THE HEAT IS ON!

[Jim Gronaw]

I must say. it is terribly hot in the Mid-Atlantic and many of our waters are suffering from low levels and oxyegen depletion. A few ponds have suffered fish kills and the one pictured above, a favored bass pond, is getting dangerously close to such conditions. Despite it all, we have still managed to catch a few fish here and there.
We piked up a bunch of dimunitive redears on Ledheds 64 th oz heads with a Crappie slider on the back. Nice time on the 2 pound test stuff.

From the same pond we went Huck Finn and caught about 20 channel cats in the 2 to 3 pound range on light gear. We kept six for the pan and tossed the rest back. More great fun! Break out the chicken livers!

After that. we did some late evening bass fishing the next night and Linda beat me up with 13 to my 3 on Senkos. Just to rub it in, she got this near five pounder on ul gear.

But we were all good sports about it and I made her walk home.But all was not well in cow-country, as one of my favorite ponds suffered a fish kill of about 200 bluegills from 9 to almost 11 inches.

My best guess is that these fish, weary from the spawn, died due to low oxygen levels due to the intense heat, low water and over abundance of algae in a very small environment. It's a shame. However, Matt and I fished there a few days later and got about 30 nice gills and a few bass. Maybe the worst is over. But we really need the rain. Looking forward to some cats, bass, gills and more throughout the summer.

Everybody needs to cool off sometime!

[Matthew J. Breuer]

Nice post, Jim! Truly a bummer about the 'gills!

[mike needles]

one of my favorite bg ponds is terribly low right now, although i havent seen any signs of fish kills. its sad to see but its nature doing her thing

[John Sheehan]

Nice post Jim .Shame about those dead gills though .Hate to see that! You are really on the fish.