Official AK fishing thread

I caught this today fishingin the Flint River ,downtown Flint Michigan.... The the same Flint River with the bad water and high murder rate. It's Thompson Center Arms 50 caliber black powder or muzzle loading rifle with a bushnell scope. You never know what you'll get.View attachment 1251321

Holy crap! From what I can see of your pic, it doesn't look like it had been down there very long.
Is it corroded pretty badly?
 
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Holy crap! From what I can see of your pic, it doesn't look like it had been down there very long.
Is it corroded pretty bad?
Yeah gonna have a buddy who is a gun nut come over and check it out, Flint river is pretty corosive, hench the drinking water problem. Either way it's a cool trophy!
 
Yeah gonna have a buddy who is a gun nut come over and check it out, Flint river is pretty corosive, hench the drinking water problem. Either way it's a cool trophy!
Oh yeah, I'd forgotten about the sad drinking water problem. I don't know much about muzzle loaders. I'm wondering if they have a ballistic signature like rifles do.
 
Oh yeah, I'd forgotten about the sad drinking water problem. I don't know much about muzzle loaders. I'm wondering if they have a ballistic signature like rifles do.

I bet that same question went through the mind of the person who ditched that muzzle loader....
 
Not the sort of thing some folks would want to have in their Google search history....
Yes sir. We're living in weird times. I was just trying to think of what I would do if I had caught a gun in the Flint river. Turn it in to cover my ass and maybe help to solve a crime? Probably.
Keep it as a cool trophy? Maybe. I don't know.

EDIT--What I would do- just my personal opinion:
Turn it in to cover my ass and maybe help to solve a crime?: YES
Keep it as a cool trophy?: NO
 
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Yes sir. We're living in weird times. I was just trying to think of what I would do if I had caught a gun in the Flint river. Turn it in to cover my ass and maybe help to solve a crime? Probably.
Keep it as a cool trophy? Maybe. I don't know.

EDIT--What I would do- just my personal opinion:
Turn it in to cover my ass and maybe help to solve a crime?: YES
Keep it as a cool trophy?: NO
I think someone, I.E. Locals, stole it , couldn't figure out what or how to use it, and threw it out, kinda like the best inner city theft device....a stick shift car!
 
Those smallies remind me of a local saltwater bass that we have here in SoCal. They are called Spotted Bay Bass, and are a amember of the Sand Bass clan. This guy is from Newport Harbor, and, from a walk-about fishing adventure. By that, I mean, walking the perimeter of the bay, on a sidewalk, fishing structure. The fish are caught on leadhead shad baits (leadhead rubber tail jigs). I find that they love 2" small baits in natural tones.
I take a bunch of blank leadhead jigs, and paint them out with a pair of spray cans; the top is painted a dark green, and the underside is paint a light sky blue. I then dip the painted heads into a puddle of 5-minute epoxy with fine glitter mixed into it.
I fish the jigs on light casting rigs, common to bassin', and on 6lb mono. My wife uses a small spinning rig, with a Penn reel.

this is one of them.

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They're typically well under 5lb's, though you can catch them that big, and maybe a teence larger. But, a 5lb Spotty is a big one, and a total handful.
They hit to stun, and when hooked, will put a huge bend in the rod in trying to get back to structure.

Toothy?
Yep. They get lockjaw too. A day of lip thumb landing these will wear a raw spot on your thumb.
Their dorsal fin is a series of spines, and, there is a razor sharp gill plate horn that loves to stick you.
They turn to mush if you guide them into your hand, and lift them "upside down". You don't need a net if you're near the water. But, fishing the seawalls, requires a little extra reach sometimes.

I'm a lifelong fly fisherman, dating back to nearly learning to walk. The bay waters are too deep to flyfish, practically. So, I break out my jigging rigs when I go there.
 
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Those smallies remind me of a local saltwater bass that we have here in SoCal. They are called Spotted Bay Bass, and are a amember of the Sand Bass clan. This guy is from Newport Harbor, and, from a walk-around fishing adventure. By that, I mean, walking the perimeter of the bay, on a sidewalk, fishing structure. The fish are caught on leadhead shad baits (leadhead rubber tail jigs). I find that they love 2" small baits in natural tones.
I take a bunch of blank leadhead jigs, and paint them out with a pair of spray cans; the top is painted a dark green, and the underside is paint a light sky blue. I then dip the painted heads into a puddle of 5-minute epoxy with fine glitter mixed into it.
I fish the jigs on light casting rigs, common to bassin', and on 6lb mono. My wife uses a small spinning rig, with a Penn reel.

this is one of them.

