Johnsfolly

That woman is a downright killer! Tell her great job from all of the Folly family!

In Maryland all sea run shad (hickory and American) and herring (blueback and alewife) are a catch and release fishery only. It's my understanding that NJ and PA still allow for the harvest to American shad out of the Delaware river. I have never eaten shad roe, but remember it being sold in PA at the Farmer's markets.

I don't mind catching eels, but hate having to try to remove a hook (which in my experience tends to be swallowed). Slimy critters for sure. May as well throw out any clothes that they slime up!

JHK - Thanks buddy! I have 27 species for the year thus far (since March 3rd) and 6 new species. I want to catch another 11 new life species by the end of Feb. I need to hit the briny waters this summer to get some new guys ! Livie is up to 18 different species. Just 22 more for her goal this year of 40 different species.

Great story and a sobering point about how we may be missing out on our lives. I say this as I am away from my family while working in Maryland. I can't just go upstairs to join them. We are the brink of several major changes in our lives and it is tough trying to figure out what is best for all of us. I will keep this story in mind as we get through these transitions. Thanks Dan.

I love seeing aggressive flatheads getting caught on bass or walleye gear! They are true predators! Nice catch!

That is a beast! Very nice smallie! Congrats!

I appreciate that buddy. I will never forget that first day on the White. You had me looking up spots to meet you guys and I lost my signal never tbought that I would find you guys. But I did and I had a great time every time we fished together. I hope to make it out to Jigfest 2018.

Will be much closer to the NJ pine barrens. Might be a possible day trip. I know that there are some boggy areas in the pine barrens. So am I am not surprised with some oddball species in that area.

Ever since I planned my recent trip to Maryland this late in April, I have been researching about trying to go after the shad that run the rivers throughout the state. Maryland has both American and Hickory shad. When I lived in PA back in college, I never once headed to the Delaware river to fish for shad. It was often a rite of spring in that part of PA with many folks more excited about shad than the trout opener. In those days I knew about using shad darts, even had a few in the day, but never fished them. I researched some spots, read articles, watched videos, and picked up some darts that appealed to me. I asked around at work when I got back in Maryland and read fishing reports. I decided on trying out the confluence of Deer Creek and the Susquehanna river with access in Susquehanna State park in Cecil county Maryland. I drove up to the park on Saturday. I knew going in that this would not be a trip of solitude fishing. If there were no fisherman then there were likely no fish in that area. As I was driving along sight of the river there were cars parked in all of the parking areas. A good sign. I kept driving past the confluence to check out the creek and get a feel for the water. What was apparent that the shad had not gone too far up the creek and that the spot to fish would be the confluence area. As I pulled into the parking area, I saw a couple of bent rods and watched shad being landed. I started with a tandem rig with a 1/4 oz lower dart and a 1/8 oz upper shad dart. The lower one was white with a red tip and the upper dart was a green head with chartreuse body. I could reach a spot with a decent current run and got hung on the bottom on my second cast. I lost both darts. It took losing a few more darts before I got a feel for the rocks and bottom structure. The guy up at the actual confluence gave up and headed off to breakfast. I moved to his spot and got the two dart tandem rig set up. I went with two 1/8 oz green/chartreuse darts. I could see guys on the other side of the creek catching shad. I was watching their cadence and retrieve speed. I tried to emulate that and I got a hard bite. What a fight. This is one feisty fish species. I horsed the fish and pulled the hook. Second cast and same thing. Hard fight and pulled hook. After several casts I had a third hard bite. With this fish, I had to channel Phil Lilly and opted to back reel instead of relying on the drag system. I was able to keep good pressure on the fish, which jumped a couple of times before I finally landed my first hickory shad ! Even with landing only a single fish, I could start to see why people get excited about catching them. What a sleek and gorgeous looking fish. They are a powerful fighter. I couldn't wait to catch another. I switched up colors and I hooked and lost a couple of fish after counting down the rig before reeling it in. What I didn't notice was I was pulling off a scale or two from the hooks. Then I hooked a strong fish and noticed that it fought differently than the previous fish. I also saw that It also was not a silver fish but was golden brown. I was thinking of a carp, but ended up landing my first ever shorthead redhorse sucker! A couple of cast later, I figured out just what I was hooking into when I snagged this gizzard shad with the lower dart. I ended up with five gizzard shad at this location. I watched a guy next to me begin catching several hickories with the majority of them being caught on a #13 silver and green Tony Accetta PET spoon. Another guy down stream was also catching shad on spoons as well. I finally hooked and landed my second hickory of the day on my darts. It was a female loaded with eggs. It was after noon and I was getting hangry. I had a couple of guys move in on me. I had enough and went to get something to eat. I left the river with a few folks still fishing. I learned a lot and had ideas on what I might need if I were to get back and fish this area again. I dropped by the Bass Pro shop in Baltimore on the way back to the hotel to pick up some spoons and a few more darts. I also picked up a medium weight rod to have a second rod for Sunday, but that's another story ! This post has been promoted to an article

I have wanted to catch a tench since I first saw one caught back in the UK. I fI couldn't catch one in the UK, I wouldn't mind catching a exotic living in the States. Would love to find some folks in this area that may have some information on new species ! PM me with their information. Thanks

Looks good buddy! You two are killing my betterhalf with the morel photos. Is keeeping her out looking for them. Got some rain in Columbia yesterday. Hope that she finds some before I get home this weekend.

