Made it out twice with my 3-wt earlier this week and thought I'd share a few pics. Nothing amazing, but I did manage 7 species over the course of two mornings.
First up was a short morning paddle near home. Water was low and warm, but eventually I found a spot where clean water was flowing in to the bayou from the swamp. The sunfish were stacked up and eagerly took the hare's ear I was fishing as a dropper.
Bluegill
Red Spotted Sunfish
Redear Sunfish
I was on the water before 7 AM and home before 9 AM due to the heat, but it was a nice way to spend the morning before heading home to hide in the A/C.
The following morning, I rolled out of bed at 4:30 and made my way an hour north to a spot I had wade fished earlier this spring. I was on the water by first light and, within a few casts had missed a decent spotted bass and landed this pretty, little green sunfish. Both on a mini crease fly.
Moving upstream, I continued to land green sunnies intermixed with bluegill, but couldn't find any of the longear I had hoped for. Striped shiner made an appearance too, often exploding out of the water to take the small dry fly I had tied on.
The bass proved largely disinterested in small dries on this trip, but aggressively attacked many of the smaller sunfish I hooked.
Eventually, I gave up on the dry and decided to see if a streamer would be more to the bass's liking. Tandem rigging a pair of the Redfish Rattle fly that Ika had recommended to me on my post about pickerel, I proceeded to work each deep pocket with a slow twitchy retrieve. Sure enough, the bass couldn't resist as I pulled at least one (if not two or three) small spotted bass from each deep hole.
I even managed a double at one point as a small green sunfish and bass took the pair of streamers simultaneously.
My light tippet cost me in the end though as it failed to hold up against my largest bass of the day, a 15" beast (by this tiny creek's standards at least).
Switching back to a #14 half-drowned hopper shortly after, I proceeded to work smaller pockets as I made my way back to my car. Almost every pocket gave up a small bluegill, green sunny or shiner. And eventually, one even provided my first and only longear of the day.
As the heat index was quickly climbing, and my water supplies quickly draining, I decided to call it a day shortly after the longear and proceeded back to the comfort of air conditioning.
Overall, it wasn't a bad two days with seven species landed and 50-60 fish brought to hand. I just need to find time to go back for the one that popped my tippet.
Chris