Last weekend I had the chance to travel to a friend's farm near Jamesport, Missouri, with my two boys and my girlfriend Wendy. There were a few ponds on the property and we caught fish at all of them but one definitely stuck out in terms of size and productivity. This pond was small. When I say small, I mean this thing was almost the size of an average driveway. Now I know what you are probably thinking. You're probably thinking that was some sort of exaggeration but I swear that it isn't. You could cast all the way across the pond and fish it in a total of about 5 casts. I almost refused to fish it because of its size to be honest, but I hadn't caught much that morning and thought I could pick up a few small fish.
It looked like the type of pond that would be overrun with small, stunted green sunfish. I thought it would be fun to pick up a few small fish on a fly. I threw a John Deere under a strike indicator but that only got a few nibbles. I was about ready to just give up on the pond when the owner walked by. He told me to try a plastic worm on the north side of the pond. That seemed like a pretty big bait to use on such a small pond to me! Then he told me that he routinely pulls 15 inch bass out of the pond! Now I'm not one to call someone a liar on a whim, but I gotta say that I doubted his claim. This guy is very intelligent and I didn't have a reason to think he was pulling my leg. After a few more casts, I decided to pick up a spinning rod with a larger lure.
I had a medium heavy action rod with a Zoom chigger craw already rigged and ready to go. I thought about changing to the suggested worm but I had such little faith in the owner's claim that I actually figured "What's the difference between not catching fish on a worm versus not catching fish on a craw?" I walked back to the pond and made a cast. Nothing. Second cast, missed a bite. Third cast, one pound bass. Fourth cast, small bass. Fifth cast, one and a half pound bass.
I was in shock! I was also bragging to everyone that would listen that I was catching a fish on almost every cast. That got the attention of my girlfriend that had only caught small bluegill so far that morning. She picked up the same rod and started catching bass on every cast too.
Then my oldest son hadn't caught anything all morning, and he reeled in a bass too. I couldn't believe it! He was thrilled and his smile says it all.
Next up was Grayson. I had just met this young man earlier that morning but I could tell he was a good kid. This poor guy hadn't caught jack all morning! I was hopeful that the bite would continue and produce a fish to avoid getting skunked. He had never used a spinning rod before so I made a cast for him and his lure got SMASHED on the retrieve. As if I wasn't shocked and amazed by this little pond already, my eyes almost popped out of my head when I saw what he had hooked. It was a bass and noticeably larger than the other fish we had caught. Grayson landed the fish like a pro and the tale of the tape was 18 inches long and 3.5 pounds!
We picked up a few more fish, but nothing the size of Grayson's bass. After eating lunch, we headed to another pond where the owner of the property caught a nice catfish. It was late in the day and we were about to head home when Wendy jokingly mentioned fishing the small pond one more time. After we got everything packed up and ready to head home, I handed her the spinning rod that we had caught everything on earlier in the day. This time it had a 1/4 ounce spinnerbait with a trailer hook. I've caught a lot of farm pond bass on this set up before and was hopeful that she would catch one more nice bass on it as the sun was getting low.
She didn't catch a single bass on it but this peculiar little pond that had produced so well over the course of the day had one more surprise in store for us. As she was retrieving the lure, we saw a boil and she set the hook on a fish. As she was bringing it in, I noticed that the fish sure had a lot of white to it. As it got the the bank I realized that it was one of the biggest crappie I had ever seen. In the end, she landed a crappie that was 13 inches and right at a pound!
Even after a few days and while I am typing this, I am still in shock that a pond so small could produce so many fish as well as fish with size to them! I'm still not sure how this is possible but I sure know that I will carry the tale of the little pond near Jamesport with me for a long time! I guess it just goes to show that you never know what to expect when you go fishing and that anything can happen at any time!
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