I spent time prepping the night before, twisting up some small tungsten head buggers which is all you pretty much need for these dumb fish.
Since the little guy would be worm dunking (screw helping him fly cast surrounded by morons), I even put on my headlamp, and walked through the yard at 10pm after a rain and pulled a ton of night crawlers up. I refuse to use that Powerbait stuff.
The morning rolls around and he doesn't feel like fishing anymore. I knew a few inches of rain was on it's way so it would be a muddy mess after an hour so I wasn't too upset about it. I grabbed my stuff, drove about half a mile, and got to the stream by 7:45, ready to go. I hiked about two miles of the stream after the opening bell, and picked up like 6 or 7 fish in under two hours.
Then the rain crashed down and I called it a day. So without further adieu, is my opening day top ten...
1.Once again, the Palominos continue to attract all the morons. It was a shit show of Cabelas Neoprene, Duck Dynasty Camo hoodies, Powerbait, snelled hooks big enough to hook a Tarpon, and lot of corn.
2.I found plenty of open water to fish and caught the majority of my fish without another soul in site, but when I did find big pods of people, the look on their faces was priceless when I would just walk right in, catch a fish on my first or second cast with a bugger, release it and walk away. "Dude, you're throwing away meat!"
3.I should have tied more buggers. I made $20 selling them to spin fishermen for $5 each. Seriously.
4.You may have heard of the Fly Fishing "Brah App" which recently poked fun at the younger fly fishing generation these days, well now there are spin Brahs as well. Flat brimmed Volcom hat, Simms waders, neck beard, stinking like weed, but the difference between these guys and a typical Colorado fly fishing blogger is the choice of fishing method and their feelings toward catch and release. There is no hip fiberglass rod and hot pink Allen reel, but a St. Croix ultralight spinning rod and a Shimano Stradic reel.
"Hey bro, what color you throwin?"
"Pumpkin Seed Sparkle Bro. Just nailed 3 more"
"word Brah!"
These guys took their stockie fishing serious. They'd surround a pod of fish, and hammer them with nothing but different colored trout magnets until they wiped out every one in the hole.
5.Watching three stocked fish in an slack eddy rising to cigarette butts from the littering morons upstream.
7.Remembering how ugly looking a stocked rainbow is....
8.Seeing a giant bobber the size of a tennis ball swimming around with no line stuck to it. I put on a big streamer, snagged the bobber, and reeled in a 17 inch brown, releasing him to safety.
9.Cabelas zipper front guide waders. Review coming soon but safe to say I love them.
10.I met some cool spin fisherman as well. These guys do fly fish on occasion, were only using artificials, and releasing every fish they caught. One even released a 20+ inch pally to the dismay of the power bait crew. They earn my respect.
More coming soon. I nailed a few on dries today :)
Sounds like a good time... except for #1,4 and 5.
ReplyDelete5 was pretty sad...
Deletei love watching the morons and weekend warriors who go out and thrash around in the water with powerbait. i watched 6 other guys do nothing but watch me work around fallen limb until i pulled out a nice stocked brown. only THEN did they bother to grab their gear, race into the water and proceed to thrash about for dumb fish.
ReplyDeleteIt's not even weekend warriors. It's "One weekend a year" warriors.
DeleteCertainly some truth to what you are saying. I do have a bit of an issue with the disparagement of people who eat fish they catch, especially if it is a stocked rainbow in PA. You are complaining about someone who eats an invasive species they catch. While farming those guys has some footprint, it isn't anywhere near the damage you do if you release a ratios and go out an buy some fish, pork, or chicken to have for dinner that night. Hell, it's probably better for the environment than the farmed feathers you use on flies. So, yea I am no fan of powerbait, but unless you a a vegan hunter-gatherer, those stocked trout on a plate are less damaging than the food you eat.
ReplyDeleteNever said anything wrong with keeping stocked fish. It's the whole circus act around it that is so funny to me. I personally release them just so I can catch them again in June when the moron brigade has moved on. As far as them being invasive, this is a fairly warm water stream and the vast majority except for a few very smart ones that figure out where to go are gone by July.
DeleteSetting aside points 2 and 10, I can agree that you aren't disparaging people who eat their catch. As for invasive or not, you are fooling your self. I do like having stocked fish, but if these we carp or something less desirable to catch, we would see them being electro fished and poisoned to get rid of them. It might be nice to go rematch them, but some will survive, some will end up in other waterways, some will result in native fish not being as successful. We can treat fishing and releasing these fish as noble a pursuit as you want, but in the end, they are a distraction purchased for enjoyment. These are concert tickets or time on the golf course. Catch and release with these guys is only a little nobler than catch and release with a stocked pheasant.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMost bloggers would delete this reply but I won't. What I wrote was to tongue-in-cheek satire, with a huge dose of reality. PA opening day is a shit show. But it's necessary to keep funding going. I get it, but it doesn't mean I can't poke fun at it. Not sure what makes me such a douche? The fact that I made fun of 30 people surrounding a single golden colored fish and banging it in the head with splitshot?
DeleteP.S. Did I not mention that:
Delete1.i was out the night before grabbing nightcrawlers for my son to spin fish and...
2.I did meet some really cool spin fishing guys and that not all of them were backwards morons?
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletedeleted comments...go on with your blog. I'm not following it anymore anyway.
ReplyDeleteI am with you man. Was going to say something about these jokers on here but had a few beers last night and figured it was not the appropriate time to leave comments. Keep up the good work Mike.
ReplyDelete