Beautiful Day, but Terrible Day Fishing 08/20/10

Hello Folks,

I spent my last day fishing on the river before my surgery on Monday, August 23, 2010. The surgical procedure is scheduled for 9:00 a.m. and I have to be at the surgical center by 7:30 a.m. Oh Joy! Nothing to eat after midnight.

The G3 was all prepped and ready to roll before I went to bed last evening. I wanted to make sure that my last day on the water for a couple of months would get off to a great start.

I could only get broken sleep last evening because my elbow was throbbing most of the night. Usually when I awake and it hurts like that, I'll turn on some late night t.v., get bored, and let it put me back to sleep.

I arose at 5:30 a.m., washed, shaved, and dressed for a morning on the river. Downstairs, I had a quick breakfast and out the door. What's nice about rising so early is that my wife is also getting up for work and we can spend a few minutes together before walking out the door for our day.

I arrived at the ramp around 6:30 a.m. and the only other boat trailer in the parking lot belong to my good friend and fellow teacher, Joe Herman. Joe had Bernie Santaniello and John (custodian at Penn Manor High School) out fishing for catties this morning. I met up with them about an hour into fishing.

Bernie was a teacher of ours back in the late 60's and early 70's at J. P. McCaskey High School in Lancaster, Pa. He also coached track and field and was one of my middle brothers track coaches.

The water temperature on the river was 75.6 degrees and the air temp was a nice cool 63 degrees. The air temp rose rather quickly to 81 degrees by 10:30 a.m., but the water temp remained stationary. There was a slight NW breeze blowing. It was rather pleasant outside this morning despite the high humidity.

The water clarity was murky and the level in Harrisburg was holding at 3.2'. Safe Harbor Dam was suppose to have Lake Aldred at 169' at 7:00 a.m., but I believe that it was down a bit from that. I noticed that they had a crew inspecting some of the concrete deck supports. There is a work crew doing repair work on one support already.

I followed my normal routine by starting out with a buzzbait over shallow ledges, switching to a spinnerbait, and then to a crankbait. Nothing was finding success today.

This past Tuesday, we were able to nail a few good smallies on crankbaits, but it took us a while to get onto the pattern before catching a few. This morning, I couldn't get anything started... Nada, Zilch!

I had one small bass and another swirl at the crankbait as I was pulling it out of the water and that folks was it. What a poor showing after a decent Tuesday. When I spoke to Joe, they only had one cattie between the three of them. While we were talking, I witnessed Joe having two "hit and misses." Two fish between four anglers is pretty darn bad.

It was rather hot and humid yesterday. But as the day progressed, the humidity broke and a nice high pressure started to move in over us from the NW. The humidity built up once again through the evening and we had a lot of dew by morning.

A major front had moved in over us and may have contributed to the poor show of fish(?).

Not only did I get to speak to Joe, but I also got a chance to speak briefly with a kayak angler who even said that he was having trouble getting the channel catties to bite... Pretty sad morning on the river.

Joe said that before daybreak they witnssed both bass and catties busting the surface, but they had no luck at all getting them to bite a lure.

It wasn't the way I wanted to end my fishing adventures before my elbow surgery, but at least I felt up to it enough this morning to get out of bed and hit the water... LOL!

During my break from fishing, I'm hoping to bring you some information and pics regarding my jet rig, tackle, and gear. I think I'll have plenty to talk about over the next few weeks as I rehab and work towards getting back on the water.

Take Care,
Dad

p.s. I forgot to mention that I saw an immature eagle and an osprey today. We've had several osprey in this area of the river over the summer. We don't get to see many this far upriver from the Susquehanna Flats and the Chesapeake Bay.