Well Joe is the pool winner for the week. I'll get to the story later but what I'll say here is what Joe said the best part of catching that fish, was that his bud Joe was there next to him to share in the moment. He was there to watch it all go down, there to full hand grab the lip, and there to capture it on his camera. Pretty cool stuff.
This was our sight fishing day. It was going to be perfect, and it was for about 45 minutes. It was the three of us, plus Abe, who I convinced to come give sight fishing a shot. He does sight fish, but not for bass, but for albies in the fall. And he doesn't use polarized glasses. In addition to his artistic eye he has super high definition polarized corneas built it. The boys got skills. So we had all tied up some flies that were going to be the one. Big Joe tying up some ultra small Clousers, Abe a super extra small nothing fly, and Flatwing Joe some tiny Flatwings, but he had the secret weapon in his quiver already.
Abe had really never done the ladder thing so I let him have some fun with it. While he stood and stared down with those x-ray vision eyes I walked around looking for those bank cruisers. It was a day before the Strawberry Moon and you could tell because his tide was high high, and it took a long while for the water to drain. I had tied on my offering for the day, which Abe said was too big, too flashy, and was more of a peanut bunker imitation than what was really swimming around. Thank's Abe.
Abe did exactly what a first time ladder sight fishermen does, yeah right. Tie a fly, get up on the ladder and figure out the balance, see a fish, cast, and catch. Well he came and conquered and grabbed the above image before he released it. You can see the size of the fly he was throwing.
About 30 minutes into the outing the wind started from the WSW. That created ripples on the water that made seeing more difficult, usually, but at times it helps as the small rollers create a magnified area of the bottom, making it easy to differentiate between bass, horseshoe crabs, and pockets of vegetation.
Abe and the Joes were in the skinner water while I had a hard time finding the fish because of all the water in the bathtub, the sun wasn't high and bright yet, and I was hunting in spots where I usually don't because of the extra moon water. I did see 14 fish, had some shots at a few of them, and got follows and refusals by some of them. Thanks Abe, that's my fly and I'm sticking with it.
With the wind WSW I thought, well maybe Abe thought, that Lobsterville and Dogfish would be worth a look. Well Abe thought it would be a good idea of both of us to get onto my
watercraft above, and "get" out to Lobsterville bar and look around. "Yeah, no". Why, because I know Abe would make it back to shore and they'd recover my body floating in Middle Ground a week later, all fat, and floated, and eyes eaten by the crabs. We did make a few casts but saw nothing but
some terns way off diving most likely on those micro sand eels, which arrived this week. But those crabs that would have eaten my eye sockets out if we took out my "vessel", let's talk about crabs.
As Abe an I had earlier made our way up and into the parking lot we looked left and saw the two Joe's out on a different part of the pond. I gave a Flatwing a Joe a call to let him know our plan of checking out another spot and that I would report back in if anything was going on. At that point he told me they had a seen a few nice fish and he would let me know as well.
While Abe dragged me around a barren Dogfish, well that was my idea, Flatwing Joe was making trip history. I hate telling other peoples stories but here it is. The boys were next to each other, duh, and walking around, slowly on a flat. They had been throwing different flies all morning and weren't getting the love they had been usually getting so Joe said to the other Joe, "I wonder if they'd take a crab fly". You see, we've been seeing small baitfish and small sand eels, and, it just hadn't been throw a crab, skitter it along the bottom or free swim it, sight fishing conditions.
So as Joe tied one of his "Fighting Crab" flies he sees three big fish moving from left to right towards the other Joe. Big Joe made a few casts at them, without spooking them, and without interest. That's when one peeled off and went back towards Joe who had a big, compared to what we've been throwing, and weighted, fly tied on and at the ready. A 15 foot plop cast in front of it and Joe said it instantly ate.
Hey, any fish you sight fish to is a good fish, and some good fish are gooder than others, but Joe had himself a dandy right there. Again, he was thankful for experiencing it with Joe, and the pictures really help tell the story.
Ok, "F - this". Now I'm ready to get to business. No more ladder sharing. Stop making fun of my flies. I'm going to get it done during the afternoon end of the dropping tide session. Abe spilt, so did the Joe's, so that left me there all alone to have all the beasts of the pond to myself. Before he left Abe gave me the fly he used, which I was thankful for for a bit, before being determined to use my own creation.
I double-timed it out there with the ladder in hand. By then the water had dropped, and the wind picked up, which made visibility tough. In fact you would have to go out as far as you could and fish inside, facing towards the beach. It was then after setting up my ladder, like a deer tree stand, that I realized, in my excitement, I forgot my stripping basket. I felt naked, and inept, without it.
That just twisted up my head. I could see, and did see, two pods of four fish, that I threw to, that refused Abe's fly, there you go Abe. But on one cast my fly line had wrapped around the ladder and I blew the cast, the one where they probably would have inhaled Abe's fly.
I felt defeated for the day. All alone. No friends with me. No fish to hand. No stripping basket around my waist. I decided to ditch the ladder over the dunes for today, my last chance to land a good one, and there were some beauties swimming around in front of us, which the two Joe's can attest to.
When I got back to my truck Joe had left my lunch under the protection of my stripping basket. I was hungry and thankful he thought of me. It was a long drive back thinking about what I could and will do different on the last day. I was looking forward to hearing Joe's story. Big Joe was tucked in for a cat nap and I grabbed a Guinness and sat down. "It was HUGE......."
