Day 2, and sure enough, nothing like yesterday. I can’t get over how drastically the water gets jacked around by the city out here from one day to the next. It was far from a complete bust though. The fish that were so actively waving their tails around yesterday had mostly all vanished but there were still a few cruisers in the shallow channel on the opposite shoreline. …continue reading Carpin… Day 2

I didn’t expect this when I lazily showed up at the sludge this afternoon anticipating another routine skunking. Carp were everywhere, tailing, daisy-chaining, cruising, and rooting; big ones, little ones, gold ones, and for the first time, a BLAZE-ORANGE little guy! …continue reading What the… Koi?

Jeff had reportedly gotten into a few over-sized gold fish cruising & tailing a few weeks ago. A week later I made a quick scouting run out to have a look and sure enough, carp were everywhere! The mud holes that had appeared vacant of fish over the past few months were suddenly teeming with big, fat, golden beauties! The days had been getting longer, the weather warmer, and big gold tails were waving. With spring in the air, the 7 weight came out of the closet and when the weekend arrived, off we headed to trudge through the sludge.
…continue reading Carp on the Fly, March 2nd, 2008

I did a little more carp pond exploring with Jeff and found a slough with a few nice fish that would consistently swim past and completely ignore any and every fly we’d put in front of them. After Jeff had successfully remained unsuccessful on a few of his own after-work trips I joined him for an evening and together we chalked up another day of defeat. …continue reading Goldens, update, June 1, 2007

The SF Bay Goldens have been ON over the last few weeks! May is really appearing to be the hot month for these sludge-pond, bottom-sucking hoovers. From the generic trout flies to the more unique, specialty “fly-of-the-hour” patterns, they’ve kept us entertained, intrigued, perplexed, and flat-out frustrated over the last two weeks. It’s been GREAT! …continue reading Goldens, May 19th, 2007

I headed back down to the sludge ponds Saturday afternoon. The day was beautiful and sunny, but the wind was howling. I didn’t expect to find any fish and almost left the rod at home. I say almost, but I’d made that mistake enough times in the past, and I’m glad I didn’t make it again on this outing. As I got out of the truck, the wind about took the door off its hinges. The pond had whitecaps and had it not been such a sunny day I probably would have turned around and gone somewhere else. …continue reading Goldens, May 6th, 2007

I slapped on the SPF 15, pulled the mountain bike out of the closet, inflated the tires, lubed the chain, grabbed the camera, and headed for the carp ponds. It had been a few months since I’d checked them out and those last few times were rather depressing considering the waterless wasteland the city had left behind in their valiant efforts of fending off the WNV (West Nile Virus). …continue reading Goldens, April 1st, 2007

It started a few weeks ago while exploring some new waterways on my mountain bike. After about 15 miles of peddling along levees, through “Employee Only” parking lots and around saltwater marshes and brackish ponds, I finally saw what I was looking for. …continue reading SF Bones 6/21/2006

It appeared that our long awaited nice weather had finally arrived for good. The sun was out and the temperatures were in the 80’s. The stripers were chasing bait in the big lake, the carp were rooting in the shallow ponds, and Monterey Bay’s surf perch were feeding in the salty wash. It looked as if the Golden State’s winter of record rainfall was officially behind us.
…continue reading Bay Area Slam

Rocky Mountain Bones, Poorman’s Permit, Delta Goldens…
A friend and I were talking the other day about steelhead fishing and trout fishing, two subjects that too often accompany each other into the same conversation between us. We were rambling on about the frustration of rejections and refusals experienced while fishing dry flies. …continue reading SF Bones 4/24/2006

Despite dropping water temps already down to the mid 50’s, the first solo trip since the boat restoration was surprisingly successful. …continue reading Delta Solo 12/9/05