Yesterday I went off to Concepción reservoir with my son Leo to see if we might catch a black bass or two. The prospects were looking good and the level of the reservoir is as highs as I have seen it. When we arrived we saw a guy out on a float tube. He was out after bass too but fishing more conventionally with lures. Leo and I, of course, are purists and target bass only with flies. We are also, as it turned out, pretty crap fishermen having taken only one fish between us!
To be honest the fishing was very slow for everyone but the sun was shining and the reservoir was just beautiful so nobody was complaining. While I have two float tubes I have only one pair of neoprene chest waders and so one of us was going to draw the short straw and fish in a pair of shorts and get pretty chilly legs. The unfortunate one turned out to be Leo (actually I didn´t give him any choice!). Leo also manage to achieve the rather unusual distinction of getting sun burn and suffering hypothermia at the same time.
Scientists tell us that male fertility is enhanced when the gonads are kept in cool conditions. If this is true, Leo´s prolonged immersion in the cold reservoir should mean that, when the time comes, he should provide Trinny and me with a large number of grandchildren!
Interestingly, while the bass were keeping much to themselves, the carp in the margins were thrashing around mightily. Some were actually in and among the flooded grasses at the very edges. I imagine they are in the prelude to spawning and the males are showing off and courting the females. It is almost impossible to resist the temptation to pop a fly in among them but, not unexpectedly, they showed no interest at all.
The bass were also pretty slow off the mark. We started with poppers but changed very quickly to sunken flies and these only seemed to provoke any reaction when fished pretty deep and slow. In addition to the fish I landed I had a brief contact with two others, again, deep and slow.
Carp were active in the recently flooded shallows.
If you go about things quietly the fish show little fear.
My first black bass of the year.
What a hunk!
We pulled up to this abandoned stone building. Wild boar have been rooting around here recently and you can see the disturbed ground all around.
fishydreams 