Rock, Bluegill, Spots, Largemouth Combo

Little did I know this morning at 3:45 AM, which by the way is the time I crawled out of bed I would land a four species combo? Why so early to go fishing? Well in the Deep South especially during the summer months, you have to be on the water early to avoid the heat and humidity. After 10 AM it starts to get humid and hot and the longer you stay on the water the more it feels like a sauna bath. In other words don’t brother to go the gym and sit in a sauna, just get out in this weather and in a few minutes your clothes are all wet and you have accomplished the bath.
Back to the combo where it all started with the typical Kentucky Spot which Smith Lake is famous for and shortly later a good largemouth . Both these fish were taken on the size 4 Boggle Bug Popper using my 5 wt Redington 8 ½ ft. As the morning progressed I picked up a few more Spots and a another largemouth. Both of these fish were taken on a size 8 orange popper using my Temple Fork 4 wt. The 4 wt. also help me land some nice bluegill and one Rock Bass which gave me the combo. This was not one of those hot popper days. The fish were somewhat finicky so I started to scan through for fly box for a different color popper. As the morning progressed I fish through 4 different colors and two different patterns. Yellow was really early, followed by a white and then I lost a turquoise popper because I didn’t brother to check my line at the fly eye, and it broke off with a tiny gill, which may still be swimming with my $4.00 Boggle Bug Popper. Around 8:30 I tied on the Green Grasshopper, which I could see after some casting that it was too close to the color of the water and it was put back into the fly box. The trip ended  around 10 AM with the Orange size 8 popper which actually produced most of the fish I landed. It is an amazing little fly because it is so unusual in color and has black legs not white legs to compliment the look. I have used this fly for the past couple of years and it always seems to rescue me on slow popper days. Today’s conditions were a slight wind out of the south, with water temps hovering around 85, which I think before by the end of the day would have reached 87. Some days fishing with the poppers produce violet hits, but today all the takes were very sudtle with the fish rolling onto the fly. Sudtle or violet I'll take the hits either way. Charles made the trip with me today, and I hope we can get together again real soon.

Sorry for the dark image, but it was still dark when I took this picture of my first spot of the day on the Boogle Yellow Popper

This largemouth kills this white popper deep down

A nice largemouth on the white popper, no this fish did not die, he had a small cut in the roof of his mouth from the popper hook, I watched him swim off.

This big gill gave the 4wt all it wanted, it made numerous deep runs before it finally gave up. Great fighter.

This 2lb. largemouth was taken on the little orange popper, he just roll on the popper, no violet hit

Nice Rock Bass on the orange popper, first one of this season

This big gill inhaled the orange popper deep in its throat. Forceps was the ticket to get to the popper

Last Spot of the day on the little orange popper

One good meal from these 3 bulls

I will be getting more of these little bugs

Landing Slab Crappie on Legion Lake Fishing With my Brother

This is one Memorial Day Weekend I won't forget for some time. My brother, Bobby and I spent the holiday weekend landing some of the largest crappie we have ever landed on the local lake near his home. I know the title of this post can be a little confusing, so here is the explanation. We were using 4 different techniques to land all the fish we kept the past three days. Let’s start with the Micro Light technique. I have talked about this technique before on this blog but let me give you a little more information. It is the method we started with Friday evening on the lake, which produced 17 crappie and bluegill. The micro-light method is just what it implies LIGHT fishing, using a 7 to 7 ½ ft. rod with a light spinning reel loaded with 4 lb. test light. This method emulates a short fly rod, which makes for some fantastic action when you are playing the size crappie and bluegill we were landing. We were using both rods Friday evening with reels that produced the perfect balance for the big 12 to 13-inch crappie we were catching.
The Jigger Pole was another set-up we used. My brother has used this set-up for a number of years. He is extremely good at playing and landing crappie with this technique. I am still in the learning stages here, but I must admit it is a lot of fun learning. Here the individual uses a long graphite rod usually 9 to 13 ft. in length with a small spinning reel or close face reel. This set-up is perfect to fish in tight places such as stomps or treetops. We used this technique Saturday evening in treetops and submerged stomps we found in some of the nooks on the lake. The best lure for the Jigger is a tube jig or a minnow. The advantage one has here is holding the lure in front of the crappie longer. 

If we had not switched from one set-up to another during the days fished we would have never landed 50 fish, we did and dressed the 15 best fish we brought home. and brought home the 44 we cleaned for a big fish fry. As always it is good to visit and fish with Bobby!