"Throw everything in the car and try somewhere? Naw, I haven't been seeing many ducks around yet anyway. Use today to get your ducks in a row (ducks in a row
)."So I spent a good chunk of yesterday prepping (fiddling around) for a cast & blast safari to the Ochlocknee River above Lake Talquin. Then started thinking, "Hmmm, opening weekend. If I'm thinking of going to Talquin at least a hun'erd other guys are thinking the same thing. Wakulla, again? Not between the bridges, too many houses there nowadays. Put in at Lower Bridge, cast & blast down to Shell Island and back? That'll work. Just stay out of the sloughs on the west side with a shottygun with you. Shouldn't be many people on the river, haven't seen many ducks there, sightseer season is over, 30% chance of rain."
Shortly after 6 found me at Lower Bridge sliding the canoe off the top of the car and stowing my old pump-gun aboard. Legal shooting time found me throwing a shallow running Swimmin' Image across the rocky shoal below Lower Bridge. Falling tide, clear water. Saw a single woody, then a little bunch of four, all much too far and in a hurry to get somewhere. Thought for sure somebody would be in the blind on the little island down from the Olin Park. Nobody there. Saw one other guy hunting ducks on this whole stretch of river and only three other boats all day.
Worked my way down to Big Boggy with two quick shots and two coots to my credit. Lots of casts and no fish. Went a little bit below the entrance to Big Boggy, then turned around and stuck the bow of the boat up in Big Boggy. Lots of little bass just inside there, all hungry. Explored up Big Boggy a little ways with the water so low the canoe was scraping bottom most of the way. Gold mine
, found a nice deposit of that gray sticky clay Granpa Pulley used to call Pirate Soap. Form a handful into a soap size bar and keep in a plastic bag to keep it moist. Works for washing the fish smell off your hands, out of sinks, coolers, etc.Came out of Big Boggy and started back up the river. Got as far as a Certain Spot Tin Can was telling me about, easy to find with this low water, and it started to rain. "Oh, this is nothing. It'll just be a little shower and stop soon." Started catching fish on almost every cast. Mostly small, but a few keepers thrown in. The larger fish didn't want a crankbait, nor did they want a suspending jerkbait. They wanted the old standby black and yellow Snagless Sally and it's still raining. Caught a bunch along this stretch of shore, kept three, moved on up and picked up another that would wind up being my third biggest and it's still raining. "Hey man, I'm wet." "So? You ain't never been wet before?"
"HERETHEYCOME" "DROPTHEROD, JUSTDROPIT" "Not over the side, moron" "GETITLATER" "GUN-GUN" BOOM, one down. BOOM, two down. "CEEEEEASE FIIIRE, CEEASE FIRE. RELOAD. Make a Condition One Weapon." Recovered the rod with a paddle. "Glad we weren't in the channel, moron." "What are you complaining about? We're not going to get any wetter." Recovered the empties. Recovered the birds. "Well, that's the limit on bluebills, remember when we used to be able to shoot ten of these?" "Yep, remember when we used to have to clean ten of these?"
Got back up to the deep hole below the bridge and found my fifth and largest keeper on the edge of the sharp drop-off. Hooked something else there that went immediately to the bottom of the hole and stayed there when the hook pulled out. Grouper?
In spite of finishing wet, cold and very hungry, an excellent day. Threw steel in the air 7 times and accounted for 3 coots (mostly gizzard
) and two bluebills, with the black and yellow Snagless Sally pulling through again for a limit of bass and home by 3. edit-Forgot the picture.
