With the New Posts button down, no one is going to see this but here is my trip report...

I was temporarily caught up on jig orders, so I took the kayak to Oxbow Reservoir for a day trip. The trip started out rough when I found that I had left my box of hooks, sinkers and jigheads at home. I was planning on mainly throwing super flukes and I had a hook already tied on that rod. I started out with a crankbait (I had that box with me) and caught a couple decent smallmouths and lost two better fish that launched out of the water immediately upon hookset. I switched over to the fluke rod and caught several fish right off:


Not real big, but they fought like they were 3 lbers.

A lot of bass were chasing fry and minnows along the shore; I had barely cast towards shore and a nice fish busted a school of minnows right in front of me; I stopped reeling for a second to watch and ended up getting snagged. I paddled up to the snag and popped the fluke out of the rocks. Before I could check the line for frays, the bass came up again and I tossed the fluke his way. He came up over the rock bar I was fishing at top speed, smoked the fluke and took off for the depths. I set the hook and the line broke (remember, no spare hooks). Hmmm....

I paddled to shore so that I could go through all of my tackle looking for another hook; I heard something hissing, puffing and kinda growling in front of me in the rocks. I had seen an otter earlier and it was him again, but he had evidently insulted a beaver and the beaver wasn't happy with him. I took a couple pictures, but the little waterproof camera only has digital zoom, so they aren't the best:


The beaver finally saw me and swam by to check me out on his way down the bank:


I got to shore, dug though my tackle and found two weighted swimbait hooks in size 6/0, not the best for flukes, but better than nothing. I went back to my rock bar and caught a couple more 1.5 lbs smallmouths and then got a better fish. He fought pretty hard and felt heavy, but it just didn't feel right:

A 3+ lbs channel cat on a fluke

I had a deer walk down to check me out and get a drink, but again the digital zoom fuzzed the picture:


I had a flock of 30+ chukars come down to drink, but again I didn't get a very good picture.

The bite slowed down and I quit fishing about 1:00 p.m. While I sat on the bank eating lunch, I watched several 1.5 to 2 lbs smallmouths move up into the shallows periodically to chase minnows. The minnows would start to move towards the bank and then you could see the bass stalking them; when the bass got the minnows grouped up where they wanted them, they would bust into the school and minnows would fly everywhere.

I'm buried with jig orders again, but as soon as I get caught up, I'm going back up; I already made sure my hook box is in my kayak stuff...