Heard some whining over the weekend about how the Yorkville dam area is closed to fishing as they continue the misguided rebuilding of the dam.
The area between the Route 47 bridge and the dam is the most heavily fished section of this part of the river. On a weekend, it's not unusual to see 30 or more anglers in that little stretch. I live a few blocks downstream from 47. Was out there on Sunday late afternoon for a couple of hours. Saw 2 people sitting on the shore near the bridge. That was it.
Gotta love it. Over 90 percent of people that fish the river have no real clue how to fish the river.
Since I started living near the river 3 years ago, and ran the canoe shop out of Montgomery, I've noticed that fewer people are out fishing the river in general. There are the usual crowds near the Yorkville and Montgomery dams, but I hardly see anyone fishing downstream of the dams anymore. Four or five years ago there was always someone out fishing away from the dams. You would see their cars parked somewhere along the road and then see the fishermen out in the water.
That doesn't happen much anymore. From Yorkville down for a few miles and then back upstream through Oswego into Montgomery, it is very rare that I see anyone fishing. Based on the complete lack of tracks in the creeks that I fish, there are even fewer fishermen out exploring them.
This is all good for me of course. I need, enjoy and welcome the solitude lately. It's been over two years since I met up with anyone to go fishing. I keep meaning to break that habit, but I depend on Saturday or Sunday arriving and making the decision right then and there . . . am I getting out of bed or not. If I get out of bed, then I decide where I'm going and leave a not for for my wife.
Not much for long term planning lately.
I knew I wanted to get out over the past weekend. The water levels were finally down to a normal flow, the first time that had happened since December of 2007. In the twelve years I've been fishing the Fox, this is the first time I've seen it stay at such sustained high water levels for so long. Wading anywhere I wanted was now possible, but there was a glitch.
Thursday and into Friday saw waves of thunderstorms roll through the area. They were dumping 2 inches of rain per hour all the way up stream in Elgin. This made the river current flow spike upward accordingly and then come almost straight back down. The fish don't seem to like this. Usually when this happens I wait a good 48 hours for the river levels to stabilize and for the fish to decide where they want to be, close to shore or out in the middle of the river. I didn't have the luxury of waiting 48 hours, so I went out to Saw-wee-kee Park in Oswego at sunrise Saturday.
Beautiful morning, good looking water, not another soul around. At least these conditions were exactly what I was looking for. Covered almost a mile of water over three and a half hours and had four smallmouth bass to show for my troubles. This is very unusual for this stretch. Normal is hooking and landing at least 20 smallies and getting hit by and missing at least another 20. This day, nothing interested them and they were nowhere to be found. Fast water, slack water, slow water, they just weren’t there.
Sunday I found myself with a couple of hours to kill in the late afternoon. I took the 2 minute stroll down to the river to fish the stretch near where I live. Within 15 minutes I knew the rest of the time would just be a stroll in the river.
Somewhere down stream of Yorkville someone owns an air boat that they like to drive all the way to the dam. You can hear him coming while he’s still a good mile away. It sounds like an airplane going full throttle, which basically it is.
This time I was in the water and first heard him, then saw him coming a good quarter of a mile away. The turkeys that I was watching hanging out on the shore line scattered into the woods. Herons squawked and took off for the far side of the river. Ducks were scattering everywhere. As he flew past me within 50 feet and waved, the sound level was deafening. The water behind the boat was churned to a froth and a large wake spread out across the channel.
So much for fishing this side of the river.
I headed to the north side in anticipation of fishing the wide expanse of riffles and lilly pads when I heard the boat coming back. He was in the north channel heading back down stream. He had seen me heading for this stretch and I hoped he had enough sense to go back to the south side of the islands and leave me some untouched water to fish. So much for that hope as he sped by me and shot down and over the riffles. Damn things should have the same noise pollution standards applied to them that cars have and have them banned from the rivers. At least the smaller rivers like the Fox.
At this point it looked like I was just out for another stroll. The wildlife was gone and I had no hope in catching anything. I listened to the whine of the engine as it faded down stream hoping that I would hear a solid crunching noise of the boat hitting something, anything. That too didn’t happen.
I lamely fished through the disturbed riffles all the way across the river, hopped onto the shore and headed for the creek. Since Yorkville has extended a fence right up to the guard rail on the bridge, cutting off access to the creek from the road, not many fish it anymore. The main way to get there is to walk across the river and few choose to do that. In the two years since it’s been cut off from fishermen, all the paths that followed the creek are pretty much gone. Some areas take some real bush whacking to get through, but that’s never bothered me.
Had only one hit in the creek that resulted in landing the fattest 16 inch smallie I’ve seen in a long time. Made the walk and bush whacking well worth it.
As I strolled across the river I was lost in thought. I realized half way across the river that my thoughts were not good. I had come up with a way to take out the air boat as it sped full throttle up the river. I had come up with a way to make this happen. I struggled for hours afterward to get these thoughts out of my head. Civilized human beings don’t make such detailed plans to take out one of their fellow human beings. But then, civilized human beings shouldn’t have to hear their fellow human beings coming when they are over a mile away.