Not Just Me.

Its not just me.

The bass have been less than playful as of late. The weather has been yoyo'ing up and down, and the fish have noticed.

Now, I had been second guessing myself a bit on recent outings. I was doing all the things that I thought should equate to success, but they weren't panning out. Why? Me? The fish? The weather? The planetary alignment? A butterfly flapping its wings in China???

I had to meet with my builder at the house recently. He is also a fly guy. I hate to say it, but I was a little happy when he started telling me that he was having to work for his fish lately. Hey! So, it's not me. He, like I, are both suspecting the weather. Makes the most sense.

We have had three days of high temps, with fairly stable weather, so I was hopeful for this evening. I wasn't disappointed. Things were definitely more active tonight. I hooked into a good number of bass, and some sizable ones. Had I landed them all, it would have been a stellar outing. As luck would have it, few fish actually made it to hand. Still, much better than things were.

Most of the fish were caught deep, on a muddler variant. Some fish were hooked up top, but the numbers were nowhere as good as subsurface.

Esten

So, I finally made it out.

Recently, its either been the weather, or my banged up body, but I have only rarely made it out. When I did, the results weren't up to par. Things weren't a whole lot better tonight, but better it was.

It was pretty windy, much more than I prefer. Usually I would have passed on such a night. However, it had been a while and I was itching to play. I caught enough fish so that it was fairly steady action. None were great, and only one landed would qualify as 'good'. Most of the fish were caught on a popper, though the larger fish were all hooked subsurface.

Bottom banging.

I decided to take a full sinking line with me tonight. The fish have been hanging down deep. Today I found them in a little shallower water than the last few outings, but they were still hugging bottom. My floating line setup with a Clouser just wasn`t doing the trick.

In the few hours I was out, I managed a few bass. One was fairly decent. I tried the floating setup to no avail. All the fish were deep. The perch to. No interest in flies at the mid to high part of the water column. Down deep the flies would get a fair amount of attention. I managed a good number of perch. Also on the clouser.

New toys.

So, as I mentioned, I picked up a new rod the other day. I ordered it online from Amazon, sold by Fishwest.com. The reason for the Echo? Easy. The company has a great reputation. So when I was searching around for rods that would fit my low end budget, it was hard to pass up the Solo for 99$. Well, thats what I paid. When I ordered, I was contacted by Fishwest to say they had recently run out of stock. No biggie, I wasn`t in a hurry and I was very interested in the rod. I noticed that after my purchase, the price of the rods went up a few bucks. When it shipped  it became a debacle. No fault on the seller. USPS managed to somehow hold onto the parcel for almost 2 weeks before it even entered their system. Incredible. Even better, when it did finally arrive, one end have the tube had been completely removed. The rod ( in its protective case ) was free to slid in and out of the shipping container at will. In the end, it is a wonder that USPS an CanadaPost managed to get it here at all.

So, whats the Echo Solo like? Well, I had the same reaction to it that I did with the White River Hobbs Creek reel from Basspro. I was shocked that such a nicely made, and appointed rod could be had for so cheap. The low end entry level gear has come along way since I first started in this sport.  I have paid a lot more, for a lot less. I`ll likely do an in depth review of it some time in the future.

The second two is a Classic Accessories Roanoke Pontoon boat. This is also an entry level model from the manufacturer. I had it out for a bit this evening. Impressed with it so far, though there are a couple of minor complaints I maybe able to make. It was fairly easy to assemble. Again, a more in depth review will be forthcoming when I have used it more.