Urban Spey Casting and Freshwater Redfish...

It started with a phone call...

"Two Handers, Catfish, the Ohio River..." was pretty much the jist of the message I left on Jarret's voicemail on Monday.

We had both been itching to blow the cobwebs out of our spey casts and the tree-lined, big water of the Ohio provided a perfect place to do so. The prospect of hooking a big cat on the two hander added even more excitement to the mix.

The plan was to meet on the river sometime after work and throw our heaviest tips and that is exactly what we did. Despite a valiant effort, even Type-8 tips and weighted flies weren't enough to scratch the bottom of the swollen river, (brace for the lame cliche') but at least we were making somewhat serviceable casts...



While we sometimes think that we are dedicated, hard-core fishermen that will stick it out for just that one fish, it was quickly becoming apparent that the odds were stacked against us. We decided it was time for a change of location. As we walked back to the car, I mentioned that I thought we should take a quick look at one more spot that usually holds fish. As we peered over the railing, we could see the backs of several large fish hovering in a soft spot just below the dam...

We quickly hopped our way down the rocks and I lobbed a clouser into the soft spot. It was greeted by none other than a close cousin to the redfish....

...the freshwater drum...sheephead...or shithead as walleye fishermen affectionately know them. Call them what you will, but these guys honestly have a bad rap as a trash fish. Not only do they pull like a freight train, but they are plentiful in our rivers and grab flies like nobodies business.

Two handers were swapped out for an 8 wt and we were quickly taking turns catching some very nice fish that were making us glad that the outfit we chose had a fighting butt and strong drag...

Most fish were in the 1-3 lb range, but a few went well over that and you knew right away when a bigger fish had decided to grab your fly. I found myself a few turns from my backing chasing a fish down the bank on more than one occasion and Jarret and I were rewarded for our efforts with a sore arm and a few big sloppy drum...

...so say what you will, but I know where I am going when gas is $4.50 a gallon and I'm looking for a fish that pulls...and I definitely haven't forgotten about those catfish!

What a week...

Sorry for the lull in writing, but I was fortunate enough to get out and fish 4 out of 7 days this week and decided to change hosts for my blog, so needless to say the blog didn't get updated as much as it should have.

On to more pressing issues...the past week has provided a real mixed bag of opportunities; from floating for trout and smallies, to drowning worms on the river, to hiking into a Class A brown trout stream. The only thing that stayed consistent was the quality of fishing and the great company I got to share it with...

Sunday was spent floating the Upper Yough for trout and while we turned some monsters on big streamers, the biggest fish that ended up coming to the boat was a smallie that Bryan nailed in the first mile of the float. Shortly after he proceeded to break off a nice northern and had a charge from a brown that easily went over 25"!

Meg and I spent Wednesday night catching catfish and drum on the Ohio. There was rarely a dull moment and despite Meg's best efforts to study, I think she spent just as much time reeling in fish as she did reading...

I floated the Bottom Yough on Saturday with Dad and Tom and we finally had the weather and flows to get the smallies active. This was what we had all been waiting for; Sandals and shorts, cold beers, great weather and smallies blasting clousers and topwaters. What more could we ask for? How about a kick ass ropeswing and a my biggest smallie from the Yough to date? That'll do...

Sunday began with Meg saying, "I could go for blueberry pancakes." Seeing that we had no blueberries in the house and I make crappy pancakes, we decided to head to a diner that just so happens to be about 10 minutes for a great hike-in wild brown trout stream. After stuffing our faces with everything BUT blueberry pancakes (I'm not sure how that happened), we burned off our breakfast by hiking 2 miles to the mouth of the stream and sharing a rod while fishing our way back up. Low, slow water made things tough, but we managed one gorgeous fish from a plunge pool that always produces...

All my previous blog entries...

...can be found at http://www.flyfishblogger.com/InTheDrift