Gotta catch 'em all

Awesome scenery. Loads of fish. Great weather. What more could you ask for?


Growing up, I was lucky to see a bass on a fishing trip, let alone ever catch one. An excellent day of fishing was catching one largemouth, and I'd cherish the memory for weeks (I didn't get out much).

With more practice, I started catching bass more regularly, and, even had a few trips where I lost count of how many bucketmouth I had caught. Still, this never happened in my home state of Washington. Bass were just too hard to find, and too small to make things interesting. However, this year has been different. I’ve finally learned enough about bass fishing to make trips with loads of fish possible. Today was one of those days-loads of fish, big and small. Probably my best day for bass fishing in Washington, ever. I only took photos of a few of the fish though, got too caught up in the angling.

Went out to some small ponds (secret, shh!) out in the north county of Clark County last Sunday. Someone stocked these ponds years ago, and the fish have flourished with little or no serious fishing pressure. The background for this blog is taken from one of those ponds, and I have seen (and caught) some quality fish in this area. We hiked far back to reach the last ponds, clawing through blackberry bushes and stinging nettle to reach our goal.

Tossing the 4’’ Yum Dinger from a dropoff got me one largemouth, and I lost three more, missed hooksets. I elected to bring my light pole on this trip, reel loaded with 4lb test, so it is a little harder to drive the hook home on such light line.

Moved to another part of this pond and immediately started catching fish. It was nonstop action, for an hour easily, lots and lots of largemouth bass. Most of them were dinks or slightly bigger, but there were a few that pulled drag, thrashed and made wild runs. Beasts! They would explode out of the green grass/algae cover and destroy my Senko clone. I messed around with a Rapala and also with a dry fly/clear bobber. Had a few bluegills swat and miss, then switched back to Yum Dinger. Sometimes, I get in a rut and use the same lure, over and over, but it’s so hard to switch when the fishing is just so good with it. I think the biggest bass from this trip was about 4lbs, definitely a quality fish for the area.
 The 9mm shell box in the picture? Someone had  a little party out there, shooting, drinking and sitting by a campfire. Idiots left a lot of trash.

Finally, as the day was winding down, I moved to another part of the pond and found a whole new place to fish from. On my third cast, I watched a largemouth cautiously follow my lure, than a second bass nailed it from under the weeds. Awesome day.