Everything That Swims: Winter Fly Fishing for Bass and Bluegill

Headed down to my neighbors pond today, hoping to tie into a couple bluegills or crappie on nymphs. I tied up with a #14 bead head prince nymph and a 10 foot leader, so I could fish a little deeper with floating line. I missed a couple fish before hooking into a nice female sunfish, and on the very next cast, I caught a smaller female. The fish fought really well, but felt like ice cubes in my hands when I was unhooking them. I was puzzled as to why the fish were not being sluggish, as they normally are very lethargic fighters when the water is this cold.
I headed to the "upper" pond that is about 1/2 an acre and used to collect silt, a place where I have good success fishing a drop off from 2-5 feet with streamers. I tied up a #8 bead head woolly bugger with a black chenille body, and a dark purple marabou tail with a couple strands of flashabou. Darker colors are my favorite this time of year especially with stained or muddy water. I landed a 3/4lb largemouth first, then a nice "bull" bluegill. By now I was pretty much going by feel, I could not watch my fly line in the water, I could only see the ripples from the impact of the line and fly hitting the water. I had a couple hits, but couldn't bury a hook in anything. Finally I tied into something decent. The fish was very slow at first, but he "woke up" as the fight went on, and I brought a good 13-15" largemouth to my net. I decided I would call it at that, it was far too dark to attempt any more fishing. I did hang around a bit to watch the geese come to roost, I saw probably 150 geese, but they were headed to another roost and only 6 or 7 birds came in. Still fun to watch though. Thanks for reading!

The fish were very far out in the pond, just look how naked my spool is... I was stretching the limits of my 3 weight with the double haul. Thank goodness it's a fast action rod.