IMG_3136.jpg


They're typically well under 5lb's, though you can catch them that big, and maybe a teence larger. But, a 5lb Spotty is a big one, and a total handful.
They hit to stun, and when hooked, will put a huge bend in the rod in trying to get back to structure.

Toothy?
Yep. They get lockjaw too. A day of lip thumb landing these will wear a raw spot on your thumb.
Their dorsal fin is a series of spines, and, there is a razor sharp gill plate horn that loves to stick you.
They turn to mush if you guide them into your hand, and lift them "upside down". You don't need a net if you're near the water. But, fishing the seawalls, requires a little extra reach sometimes.

I'm a lifelong fly fisherman, dating back to nearly learning to walk. The bay waters are too deep to flyfish, practically. So, I break out my jigging rigs when I go there.
Sounds fun to catch them and also tricky to handle! Like Northern Pike here are tricky, if they don't get a lure treble hook suck in you they will bite you, mouth full of big teeth, big and slimy, and a nasty disposition!
 
Like I said, fly fishing is my thing, since a wee one. My grandfather was a fly fisher, from Weiser Idaho, and a confirmed wet fly fisherman.
I've professionally guided, tyed flies, and taught fly casting/fishing, even to teaching at a college credit level, for Environemtnal Science or Physcal Eduation credits.

I grew up in SoCal, on the coast, and started fly fishing in saltwater in the early 70's, in Redondo Beach, in King Harbor, at the bait barge, and near the big Edison Plant cooling water return pipe in the harbor. That warm water source would bring Bonito, a tuna family member, into King Harbor, and in range of my canoe. If no Bonito, there were always Mackerel that were ready to play. I created a lot of anchovy pattern streamers in those days, from peacock hurl, and flash dubbing.
I've also long been a surfer, and, have run into a Croaker species that is called a Corbina. Croaker also include a host of named Croaker cousins, and, White Seabass.
Corbina, and surfing,.... if you surfed near sand, you have experienced Corbina banging off of your legs when the waves roll up onto the beach, and then back out. They allow the waves to push them up onto the beach into inches deep water, where they chow on sand crabs that burrow into the sand. When the wave recedes, the fish get pulled back into the surf, mere feet from shore, and the whole thing plays out again with the next wave.
In this way, you can sight fish for them.
I've seen this play out thousands of times as a surfer, and then the idea hit, that of fly fishing for them.
Problem,... at that time, there was no such thing as a sand crab fly pattern. So, I made one of a sand crab colored rabbit skin strip (natural buff-tan), and a bright orange "egg sac" that is what the fish are after and keying on in the surf line.

I grabbed my 8'6" 6-weight graphite fly rod, and off to Dana Point Strands I go.
I knew nothing of surf fishing with a fly rod, except that I knew a regular line wasn't going to work. So, I grabbed a chunk of lead core trolling line, about 15' of it, and, rigged the rest of the reels spool with backing. I developed a crude chuck and duck style of casting, but, it worked, and got the fly out to just beyond the waves breaking.
The lead-core brought the fly to the bottom, instantly, and allowed me to crawl the fly back on the sand bottom.
I continued this for a couple of hours, and not much going on. I was seeing fish, but, no contact. So, I worked my way north, and was running out of beach.
I got to where a strong rip current had created a nearly parallel to shore deeper channel, that was flowing like a creek. This chennel was formed by the beach on one side, and, a sandbar on the other side. I went out onto the sandbar, and was casting back towards the beach into this creek. I was trying everything I could think of, and my mind started drifting back to trout stream fishing, with a nymphing rig. So, I started a hand twist retrieve at the end of a drift, and I could watch the fly dragging bottom. Suddenly, as if on cue, a Corbina flashed into view, and settled directly onto my fy (their mouthes are on the bottom). It inhaled, and I set the hook, and, I was hooked into a rocket. This thing took off for the next horizon, in a long reel screaming run that started to run fairly deeply into my backing. I pulled, it pulled back, and this went on for a good five minutes. Suddenly, I went from this weird guy fly fishing on the beach, and to be avoided, to, someone that everyone was watching and hooting for.

