Took a few hours to try this stream since most of the others around here were a little dirty due to rain. Little rainbows were hitting in every still pocket.
Going to Montana/Wyoming on July 8th. Latest update from The Tackle Shop is the cold winter and rainy spring means be prepared to fish salmonflies the week of the 4th .
Just bought a 5'8 extra heavy Ugly Stick Elite conventional rod yesterday. I have a 7'0 Ugly Stick Big Water that I bought a few years ago for some godforsaken reason. Can't stand a 7'0 conventional rod for bottom fishing. Way too long. The 7'0 has a Penn Squall 30 on it. Will put the Squall 30 on the Ugly Stick and should have a bottom fishing beast that can pull up amberjack, big snapper, etc. Guess I'll keep the 7'0 Ugly Stick as a backup rod.
Fished the creek where I'm staying with some dirty water. Still did pretty well, including catching a bunch with the fly I helped my daughter tie.
HOOSINSC I did the Bartam's Bass class today. They had a presentation and they we tied some poppers. In the afternoon I went out with Karl and another of the guides to fish. Hooked 3 but couldn't get them landed. I caught two trout on the poppers though. Karl was the only one in the group to land a bass and the other guide got a huge rainbow on the popper. I also tried a brook trout stream before the class. Was very overgrown and only had like two places to get a fly in the water. Hooked a brook under a waterfall but immediately got him around a stick and he got off. Spooked like 5 walking through the overgrowth.
I’m a bit nervous I’m ahead of the hatch, I’m fishing the Madison tues/wed of next week. Then 3 days on the south fork Sat - Mon.
Not really about the water. Just the best water to fish for them and generally how far up they go in the Chattooga (Hwy 28) and Chauga (Cassidy Bridge). Basically barely moving water. They're going to try and make this an annual thing.
Had to grind for these more than usual. For the first time ever, there was a bunch of boats all around a honey hole I have. There usually isn’t anyone out there. Yesterday there were 3 or 4 large shrimp boats. There were a bunch of jack crevalle and sharks from the shrimp boat by-catch. I think all of that drove the snapper away from the general area. Dropped some lines on one of my best spots. Hooked a shark and there were jacks everywhere so we moved to another spot about a mile away. Didn’t mark anything and didn’t get any bites. Hopped around to 4 different spots. I was starting to get real nervous because usually this is automatic out there and now I’m looking at possibly not catching anything. Moved a bit further away and of course another boat was directly on the coordinates for a spot where I’ve caught them. I got as close to the spot as I could without crowding them and hit spot lock on the trolling motor. From there, it was on. I’m posting pictures of the Simrad sonar and you’ll see there were millions of fish here. We caught our 6 snapper , tried to keep only 15-20 pound fish. We released a bunch. Probably caught 20 total. There were coming up in packs under the boat. I was trying to cherry pick mangroves with a spinnging rod with a buck tail jig but I only saw ARS. It was run fighting big fish on a smaller spinning reel. I did see a silverish fish in the pack-I think it was a spanish mackerel. We were worn out after playing with those for about 2 hours and started the 2 hour cruise back in. Great day. Headed to the barrier island Horn Island with the wife and baby here in a few hours this morning.
i wondered where the cutoffs might be. most of my bartrams have been on the chauga and twice at cassidy bridge i have caught them
The only one I've caught (not counting on spinners on Section 2 growing up) was at Blackwell Bridge on a #16 Parachute Adams
2nd cast, thought I might be able to get on them fast but I was likely fishing a couple hours too early because that was it
Lots of storms/rain lately. Wasn't expecting much. Both on a Texas rigged trick worm. 2nd deserved a better photo and weighed/measured but she throated it like a young Briana Banks and I had to mouth fist the hook out. Quick photo and back to the water.
Looks like I’ll be fishing in your neck of the woods tomorrow Pharm . We’re looking at launching around Huguenot
I’m off tomorrow just saying I took my FIL out Friday and got skunked. Hard to h i from solo kayak fishing to guiding a boat
Inshore? it’s a bit of a treck for me. Really haven’t fished that area before. I’m terrified if this full moon it’s kicked my ass twice in the last couple months
Yeah inshore off the kayaks. If there’s something closer to you, let me know. We’d be coming from Orlando so right there with you about it being a trip. Also hesitant with the full moon, but salt strong seems to think it’ll be a good day. Still beats the hell out of working.
