Told My Wife I Was Fishing…. But Couldn’t Stay Away From The Beaver

CW and I made our now annual pilgrimage to Erie for spring bass over the weekend.  It seems we mis-timed the arrival of all of the bass into the shallows.  The water was still pretty cool and finding willing fish that were not on beds was a bit of a trick.  Had we been in a boat and not on foot, I understand there was great fishing to be had…  Sadly, no boat was to be had!

So mid-way through our first day I was wading through a narrow corridor in the  reeds and found myself face to face with the biggest hairiest beaver I have ever seen!  (Sorry… couldn’t resist)  She looked at me, I looked at her…. I didn’t flinch… neither did she.  She turned around and gave me a rear shot and slapped her tail angrily against the water and swam off.  The only thing I can surmise from the encounter is that I have no game and once again did something to cause the aforementioned beaver to turn tail and head in the opposite direction.  Apparently I have learned nothing since high school.  And for those of you that are wondering why I have no picture, I tried to snap a quick beaver shot but I was so awe struck by the furry creature that I couldn’t seem to get the camera out of my pocket fast enough…. story of my life.

So where was I… oh yeah… fish!  So despite some tough conditions, CW and I managed to have our way with some largemouth bass but the highlight of the trip was some brown lining that was done as we had to duck out of some ugly weather conditions.  The water on the lake was being whipped into a frenzy so we found a small cove on the inside of some tall reeds.  We found this because we followed a carp back through that narrow channel and hit the mother load.  Dozens and dozens of HUGE carp in spawn and pre-spawn ritual in two feet of water.  I switched gears and put on a small carp fly dropped it in the feed zone and waited…. small twitch… head turn… take!  Game ON!  In a matter of a minute the brute was headed into the reeds and I could do nothing to stop it.  Game OVER….  I will post a video showing my dismay later this week.

Luckily CW had his “A” Game and hooked into this beautiful 14lb monster that I had to help him dig out of a pile of weeds to finally land.  I think his smile pretty much says it all!

I also managed to hook and land my first ever Gar on the fly.  Scratch another one off of the species list!  What a great set of teeth!  🙂  It was truly comical watching me try to get this fish to open it’s mouth so I could retrieve my fly.  I looked like a total rookie but was trying not to lose a finger!

Our last night there the top water action for bass finally turned on and we had a blast throwing poppers into the night right before a massive storm front rolled in and the lightning began to strike…  I am as hardcore as they come when it comes to fishing.  We put in 14 hours on the water that day but even I don’t have any desire to be the headline of the local Erie papers that reads “Stupid Pittsburgh Man Gets a Charge Out of Fishing Presque Isle”.

All in all we fished till we could no longer cast, ate copious amounts of beef jerky and licorice, had some great encounters with mother nature, and reminded ourselves of why we love what we do so much.  Our next trip cannot come soon enough.  Don’t let the weather and the water keep you indoors!  Find a friend, find a trip, find a way!

More pics and video to come in my next post!!!!!

Good Luck and Tight Lines,

MBL