Lloyd

Sorry to hear this. One summer day in the late 90s I was chasing stripers with a buddy of mine around Menemsha, a fishing village on the north side of Martha's Vineyard. When we pulled up to the dock who did we see but Flip Pallot. We had watched many episodes of The Walkers Cay Chronicles and I was in equal parts awe and disbelief. But my brazen friend, who at the time was about 15 years old, walked straight up to Flip and asked if he'd like to join us on his 13 foot Boston Whaler. And Flip said sure, why not? He was short on time so we only motored a few hundred feet down the channel before dropping anchor, putting us within casting range of a sandy flat where stripers cruised. It was mid-day and the water was super clear, so I didn't expect to catch anything on artificials. Live mackerel had been the ticket for those conditions. But Flip pulled out a streamer and began working the current seams with his fly rod, and within about 20 minutes he nailed a decent bass. My friend and I were throwing jointed plugs on spinning gear and we couldn't conjure a single hit. The entire time Flip was as friendly as could be, asking us all about our recent adventures and regaling us with a few tales of his own. Soon after that we had to head back to the dock, but the memory was made. Flip Pallot was a great fisherman, and a gentleman.

Very nice! Congrats, John!! Great pictures, too 😀.

That's awesome. One of my regular creeks has a lot of smallmouth, but it's heavily pressured for its entire length. The other one gets a lot less attention, but it only has about half the flow and many of the good pools have silted in over the last few years. I really want to find a few more of those under the radar creeks (which is presumably becoming harder and harder), even if that means driving an additional half hour each way. Let's just say I spend a lot of time on Google maps :).

Congrats on your move! I'm 60 - 75 miles from some good creeks. If that number were 20 and I were fishing 4 days a week, it might change my perspective a bit.

Yeah, I strongly prefer artificials as well, but in those situations where there are big bass in front of me and they aren't eating my lures (maybe because they're inactive, or because they see me, or because my lures look ridiculous and nothing like the prey they supposedly represent), I will resort to live craws or minnows if they're available. And they almost always get it done. IMO the big downsides to live bait are: 1) getting it is often a challenge, 2) keeping it frisky on your hook is another challenge, 3) you can't cover much water with it, and 4) it's a pretty boring way to fish.

I get to creek fish three times per month at best, so maybe 10 - 15 trips per year. Given that my time on the water is priceless, I don't mind paying a little more to have the best possible lure for the job. Fortunately, flukes are cheap :).

Can you catch live crayfish at your creek? As WestCentral said, if you can see the fish, they can see you, but as long as they're not spooked it's rare that they won't slurp a well presented craw.

They definitely stocked it last winter. I caught a few.

Dang, what a huge bummer. On the flip side, I'm impressed that anyone (I assume it was MDC?) was collecting data on a pond as small as Walker.

In my experience it's not easy to consistently catch bass in the summer in most St. Louis area ponds. The prespawn period (March - April) is about 10x better both for size and numbers. In the summer there are days when the fish are biting like crazy, but they are few and far between. I think a lot of the ponds have healthy populations of bass, but all the fishing pressure has a very negative impact on catch rates.

That's awesome! Way to get her started on the right foot! I've tried to introduce some of my more casual fishing friends to the fluke and they're still a bit skeptical :).

Thanks, John! It really is an amazing bait. Definitely my favorite smallmouth lure, and there isn't a close second. That erratic action just triggers them like nothing else.

On Sunday I had a marathon creek fishing day, starting before 6 am and ending after 8 pm, and the fish were chomping. I've heard that on the Susquehanna the fishing is best after rain when the water is rising, and maybe that's the case here, too. According to a nearby river gauge the water level peaked around 3 am and then started dropping, and the water at the creek was up and had a slight stain. Over the course of the morning and afternoon I caught a number of 17 - 19.5 inch fish on a fluke and a WTD bait, making it a great day, but the best was yet to come. It was a little after 6 pm towards the upper end of the smallmouth habitat on the creek. I had made a cast into the lower end of a long pool when I saw a big wake behind my fluke. It followed for several seconds before it hit, and then a drawn out battle ensued. When the fish jumped I saw that it was big, but I didn’t realize just how big. Maybe I should have guessed, because she just wouldn't come in. I’d gain some line, and then she’d make a 10 - 15 foot run. There was a small tree in the water towards the far bank, and she very nearly got into it a few times. I had to really strain the line to keep her out. This was the first time while fighting a smallmouth that I felt that 8 lb. test wasn’t quite enough. I would have felt a lot better with 10 or 12 lb., as she definitely had the upper hand for most of the fight. Obviously I lost all sense of time while fighting the fish, but I’d guess it took me about two minutes to get her to the bank, and then I saw what a tank she was. I knew immediately that she was pushing 20 inches if not over 20. And her depth was so much more impressive than any of the 19 inch fish I’ve caught. I had the thought that she was in a different category of fish, that she might as well have been a different species. Holding her up for pictures, I was confident she weighed at least four lb.s, although I’ll never know for sure. While keeping her in the water I carefully measured her several times and she was a little over 20 inches. I've caught the same fish twice several times on this creek. When released she swam off strongly, so hopefully I'll have another run in with her in the near future. What a thrill.

I had a similar experience a few weekends ago. I explored two creeks that I'd never been to before, but which have reputations for being decent smallmouth fisheries. The first creek I visited was awful. The scenery was beautiful, but there were hardly any bass, and the few that were there were small and tight-lipped. The second creek was completely different in terms of results. I was throwing a Shower Blows 77 WTD lure and almost immediately I caught a 14" smallie. A good start, and in stark contrast to the first creek. I made my way upstream, and continued to catch fish, but after that one smallie all I caught were 10 - 12" spots. It was definitely fun to catch these fish on topwater, and their strikes made them look a lot bigger than they were. But after a while I started to get tired of them, and wanted to catch a big smallie. I plan to try some different sections of this creek and will hopefully find some that are less crowded with spots.

Well said. I've been fishing for almost 40 years and I've learned a lot, but it's obvious that there's still SO MUCH MORE to learn. Most of the time when I try something new I end up very glad I did, because I uncover some new wrinkle that changes the way I think about fishing, almost like an unlock in a video game. To me the experimentation you can do while fishing is one of the most satisfying aspects of the sport.