My first fly caught Corbina:
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I have a fisherman friend who has raved and raved about Corbina on the grill. This one went home with me, and made White Seabass seem like eating garbage fish. Its very rare that I ever keep a fish.
 
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I haven't been fishing in a long time. I made the mistake of turning it into a living. That led to a bad case of burnout, as I wasn't ever fishing for the love of it.
So, my pics and stories are a bit of the past.

Wild Trout. Thats my addiction.
My family lines are from Utah and Idaho, going back to the pioneers. I spent a huge amount of time in both states exploring small waters.
I've been puring over some old pics, and, thought I'd share a few, and some stories.

This is in south-central Utah. It has brown trout, and rainbows. On this day, I ran into a small mayfly hatch at sundown, and managed to catch a few nice browns in some riffle water just downstream from this pic. I took this pic, because i liked the layering of the weeds/algae flowing in the current. Thats my cousin on the bank, exploring, looking for fish. More pics with Greg, and our explorations of Utah to follow.
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OK,... so, we decided to fish some of the colorado river drainages of south-central utah. We drove, and, upon nearing our destination, we came to an overlook, and, it was smoky. Ugh.
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So we trudged on, hoping it wasn't going to effect us as we had many miles of dirt road ahead.

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and, heading straight towards this,....
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We eventually emerged into this, an emerging meadow spring creek:
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We followed it downstream for quite a nice walk,... cousin Greg at the stick:
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And this led to a wonderful little spring creek canyon,...
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and to the next post,.... max'd my pic limit out
 
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Then there is this glorified ditch in central utah. It takes water that was destined for the Colorado River, and drains it into the great bonneville basin.
The farmers used it as a conduit for so long that an endangered native cutthroat trout was found breeding in the flows. This meant that the stream was now required to be maintained at sustainable flows, and has become a gem loaded with substantial to outsize trout.

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I nailed a giant brown trout on a cicada dry fly pattern just at the base of this beaver dam. It was, in this smallish flow; right at that green nettle tuft at the waters edge.
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I lived in Provo for a while, and would frequent this stream at a time when it was unheard of, or, no one cared. It was loaded with monster browns at that time. Catching a brown over 24", totally possible, with many monsters that you couldn't even move.
You could start at the bottom of this deep canyon, and spend two days fishing upstream; no trail, really deep boulder strewn canyon. At the end of two hard days of fishing upstream, you would cross a small dirt road, where you could leave a back up car, or, have someone pick you up. My friend up there, the one guy I could get to go into the canyon with me, fished it with a Rapala lure, fairly heavy line, and would nail giants. These pics are of an area from that upper road, upstream, into a more gradual, less steep, canyon area.
At any rate,... this stream was hardly a seasonal flow, until it got used as a conduit below a reservoir. Now, its a small stream gem.
 
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This is a trip into an upper colorado drainage, green river drainage area of central-eastern utah.

The accommodations out there can be a little rough:
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But the water is sweet; cuz'n Greg again,...
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This one, below, well,.. its sort of a gutter flow.
I'll explain,...
There was a wonderful outdoor fishing show many decades back, back when we had to VHS tape it by hoping to get the time right, and making sure the cable box was also on.
That show, was hosted by a gent named Jerry McKinnis - Fishin' Hole, I think?
At any rate, in one episode he went to this small stream, and went upstream into this beautiful canyon, and just tore it up. I tried to replicate his effort, found this same stream, went up into the same canyon,... and got skunked.
This place was like three hours into nowhere, and with nothing around it. I was bummed.
So, I drive back down out of the canyon, and the river dries up, and is run into ditches, into the farmers fields, and the river bed is dry. Fack!
I already had reservations to stay in the only hotel for miles around. So, I went in, and, they also had a diner attached. So, I order a burger. I started to speaking to the owners wife about my luck, and she looked confused about the river being dry, and she pointed across the road, and there it was flowing. WTF?
She said the kids in town float the river, and fish in it all through this stretch of town And, the town folk actually are friendly, and let you cross their property.

The next morning, I drive my truck 100' across the road, and start fishing upstream.

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Cus Greg again,....
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And, finally, me, with a slimer of a brown trout caught out of a gutter flow, that sort of reappeared on me, after it disappeared.
This was a good thing, because I went from skunked to pumped.
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