Yeah I’m down in palm valley weather. Lot it good spots around there and st Augustine. I’m down to meet up? Are both you guys coming from Orlando?
Yeah, west Orlando. If you have some spots in St. Augustine I’m sure we can call an audible. I’ll shoot you a PM.
Beauts Had spousal duties that dinged my chances of getting out early. 83 now. Little to no wind. Well, a dry line don't catch fish and I'm far too antsy inside. Go see if the fish whistle can stir em up.
Shallows fall off to 10-15 ft pretty quick. There is also some asshole trees underwater that owe me some $$$. Have seen a very thiccboi pike cruising the transition area.
It’ll be sick, don’t take your eyes off your flies. I fished the middle narrows of the Teton today. 70+ trout between my pops and me, all on dry flies. Fished two #4 size ants most of the day. Doubled up on two 17”+ fish. It was unreal
Welp I think the shrimp boats might have ruined my honey hole. They were out there again yesterday and the sharks were thick from their bycatch. Snapper season closes July 5th so went out there yesterday for last time this season. 1st spot that used to be money every time had nothing. 2nd spot that produced quality fish last trip had another boat on it so I got as close as I could without crowding them. I think there were snapper there but we kept hooking up to sharks that would either damn near spool us or cut us off. I probably stayed there way too long and lost a million hooks. Finally when my buddy brought a 7 foot shark up to the boat I said fuck it. Tried 3 more spots. Launched at 6:30 got to the first spot at 8:30 fished until 12:40 PM and it took every bit of that to catch a 3 man limit-6 snapper. We threw back a bunch but we've had several trips where we caught 8 snapper in 30 minutes.
Huguenot has the best flounder fishing I’ve ever seen Pharm . I kept 1, lost 3 at the boat as I was grabbing my net and threw 3 back, my friend kept 2, threw back 2. We also saw a guy at the launch point with 3 or 4 that were at least 24”. Definitely worth the trip for you and it’s an area where boats can’t get to. I will say that I was a bit agitated when my alarm went off at 2:30 this morning, but it was a great time.
Yeah I’m a creature of habit. I went out of my same spot and fished low tide and got about 5 reds. It was hot as hell
I have another opportunity to go to Yellowstone this fall. Only thing is due to prior commitments, out of the 12 days they have the house and cars, I’d only be able to fly out Weds and back on a Sunday. Obvious answer is “yes, do it,” but I’d want to be able to take in the park, the Tetons and Jackson. I could fly in and out of West Yellowstone and get in Wednesday at like 12:30 pm. Imagine I could be on the water soon after that, but no idea what time sun sets in early October out there. That would give me all day Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Sunday flight leaves at noon and gets back at midnight here. Only problem is it appears to be about $1700 round trip per google. Otherwise, there’s a direct into SLC, I’d have to rent a car and then drive 4.5 hours and get in later Wednesday late afternoon. Flying into Bozeman or Idaho falls saves me a few hundred but the flights from slc to those airports get in later than driving from slc and then I’d still have to drive the rest of the way to west Yellowstone. Then Sunday if have to wake up super early and drive back to SLC. anyone have any opinions here? I have been invited every year for a while and keep saying “next year” but should I go now, or block off a week + for next year and hope I am able to go? Feel like if I did the 3 days it would be awesome, but idk when I’d be able to go back out there and take all of it in.
Why not fly into Jackson? That seems like it would be cheaper. But go. Sun is probably still up in the early evening at that time of year.
Float trip on the Madison didn't go as well as I'd hoped, but my wife says she had fun so it was a success in that I may be able to get her to do it again. We only caught in the 15-20 range, mostly on the smaller side. My parents greatly out fished us including a 23 incher for my mom that took her into her backing. I've yet to catch one over 17 inches or so on the Madison in my float trips. Had several bend the hook/break me off. But the other person in the boat or someone in our group has caught a 20+ one every time. Had gotten up at 5 this morning and went a waded the Madison for a little over an hour this morning before the float. Just caught 3 small ones there.
Hot and windy today but got off work early Took about 2 hours but I finally found a couple hugged up around a brush pile under a willow tree Had to climb said brush pile/maybe a beaver dam to retrieve the fish but Yolo The AC and the indoors feel real nice right now