I decided to go fish a creek. I knew it would be a little high, I assumed it was going to be muddy. I’ve fished it under worse conditions, if the fish were in there I’d be able to get a few.
With the unusually cold and cloudy April we’ve had, we’re about 2 or 3 weeks behind where we should be when it comes to things growing and smallmouth bass moving into the creeks. There were surprisingly few wild flowers littering the forest floor. Rather than spend the time fruitlessly looking for things in bloom, I concentrated on the fishing.
The creek was a little high like I expected. The surprise was the clarity. Hardly any mud at all with a good 2 foot clarity. With the increased depth there were more places for smallies to hang out. I had my hopes up.
In the first 5 minutes I had two fish on. I knew they were both smallies by how and where they hit. The first one didn’t stay on long before it tossed the lure. The second one hit hard and had a fair amount of weight to it. It came to the surface to spit the lure out. Would have pushed the 18 inch mark for sure.
If this was how it was going to be, I was looking forward to a good day of fishing a little creek.
An hour later and not another hit. I was in the process of giving up, making a few more casts before moving on. With 8 feet of line out I saw a decent sized fish come up and nip the jig and twister. I set the hook and realized it was either a small pike or muskie. I pulled it up on shore. It was a pike a couple of feet long. It barely put up a fight.
People target these things? . . . was went through my head. The most uneventful landing of a fish I’ve ever had. I’ve had smallies take a lure with that much line out and they fight like hell to get away. This thing rolled over and gave up. I’ve fished the Fox for 15 years and have landed maybe a half dozen pike. I’ve hooked more muskie in one year. It seems like this year I’m going to land every other species in the river before I tie into a quantity of smallies.
I considered keeping the pike. I’ve eaten pike before and this one was good for quite a few filets, but since I don’t keep many fish I never read the limits of the different species. If I’m targeting a meal of smallies, I have to go back and read what the limits are. I can never remember. Since I couldn’t recall reading anything about pike, it was lucky this day.
I decided to go fish a more urban area I don’t fish much anymore. Now I remember why I’ve given up fishing the more urban areas. I can’t stand them. Too much noise, too many people and nothing visually interesting. I half heartedly threw a lure around, but I could tell at that point I could care less.
So I started to follow the geese around. I wanted to see how many goslings were out and about already. There were quite a few.
At first you didn’t notice them, there were just a bunch of geese bedded down on the ground. But then I noticed that a few of the geese were sitting with their wings slightly spread out. The wings were being used as blankets for the goslings.
For all the geese and goslings I’ve seen over the years, I’ve never seen them do this. Some had just a couple of young ones while a few others were trying to cram up to a dozen of them under their wings.
WIthin 10 feet of this was a lone goose bedded down. I’m assuming the male, but I could be wrong. All I know is that if I got too close, I’d get hissed at.
I’ve been chased down narrow paths on islands by pissed off nesting geese. The hissing is the warning sign. I kept my distance.
I was surprised at how quickly I gave up on the fishing. I guess I’m not cut out for fishing like this anymore. I’d rather be skunked in an area that is inherently beautiful than put up with this. Not worth it to catch a few fish.
The creeks are coming down before the river, like usual. I think I’ll be heading back up them to wait for the smallies to come to me. While I’m waiting, I’m sure I’ll find other things to keep me occupied.
Travis
29 Apr 2011Very Nice. Soon I’ll have to get my waders and hit the flows again. It’s been awhile.
Nina
29 Apr 2011I’ve probably had crappie and bluegills that hit and fight harder than it seems like that pike did. That picture of the geese is cool too, thats a lot of frigging chicks…too cute though 🙂
Ken G
30 Apr 2011I’ve had tree branches fight harder than that thing did.
You would think I would have seen that with the geese before.
Something new every day.
bob long
30 Apr 2011gray’s…….
marvelous narative about essentially nothing, anything and everything having to do with fishing.
The Four Season Angler
30 Apr 2011I hate the hammer handles. Fortunately the back straps and meat below the Y-bone mess are super tasty. We fillet and eat a lot of those things when in Canada, but the perch fight harder.
You won’t ever see me out pike fishing around here.
Tim Silva
30 Apr 2011Pike are funny fighters. I’ve had some that just swim right in, like lemmings to the cliff. Many others that fight like hell, even break water. Who knows??
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John
2 May 2011The geese and pike are both nasty critters… but oh so tasty!