Couple of nice fish! Good luck when you go out today.

Griz - congrarts on your turkey buddy! Now you can really put in a hunt for your second bird .

Thanks Gavin. I have them on my radar. Planning on giving them a shot over the weekend.

I do like the oddball looks of mirror and leather carp!

I will be back there n the next couple of weeks to try for snakeheads. Caught my first one on the other side of the street last year. Though Livie did blame you for me missing at least one fish. Sure you could guess the OAFer that accounted for the other lost fish.

Last week I was back in Missouri. Came back to bad weather, but it got better later in the week. On Thursday I left work early to take Livie down to Spring creek, a tributary of the Gasconade river south of Vienna. I have fished this creek in the past and caught some spawning shiners. We were also planning on staying into the evening/night to be armed with headlamps to target madtoms. I always set yearly goals. This year my goals are fairly modest (mainly targeting some new species and not really numbers). My main driver for the year is to help others meet some of their goals. Livie set a goal of catching 40 different species this year. Prior to this trip she had not caught more than 40 species in her whole life. Since we are going to be in Maryland after this summer, I felt that I could get Livie plenty of new species out in the briny water. With microfishing, you need to be able to see the fish respond to the bait. That means clear water and relatively calm conditions. Well the water was clear, but the winds were brutal. We started fishing a spot that I had caught my very first greenside darter. Between the wind gusts we did get to see some different minnows and began catching darters. Mostly were female orangethroat darters. Livie caught the first male orangethroat (her first of the year and her 11th species since March 1). He was a nice fish. Soon after I caught my personal best orangethroat darter (in terms of coloration and condition ). We never did find any greenside or other darters on this trip. So we focused on minnows. I caught a northern studfish and a couple of bleeding shiners. She and I kept switching off with the #26 Tanago hook rig. She and I both caught several new fish for the year including our first longear sunfish for the year. Some of her memorable catches of the day. Blackspotted topminnow A bigeye shiner (new lifer). Northern studfish Striped shiner (new lifer) It was starting to get dark and we headed north to fish a spot where Livie last caught a madtom by hand (Daryk would recognize the spot). Now it was time with a hook and line. The wind was still going to be a problem. We did not find any madtoms early on. At one time we got hit with what seemed to be thousands of mayflies(?). It wasn't until we got to a section of the creek that had some chunk rock and gravel and it was dark enough that we began to see some madtoms. I have fished for madtoms a couple of time before and they can be a real challenge. First they shy away from the light. Then they spook easily when you walk the stream. Lastly for some reason they are difficult to get a good hookset and that if you miss you won't get that fish to bite again. The good things are that they are pretty plentiful and if you can get a bait near the fish they can be aggressive. For us to be successful we needed several strikes to get one hook up. Just to prove a point Livie had three strikes and pulled two of those fish well out of the water but they were not hooked and dropped back into the water. I missed at least three myself. Then Livie broke the ice and landed her very first hook and line slender madtom ! She and I both lost another one or two. Then I finally caught my only slender madtom of the night. The worse part of the evening as that as we headed back downstream towards the car we passed a large hole around a large tree/rootwad and there were at least four or five madtoms in the hole ! Livie ended up the night with seven new species on the day and three new lifers. It was a great evening! She is close to halfway to her goal. We will keep at it.

