Kayak Fly Fishing For "Grassies"

   On Satuday, I grabbed my 3 weight, my kayak, a box of cicada flies, and headed to Hollymead Lake. Forest Lakes South got hit pretty hard this year with cicadas, so I decided I would try there. I had a couple small bass and bluegill look at my fly, but I think they were too full to eat any more cicadas. I did, however, have a grass carp slurp down my cicada fly, but I missed it. I paddled around the lake a little longer, catching 2 bluegill and a small bass, before finally hooking and landing a 25" grass carp. My little brother also found that "emerger" cicadas (still in the shell) that we had frozen a couple weeks ago were working for the grass carp. We paddled into the flats at the upper end of the lake, and everywhere we looked, there were schools of carp. When grassies are schooled up, the competition for food is pretty high, so everything that gets cast at them is usually eaten. We had very good luck for about half an hour until the wind picked up and the fish spread out. For the rest of the day, we paddled around and cast at mainly singles, or groups of 2-3 fish, which are a lot more wary and hard to present a bait to without spooking them. At the end of the day, I ended up landing 7 grass carp ranging 25-28", and my brother Ewing landed 6. We will definitely be back for more! Thanks for reading!

                                                This one slimed up my kayak pretty bad

          First one of the day landed when we pulled our kayaks on the bank in this cove and one swam in.