inch range, right off a weedy point. After this, I headed below the bridge, near an area some call the underwater pond (I have heard that there was actually a pond here before the lake was filled, topographic maps confirm this to some extent). I always do well in this area, and I was able to catch a bunch of crappie, as well as several bass in the 10-14 inch range. Not bad, but I was hoping to get into something bigger. So I headed to the far shoreline, where the structure is mostly weedy, woody cover, such as downed logs and brush piles. I decided to drift the full length of this, throwing some tubes, and some Gulp! Minnow jigs.
For the lighter side of this article, a few casts in, I hooked something that felt heavy but didn’t seem to be moving much. I was able to keep pulling it up, and sure enough, it was a 3 foot wide brown turtle. Unsure of what to do next, I simply got as close as I could, cut the line, and said “sorry about this buddy.” I continued the drift.
Now for the good part of the story. I found a large, downed tree that was lying mostly in the water. I casted into it and sure enough something big whacked it, and began putting up a good fight. Unfortunately, whatever it was got away. I continued to work this area, catching a few pan fish, until I had another hook up that felt very nice. I ended up missing this one too. Spent another 20 minutes in the area, until my efforts produced diminishing returns. It was getting dark, and I didn’t have lights with me, so I promised myself I would return another time, and I headed off.
I came back Monday evening, and after fishing a brush pile and picking up a small bullhead catfish, I headed back to the same downed tree. After a hook up with an undersized smallmouth and a small bluegill, I had yet another hook up with something that felt nice. But, there was a loop in my line, and my spool couldn’t move, so it snapped me off. A few minutes later, I finally hooked a nice fish over here. It ran for awhile, and tried to hug the bottom, but I had hooked it nicely. When I finally got it up to the surface, I recognized the familiar dark stripe and extended lower lip of a largemouth bass. He jumped a few times, but I got him in the boat. I didn’t have a digital scale with me, but my conventional one showed the fish to be 4.5 pounds, the biggest bass of the year for me so far.
I have no idea if this was the same fish all four times, but I didn’t find any jigheads in his mouth, so I’m assuming there must be more nice fish down there.
God Bless, and tight lines.
