09-06-2017, 02:33 AM
Spent Labor Day weekend at the Willow campground in the Northern portion of the state park. I've got a favorite spot there that allows me close access to site 15 which has been down all year from high water erosion.
Site 15 being closed gives a nice place to beach a boat or launch a pontoon. Had a buddy come along that has a drift boat and we were able to beach it there all weekend.
Fished Saturday morning and got skunked, took a siesta and an early dinner and hit it up Saturday evening. It was a little better, it turned on about an hour before darkness. My buddy boated two wipers throwing shad looking streamers with the fly rod. I still had a spool of 6 pound test on my reel from a few weeks ago fishing on the Green below Fonts. Got freight trained by something big, two big tail pumps stripped line and then he broke me off. I lost another at the boat just as it got too dark to fish (In a drift boat with no lights) and we called it a night.
Sunday we walked the dyke about mid day and my buddy sight fished carp, he's pretty good with a stick and got one to eat. It's pretty cool to watch someone cast from the top of the dyke down over the riprap and place a fly just in front of a cruising carp.
Sunday evening we headed out again in the drift boat at just before six o'clock. As we were rowing away from shore we were wondering whether we were out a little too early. 75 yards from shore an 18 inch Wiper inhaled the Kastmaster I was throwing. From then on it was two hours of wrist tiring, giggling, goodness.
I've fished a lot of days at Willard, I've seen Wiper boils. What happened Sunday evening I've never seen. For over two hours we had fish boiling all around us. It seemed the entire lake full of Wipers had herded the shad into the Northeast corner of the reservoir. I'd be throwing out of one side of the boat at a boil, then the other side of the boat would erupt.
We were never more than 10-20 oarstrokes of another boil. Every time we thought it was slowing down an explosion of shad, birds and huge fish would happen on the surface. We easily caught 12-15 fish apiece in the two hours it went off. These were all tanks as well, 18-22 inchers. Each hit would send the rod doubled over and the drag screaming. I had one straighten out a swivel and swim away with my Kastmaster, my buddy lost two flies, one on a breakage of a blood knot.
My buddy went out the next morning and didn't see anything nor get a bite. He'd asked me to come, but I told him I was leaving on a high note. Regular fishing days are going to be a let down from now on...
Photo credit to my buddy Dibs for about half of the pics.
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Site 15 being closed gives a nice place to beach a boat or launch a pontoon. Had a buddy come along that has a drift boat and we were able to beach it there all weekend.
Fished Saturday morning and got skunked, took a siesta and an early dinner and hit it up Saturday evening. It was a little better, it turned on about an hour before darkness. My buddy boated two wipers throwing shad looking streamers with the fly rod. I still had a spool of 6 pound test on my reel from a few weeks ago fishing on the Green below Fonts. Got freight trained by something big, two big tail pumps stripped line and then he broke me off. I lost another at the boat just as it got too dark to fish (In a drift boat with no lights) and we called it a night.
Sunday we walked the dyke about mid day and my buddy sight fished carp, he's pretty good with a stick and got one to eat. It's pretty cool to watch someone cast from the top of the dyke down over the riprap and place a fly just in front of a cruising carp.
Sunday evening we headed out again in the drift boat at just before six o'clock. As we were rowing away from shore we were wondering whether we were out a little too early. 75 yards from shore an 18 inch Wiper inhaled the Kastmaster I was throwing. From then on it was two hours of wrist tiring, giggling, goodness.
I've fished a lot of days at Willard, I've seen Wiper boils. What happened Sunday evening I've never seen. For over two hours we had fish boiling all around us. It seemed the entire lake full of Wipers had herded the shad into the Northeast corner of the reservoir. I'd be throwing out of one side of the boat at a boil, then the other side of the boat would erupt.
We were never more than 10-20 oarstrokes of another boil. Every time we thought it was slowing down an explosion of shad, birds and huge fish would happen on the surface. We easily caught 12-15 fish apiece in the two hours it went off. These were all tanks as well, 18-22 inchers. Each hit would send the rod doubled over and the drag screaming. I had one straighten out a swivel and swim away with my Kastmaster, my buddy lost two flies, one on a breakage of a blood knot.
My buddy went out the next morning and didn't see anything nor get a bite. He'd asked me to come, but I told him I was leaving on a high note. Regular fishing days are going to be a let down from now on...
Photo credit to my buddy Dibs for about half of the pics.
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