Elephants Eat Peanuts

Most of the time when you think big fish you think big flies. This is true most the time especially with largemouth bass. Today I was fishing with a small popper looking for panfish and got a surprise with this nice  2lb bass. A 2lb bass isn't really anything to be excited about, but its not everyday when you catch a bass this size on a popper that is as small as the tip of a pencil eraser. I don't recommend throwing small flies to large fish often, but occasionally a big fish will eat a small fly and as they say, elephants eat peanuts.

PTSD

Post Traumatic Striper Disorder

Post traumatic striper disorder is a mental health condition that's triggered by extreme striper fishing. Symptoms may include flashbacks, day dreaming, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about striper fishing. Many people who go striper fishing have difficulty adjusting and coping back to a normal life. In some cases, the symptoms can get worse or last for months or even years. Sometime PTSD can completely take over your life. In a case such as below, you may have post traumatic striper disorder.

I want to catch a big striped bass.

by: kovacsxtranormal

I Wont be able to fish this weekend. I was going through some pictures today and wanted to post up some pics of some nice stripers I have caught over the years in Texas. I haven't caught a double digit striper in a number of years, hopefully that will change soon. One of these days I will have to make a trip to the northeast to chase these fish in their natural habitat.

My best striper @ 21lbs

Caught on a 5weight

It Wasn't Happening

Not sure what was going on today with the carp. They where not up on the flats like they usually are, and the few fish that where there were acting very skittish. Not sure if it was the lack of wind or the front moving in that had the fish all jittery this morning. David caught one small bass and I caught a small carp. Everyone else we spoke to at the lake was not seeing any fish either. There was a hex hatch going on and that was cool to see.

 

Carpaholic

A good clip on the addictions of fly fishing for carp. "Carpaholic" is about  the journey to the inner sanctum of Denver, Colorado chasing the golden ghost through the South Platte River as well as local ponds and lakes. Barry Reynolds has been doing this longer than most and is willing to share what he's learned and encourages you to try and hook the golden ghost. Elitist fly fishers need not apply, scumdogs only.

Summer School'n

The bass are schooled up and are running around in groups of half a dozen or so. Once you find them ganged up you can normally pick up several fish in just a few cast, but the fishing will be slow between the spurts; at least for me it has been. Kelly Galloup makes some great streamers that are mostly tied for trout but the larger streamers make great bass flies. Not much else to report today, just some standard Texas stock tank fishing for bass.

Decent bass on a Galloup's articulated rattlesnake

San Diego Jam

The San Diego Jam Knot is the knot I use most of the time when connecting my fly. I really like the knot and it works great on fluorocarbon. One thing I have learned when tying knots with fluorocarbon is to slowly tighten up the knot. If you tighten the knot to quickly the fluorocarbon will heat up and make your knots very weak. This is true even when the knot is wet, and the same is true with mono but fluorocarbon seems to weaken more with heat. Overall I have been pretty happy with this knot, the only thing I don't like about it is it typically uses up a lot of line to tie compared to other knots.  

Some more Pics from San Diego.

Beluga whale interaction at Sea World 

The water was 45 degrees

Riding horses on the beach

Mexico is right behind us

The stadium up on the hill is a bull fighting arena

Lots of border patrol in the area

A big ass walrus, 3500+lbs 

Big Sharks at the Sea World aquarium 

More Carp'n

Justin and I went and chased some more carp this morning. The fishing started off a little slow, the fish where not in the same area as they where a few days ago. A short move to another cove and we were back in the fish. There were a lot of carp up shallow this morning crawling around. I think we both ended up with 6 or 7 fish by noon. Used my trusty TFO TICR 5weight and had no issues landing these fish.

Pretty fish

Carp crawling around in the shallows

A black widow we stumbled upon