White Rock Lake

Emalie and I visited Whiterock Lake yesturday evening and caught a few "perch" (a fella kept screaming Perch! Perch! she done caught a Perch! Everytime we hooked one.)

Its a shame there are so many people "meatfishing" this creek for barely a mouthful of pollution laden Sunfish. Oh well, they may have more mercury in them than a rectal thermometer, but they sure are pretty:







And here is a dog:

and another dog:

Mayday, Mayday!

This weekend was busy with my Grandmothers 80th birthday and the accompanying festivities. On Friday I left Dallas and hurried eat to Tyler State Park where I actually managed to catch a couple nice bass despite the rain, as well as a Warmouth, a first on the fly for me.

The first one put up a good fight, wedging itself in some moss, forcing me to gingerly raise the rod with just enough force to dislodge it, but not dislodge the size 12 Bully's Blue Gill Spider that he took.

Happily I was also able to catch the previously mentioned Warmouth. More like a minnow, but still a species on my "checklist"


On Sunday I woke up and after scuttling plans to make a run up to the Blue River, I instead left my better half snoozing and went to one of my usual spots in Garland and caught a couple small bass before lunch.

The once nice pond is quickly becoming a fetid bog, I had to de-gunk my fly before every cast.

Caught on a swimming Nymph

I also managed to take some pictures of the new FJ Cruiser Emalie and I bought recently.



I am more than a little proud of my first new car in 10 years!

I also snapped this pic of my popper/clouser box:


Sunday afternoon Emalie and I went to our church pond and caught a number of Sunfish including this beast:



Obviously a hybrid of some sort, with alot of greensunfish in the genes as well as some Redear?

That's all for now!

Beer, Fishing and One of My Fly Boxes.

Oh...How hard is life for me, your fearless potentate of panfishing prowess?

Just thought I'd take a break from work to make a post about a couple of my favorite subjects: Beer and Fishing.

Just say that again..."Beer and Fishing".....The way it cascades off the tongue. I think I might actually start signing letters that way:

Dear Somebody Jones,

Congrats for whatever it was you were doing that I decided to use as an example in my faux-letter!

Beer and Fishing,

Jonathan

Ok, I have had my joy-seizure of the day. Here is a bunch of beer I tried recently. All of which I liked alot. Even the New Belgium Ranger (which i sincerely did not want to like) was pretty good. The Turbo Dog by Abita was my favorite.

Emalie went to our church pond last friday afternoon for about 30 minutes. Had fun, caught fish:

What? Don't you take your chihuahua fishing?!

And since a few people have asked me, here is a picture of one of my fly boxes. It holds all my "bream" flies, except for closuers and poppers.

Hope everyone is enjoying the wonderful weather....more posts comming soon!

Paluxy River, Dinosaur Valley State Park

Whew...
This last week has been extremely busy with work, Texas Historical Foundation goings on, and getting a new car (more on that later).

Sunday morning I roused Emalie and the girls and dropped them off at her mothers house, before heading to Glen Rose to hit up the Paluxy.

I got in the water at 9:30 am and got out around 4Pm. It was a long dag, full of fish, beautiful river, and the occasional slip and fall.


Nothing like a stretch of river all to yourself...

I have fished this area quite a bit and I always manage some nice long ears from the deeper part close to the far bank.

Male Longear with extremely blue fins.

Check out that pattern!

It was good to have the 6wt back, though way to heavy for the long ears, it really helped to cut through the brisk wind.

Green Sunfish
It rained rather recently so the water was high, and as I moved downstream the current picked up and I came across many small riffles and mini rapids.

At this point the fish started to get a little larger, but not by much. I didn't catch a fish over a 1/2 pound, which was kinda disappointing, but I made up for it in volume of bites and the beauty of the Park.

Spotted Bass

Throughout the day I used a series of poppers, small woolyboogers, bone minnows and nymphs.



This was the only Bluegill I hooked



It was a great trip, and I caught a couple dozen fish!

Last Few Days....

I had a request to post some info on the flies and the rigging I use when I am targeting bluegills and crappie. So I wanted to take a few moments to explain my set up. I originally posted this on the Texas fishing Forums bluegill/sunfish board:

I generally fish a popper dropper rig that I up-size or down size depending on what I am targeting.I will use a foam spider in a size 8 hook, on a 9ft leader, with a 3 foot segment of 3x fluorocarbon tied to the bend of the hook, ending in a nymph such as a halfback, hares ear, or electric blue north fork nymph. I sometimes catch 2 fish at once on this rig.If I am trying to target a mixed bag of bass and larger bluegills I will make the popper a size 10-8 popper, such as a Boogle Bug, with a 3 foot section of 1x fluorocarbon ending in a size 6 Clouser Minnow, or larger nymph. Its important that the leader is mono, not fluorocarbon, I find the flouro sinks too fast and messes up the popping action of the indicator. The idea is that the first fly, the popper, acts as a strike indicator for the dropper, usually a nymph or small streamer. If that is not working, or the fish are really deep, I generally have a 9 foot leader of fluorocarbon ending in a Clouser, shad colored, or a silver Bully's Blue Gill Spider. All of which you can find on breambugs.com

A yelllow Boogle Bug popper and a Bone Minnow, "popper/dropper" rig:

Small Garland bass caught with a Crappie Fly (available at breambugs.com)

Brian Davis, whose blog you can find in my blogroll, was at the pond when we arrived. We chatted, traded flies and had a good time.

Last night I went to Stonebridge Lake and managed a few bream, including this nice Redear, as well as a bass. I hooked what felt like a 3lber, but she broke off at my feet!

Also caught another sad turtle!

I just bought a new FJ CRUISER, I'll post pictured of the BREAM'MOBILE when it arrives....

New Hole

I found this spot using google earth recently. Its about 20 minutes from my house, located in a neighborhood in garland. It is a pretty unique pond. very blue water, pretty good clarity. The pond seems to be rather deep. It looks like a small limestone quarry that was allowed to fill in. They installed a fountain in the middle, I guess to keep the water circulating, because there is no flow in or out, as far as I can tell. I cought a a few sunfish, and this crappie. Intersting place I will be going back too.


I have some good trips coming up:
The Llano, the San Saba, the colorado and some private water on the weekend of May 1st.
May 15-16 will see me and the better half down in the Austin area. I plan for us to visit to Comal, the Guadalupe and possibly Lady Bird Lake. A few weeks later on the 28-31st we will most likely be staying at a bed and breakfast on the Llano. As summer arrives we will also start to make some trips to the Paluxy, Bosque, Nolan and Brazos. This year is shaping up to be great.

Great weekend.

Between going to the zoo, craft fairs and creepy O-temples, Em and I have been fishing up a storm.

On saturday night we met up with fellow poster from warmfly.com, Brian Davis, whose blog you can find in my blogroll, at the north Garland pond I have been visiting lately. We fished for a while and discovered a new pond nearby that has some white crappie, bass and blue gills. Looks very promising.

On sunday night Emalie and I stopped by the north Garland pond for a couple final casts before home and I caught this chunk. Bet you can't spot my secret to big bluegills?

Emalie caught this fella at the new pond, the best fish at the new pond...