Fished the Pond at work, 7/11

[Allen Morgan]

I had tied up a deer-hair bass popper that I wanted to try out, so off to the pond at work I went this afternoon.  The popper works, although nothing decided to sample it.

 

I was seeing a few surface hits here and there, so I decided to put on a foam hopper and see if any of the sunnies were hungry.  I didn’t get any hits on top, so I tied a dropper onto the hopper and dangled a BH Wooly Bugger below the hopper.

 

I got a few hits, but didn’t connect with anything.  I also had trouble getting the Wooly Bugger to dive, as I had a big maribou tail and not much weight on the fly.  I looked though the little fly box I had with me.  Apparently, the Wooly Buggers that I tied up with weight were in a different fly box that I left in the van.  I noticed a bigger Wooly Bugger in the box I had with me, a size 8.  Oh well, we’ll see.  I cut the little bugger off and tied on the bigger one.

 

Almost immediately, got a couple taps, as indicated by the hopper.  Then, it went down, and I set the hook.  I noticed that my rod had a good bend in it, and I couldn’t pull the fish up.  I was thinking either a LMB or a decent Channel Cat, but wasn’t surprised with this Hybrid Sunfish:

 

[IMG]http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/6715/20120711hybridsunfish1.jpg[/IMG]

By [URL=http://profile.imageshack.us/user/allenok]allenok[/URL] at 2012-07-11

 

I threw the rig out again, and did a SLOW retrieve along the face of the pond’s dam, about a foot away from the cattails.  I got the hopper within arm’s reach, right at my feet, and stopped it.  I got a hit, lifted the pole, and had this on the Wooly Bugger:

 

[IMG]http://img842.imageshack.us/img842/1721/20120711bluegill.jpg[/IMG]

By [URL=http://profile.imageshack.us/user/allenok]allenok[/URL] at 2012-07-11

 

I threw it out again, and was rewarded with another Hybrid Sunnie:

 

[IMG]http://img402.imageshack.us/img402/7660/20120711hybridsunfish2.jpg[/IMG]

By [URL=http://profile.imageshack.us/user/allenok]allenok[/URL] at 2012-07-11

 

One of the Maintenance supervisors showed up, and we gabbed for a bit, and I managed to catch another male Bluegill.  I did get a surface hit on the hopper fairly close to the bank, but didn’t hook up.  After the Maintenance super left, I got a hookup with what felt like another Hybrid Sunnie, that promptly got my tippet tangled with the cattails.  I ended up loosing the fish, my tippet, and both the hopper and BH Wooly Bugger.

 

Dang, that was the only size 8 BH Wooly Bugger I had.  Guess I know what I’m doing tonight!

[Vince Fusco]

Some real good looking fish,Allan. Nice and thick with good colors.

[Tony Livingston]

Very nice HBG in your first pic Allen! That native BG is no slouch either.... the third pic looks  like a Green Sunfish, but it's a biggun'!