Low, heavy clouds, cool drizzle, and exhausted from staying up too late the night before, I left San Antonio on my way back home, disappointed that my trip the South Llano this weekend had to be canceled. It seems the less time I have to fish, the more often the weather does not cooperate.
Heading north on 35 and having all my gear in my truck, I figured stopping and fishing my old stomping grounds would be fun. A little drizzle wouldn't hurt me, and the San Marcos River was actually warmer than the air.
I had grown up fishing here, skipped class in college to fish here, and though I hadn't fished it in years, I still felt like I knew the water like the back of my hand.
I parked my truck, put on my rain jacket, rigged up a rod, and walked down to the water. I wadded out to thigh deep water, cast my fly, a
Hot Tail Mini-Craw, upstream to a break behind a log in the strong current. First cast, nothing. Second cast, nothing. Third cast, FISH!
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| Redbreast Sunfish, Hybrid of some sort? Help me out here! |
I readily snapped a picture and released the fish, then quickly made another cast to the same spot. Smack, another fish on the next cast!
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| Redbreast Sunfish |
I began to move around and cast to different spots. Each spot on the river seemed to have its own specific species. The last spot was Redbreast Sunfish, the next spot was Redspotted Sunfish.
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| Pretty sure this is a Red Spotted Sunfish |
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| Possible Redspotted Sunfish Hybrid? |
I moved again, and again I caught more sunnies!
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| Another Redbreast Sunfish Hybrid? |
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| Redbreast Sunfish |
This was the outlier in Redbreast Sunfish spot.
Identification help needed!
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| Redbreast Sunfish |
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| Redbreast Sunfish |
The trees above seemed especially large in comparison to everything else around me.
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| Roughleaf Dogwood Flowers on the banks of the river |
I continued to move, explore, and remember. I still remembered all these spots from when I was a kid.
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| Possible Hybrid Sunfish? |
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| Redbreast Sunfish |
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| Bluegill x Redbreast Hybrid? |
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| Redbreast Sunfish |
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| Bluegill x Redbreast Hybrid? |
And the award for most beautiful fish of the day went to my last fish of the day.
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| Possible Redspotted x Redbreast Hybrid |
Although my weekend fishing didn't exactly go as planed, the refreshing waters and small beauty revived me. Just a little reminder that life is what you believe it to be.
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The colors on this sunfish were so rich, just amazing.
Redspotted x Redbreast Hybrid? |
*Please feel free to leave me comments on this post. I certainly could use some help in identifying some of the sunfish!
Nice variety of sunnies, looks like a great day on the water...
ReplyDeleteThanks, and yes it was a great day. I don't usually share all my pictures from a trip, but I decided to this time.
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