I have suggested, prodded, (other OAF members have prodded as well0, but Livie would not write this post herself. Because I anted to showcase another life list species for her, here is the last post from when she and my betterhalf were in Maryland visiting me back in March/early April. We did get a break with a little better weather and the right tide, that allowed us to try for some schoolie stripers. With the long cold weather this was a crap shoot at best. I have had success fishing blade baits, like Johnson Thinfishers, etc., in this location in the past. I put on small black/chrome Thinfisher on Livie's rod and a silver XPS Lazer blade on my line. The wind made it difficult for Livie to get her bait out far enough to reach the edge of the channel where the fish were likely to be located. I made a few casts and no bites. I made a cast across the channel near the bridge and got a solid bite. I was able to land a 13 to 14" striper, my first of the year. I handed the rod to Livie. She was having trouble getting near the spot where I got bit. So I made the cast, she reeled and jigged the bait and got bit. She was shocked at the fight at first and then made up ground on the fish. She landed a nice 15" striper, which was a new life list fish for her ! I could not have been happier. Not only did she catch the bass, but got a small bonus anemone . We fished for another 15 to 20 minutes until it started getting dark. Did not get another bite. Was thinking about MOCarp on our next trip that was planned for Easter Sunday. I crumbled cheerios and raisin bran then mixed that with water and some cut worms. I put that in a bag and we drove down to a spot that I had seen carp and maybe some suckers last year. We pulled up to the access and I tossed out the chum mixture. We went and saw a movie to let the fish get into that area before we fished it. After the movie I set up the rods with a slip sinker fish finder rig. We loaded the hooks with worms. I got the first bite, but missed the hook set. Livie got a strong bite and hooked into the first fish of the day. Unlike last year when dad did not land her fish, I got the fish netted and Livie got a picture of her and a carp. As you could tell we were well hidden ! I missed a couple more fish. Livie blamed those lost strike on the OAFers that were texting me at the time (you both know who you are). She alos hooked into a larger carp that pulled the hook near the bank. She did catch a couple of white perch and I ended up with a goose egg on the day. As I state many times on this forum, I never have a problem with my daughters, son, or my betterhalf catching more or bigger fish (except when we are fighting for the catfish trophy), because if they have a good time I get to fish more ! Can't wait to get her back out to get back on the stripers when they are really thick.

Glad that you enjoyed your catch. I remember triggers having that super thick skin but it was not hard to pull that skin away from the meat. Nice firm flesh. Bet they would have made a nice cerviche.

Very Nice DJ! I've caught bonito and triggers, but never landed an amberjack. Thought that I may have one or two on previously but ended up with pulled hooks. Great fight while it lasted. Used to spearfish (don't tell anyone) triggers. I really like eating them . I agree with DNJ21 - keep the reports coming!

One of the great things about being an obsessive multispecies angler and a micro-fisherman is that no creek, tributary, drainage ditch is too small to potentially hold some new species. it also helps when you have a partner in crime, in this case my daughter, to convince your wife that a quick side trip to find a small creek is a good way to split the long trip. My wife and daughter stayed out in Maryland with me and we decided to drive to Memphis (that's another story) instead of a direct route back to Columbia. Suggesting the Memphis trip was primarily to visit the Bass Pro shops in the Pyramid, but a secondary motivation was to catch some of the diverse species found in Tennessee. We decided to drive through the night. I picked up driving after 3 am and was scanning every river, creek and stream as soon as it got light enough to see. After we passed the Duck River just outside of Bucksnort, TN, I pulled off at the next exit and tried to find any access to a tributary or the river itself. We did find a boat access and saw that the river was cold and colored up from the recent rains. We didn't wet a line. However, we found a small clear water creek going into the river. Below the culvert was a plunge pool followed by a series of riffles and pools. The pools held fish that neither Livie or I had ever seen before. I had on a long shank #20 hook and a small piece of worm that I put on the hook at the car. I dropped the bait into the school of minnows and caught my first rosyside dace. As elated as I was with this new life list species and the first fish that I ever caught in Tennessee, I was just as disappointed that the fish took my bait with the remaining piece of worm back in the car. Livie did not want to go back to the car to get another worm. So she dug around the creek and found a couple of small worms. With those worms, we got into a few other fish. Livie caught the first darter and we were not able to get a photo since it ended up back in the water after she got it unhooked. She did find a couple of more and even with the poor picture we were able to id this one as a buffalo darter based upon the humped back and the anal fin rays differentiating this species from the orangethroat darter. I had to get one as well and landed this buffalo darter, another life list species. I tried to catch a different looking darter in a deeper pool, but failed to get a good hook set and could not get it interested again after taking the bait once. There were a number of minnows and a couple of large ones with obvious nuptial tubercles. The small minnow kept taking the bait. Livie and I caught a couple of southern redbelly dace, a new species for her, but she could not hook and land one of the rosyside dace. The larger fish eventually left that pool or hid under the larger rocks/logs and we never did get a chance to hook one. Livie was determined to catch a rosyside dace and finally caught one in the pool where I hooked my first one. Then she hooked this fish. The body shape and mouth size would indicate that it might be just another rosyside dace, which I am inclined to go with. It's just that the coloration is just off a bit. I have not been able to get a good id on it and am open to suggestions by anyone familiar with Tennessee minnows . It was then that I got a text from my wife that we should head back on the highway. I'll leave this photo of a Luna moth near the road as a parting shot.

Congrats buddy! Benefit from years of experience. You'll never guesss where I am..... An airport! No turkey for me until maybe the last week of the season. Living vicariously from fellow OAFers!

That a Folly approved catch! Congrats on your hand fishing!