May: Summer begins in May when the last exams are graded and final grades have been submitted. This summer, I prepared for three in anticipation of Jonny's and Zakur's visit.
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| With foam all things are possible |
I did a little point hunting before the corn got high. May was rainy, so fishing was difficult.
Scouted for carp, largely to no avail. The few I saw did not play nice.
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| Carp proved challenging. |
Explored a bit in the new kayak on those rare occasions when the river was navigable.
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| Navigable water: rare for this spring |
Got the boy out a couple times.
Attended a minor league game on a beautiful summer evening.
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| Sport |
She let the boys eat ballpark junk food, a minor miracle and they knew it.
June: Like May, June was wet. Real wet. Second wettest June on record.
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| To put it in perspective: I like to fish this water at about 350 CFS. May and June are dead to me. |
All plans to float for smallmouth had to be nixed. Instead, when EJ and Z arrived we headed to the lake country for a bit of camping and, hopefully, some quality largemouth bass fishing.
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| EJ and Z set up camp. I've lived in apartments smaller than this tent. |
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| Rain. The boats were there in case we needed to escape. |
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| Photographing a frog early in the trip; enthusiasm still high. |
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| Still raining. EJ pores over a vintage Gray's Sporting Journal, circa 1978 (which is also when he bought those socks.) |
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| Morning breaks moderately clear. EJ fries bagels in leftover bacon grease. Pure genius. |
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| Our evening ritual: three casts and you're out. |
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| Shoving off the first morning; manageable drizzle. |
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| Small, but an honest-to-God fish, dammit. |
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| Skies clear; fishing becomes tough. |
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| We load for another lake. |
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| It begins to rain again. |
The weather on the lakes was unpredictable. The fishing was, unfortunately, quite predictable. We managed a few small fish and decided we'd had enough.
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| We leave the lakes, defeated. |
We stopped at a small stream that had dropped to wadable levels, but it was still off-color and largely non-cooperative.
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| Z works the fast stuff. |
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| EJ works the slow. |
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| Only fish from the small stream: a straggling white bass. Jonny adds a new fish to his life list. |
Jonny and Z left to chase eastern trout, and I started to explore some other local waters.
I found a beautiful little stream, near to home and with enough willing fish that I can probably say it saved my mind.
Did a bit more point hunting with a friend.
One field gave up six cups of these black raspberries. This is summer in Indiana.
July: Rivers were still moody, but I found time to get some fish on waters familiar and new.
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| First gar: a strange and interesting fish. |
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| Aftermath of a whitefly (Ephoron species) hatch. I wish I'd been there yesterday. |
Ben took me to one of his locals, just a trickle but full of small willing smallmouth, and a few bigger ones as it turns out…
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| We knew it was big at this point. |
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| My turn. |
August: By now, the tomatoes in the garden were pure perfection and for reasons unknown, a pond that I had written off started producing largemouth again.
Ben and I floated a long stretch of new river, reputed to be one of the best smallmouth rivers in the state. It was a challenging river to fish, but worth it in the end.
The home river continues to be fickle, but gives in now and then.
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| Tricos, I think. |
And the pond…well, she and I both do our best to squeeze out the last of summer…
