7/12
PRY12 - 6.90ft.
Took the yak out late in the day and did a paddle/wade trip upstream on
Kilbuck Creek. The creek looked to be in good shape with water clarity at about 2.5 feet.
The bite was not what I expected it to be but I did manage to land 4 small smallies and a catfish.
I lost to decent size (15+ inches) smallies, one on a tube and one on a topwater.
The rains just don't seem to want to stop this year.
It's been a month since bringing a smallmouth to hand before this outing.
OUCH!
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After the event Jude grabbed his fly rod and hit the river with Tim and Pat following close behind. Jim and myself decided to hit a different stretch to finish out this awesome day.
(From Kishwaukee Valley Smallmouth Blog)
(http://kishwaukeevalleysmallmouth.blogspot.com)
Now that we were all done, we decided a little fishing was in order! A few of the guys couldn't stay on for fishing, other duties called them back home. We split up into 2 groups, I went off with Terry to a local creek for some smallmouth action. We decided to fish down stream, this stretch would be 90% new to me since I had only dabbled a little bit in this water. I started out using a new fly I came up with, an articulated hellgrammite, hellgrammites are a smallmouth favorite and I was hoping that with my attempt at this fly being articulated would only help. Caught a fish right away, nice, skunked would not happen. I continued throwing the fly through pools,riffles and around any structure I could see. This new fly seemed to be working, as I caught a few more fish, but the prize still lay ahead. We came up on a nice pool with 2 sunken and large tree limbs, dropped my fly between them both and let it drift through when it hit by a smallmouth, a good hook set and it was on. He was hell bent on taking me under one of those limbs, surely would have cut off had he done that and I knew it, so I managed to lift him over the limb, some good stress on the glass rod doing that. When I saw him, I knew it was a good fish, I knew it was going to beat my personal best, got him to shore, lipped him. Sure enough, be my personal best by a full inch, he taped at 16.5.
What a day, long, but so rewarding. I was tired and hot and the cold beer at home was calling,I parted ways with Terry and spent the drive back home with a bit of a grin on my face.
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7/17
DEK12 - 3.60
Hit the Kilbuck on an upstream wade and picked up 5 smallies and a catfish all on a black tube.
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7/18
DEK12 - 3.48
Did a float of the south branch with Jonn Graham from Oak Ridge F.P. to Kishwaukee River F.P.
Jonn picked up 5 on a spinnerbait while I picked up 3 on a tube.
Fishing was quite slow I believe do to high, but receding, waters.
Wish it could have been a better outing, but Jonn understands how it goes when you're chasing smallies in small rivers.
Maybe next time.
After Jonn and I finished up on the Kish, I shot over and floated Kilbuck looking
for better action, which was still not to be found.
I think I picked up 2 more dinks.
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7/19
APL12 - 2.57
ISA, NW Region Apple River Outing.
Hit the Apple with some ISA buddies. We broke into 3 groups and fished different sections of the river. Over 100 smallies were brought to hand on this day between 7 of us.
I fished with Paul T Sr. who picked up over 30 smallies, while I ended the day with 17.
I fished a 3.5 inch tube most of the day, which was a little too big for the small smallies we were catching, therefore keeping my catch #'s down.
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7/20
DEK12 - 3.32
Had to do a last minute scout of the area I plan to hold the Winnebago County Forest Preserve Districts "Get Outside!" Summer program to be held on Saturday, 7/26.
Picked up 1 smallie on the scout.
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A River Within
Bottom L-R: Terry, Jude, Josh. Top L-R: Pat, Paul, Tim, Jim.
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7/26
WCFPD/ISAA River Within
A BIG THANKS to Pat, Jude, Jim, Josh, Tim and Paul for making this happen.
July 26, 2014; A River Within
"Get Outside!" is a Summer program thru Winnebago County Forest Preserve District (WCFPD) whereas participants participate in many programs throughout the Summer and receive a stamp with the completion of each program to earn points towards winning prizes.
I was contacted a few months ago (sometime before Summer of course) about the Illinois Smallmouth Alliance (ISA) hosting one of the
programs. I talked with other ISA members about putting together some type of unique program. We decided that sticking along the lines
of education had more to offer people than just having them toss a worm & bobber in some water and hope a fish comes by and eats it.
We decided to have participants get their feet wet and do some hands on river seining so that they can learn of what types of creatures live within a river that fish like to feed on. After completion of the seining, I thought it would be cool if the participants could go on a horse drawn wagon ride along the trails of Deer Run F.P., Jamie at WCFPD also liked the idea and set this up.
The day started off with ISA members meeting at the Cherry Valley Cafe in Cherry Valley, Illinois, at 7:30am for some good chow and of course talk on how what a terrible year this has been from the high waters keeping us out of our rivers. After breakfast it was off to Deer Run Forest Preserve to set up base camp and do some pre-seining so that we could display some creatures in a tank for people to view while waiting for the program to begin. A few minnows, a couple clames and a couple big tadpoles filled the tank.
Bottom L-R: Terry, Jude, Josh. Top L-R: Pat, Paul, Tim, Jim.
The program was limited to 30 people, and was full, but only 17 of the 30 showed. Everybody seemed to enjoy the program and had a good time running the seine nets up and down the river to see what they might pull up.
There's not much more to report other than I think a few of the kids will remember this day for quite sometime.
I leave you with pictures of the day......
After the event Jude grabbed his fly rod and hit the river with Tim and Pat following close behind. Jim and myself decided to hit a different stretch to finish out this awesome day.
(From Kishwaukee Valley Smallmouth Blog)
(http://kishwaukeevalleysmallmouth.blogspot.com)
By Jim Sietsema
Now that we were all done, we decided a little fishing was in order! A few of the guys couldn't stay on for fishing, other duties called them back home. We split up into 2 groups, I went off with Terry to a local creek for some smallmouth action. We decided to fish down stream, this stretch would be 90% new to me since I had only dabbled a little bit in this water. I started out using a new fly I came up with, an articulated hellgrammite, hellgrammites are a smallmouth favorite and I was hoping that with my attempt at this fly being articulated would only help. Caught a fish right away, nice, skunked would not happen. I continued throwing the fly through pools,riffles and around any structure I could see. This new fly seemed to be working, as I caught a few more fish, but the prize still lay ahead. We came up on a nice pool with 2 sunken and large tree limbs, dropped my fly between them both and let it drift through when it hit by a smallmouth, a good hook set and it was on. He was hell bent on taking me under one of those limbs, surely would have cut off had he done that and I knew it, so I managed to lift him over the limb, some good stress on the glass rod doing that. When I saw him, I knew it was a good fish, I knew it was going to beat my personal best, got him to shore, lipped him. Sure enough, be my personal best by a full inch, he taped at 16.5.
What a day, long, but so rewarding. I was tired and hot and the cold beer at home was calling,I parted ways with Terry and spent the drive back home with a bit of a grin on my face.
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