As we near the end of the year I though that people might like to see some of my numbers. In order to maintain a pretense of maturity I made these charts in percentage of carp landed in order to gloss over the total number. I will say that the total was somewhere between 100 and 200.
First off lets look at percentage of fish I landed this year by type of water. I almost would rather not! It almost hurts that I caught 20% of my carp in 2011 in 4 days on the Columbia River which is several thousand miles away. What a fishery, I cant wait to get back!!!!
Next lets look at some flies. Tracking numbers on flies can be misleading. As you can see I caught most of my carp on four patterns. These are good patterns but I have confidence in these flies and fish them allot so you are really dealing with a chicken and the egg scenario. That being said, I really do believe that these are stellar patterns. Right now I am really excited about the column named "Proto HeadStands". This is a new series of fly I have been working on and they were pretty hot for me in October / November.
And finally lets look at the percentage of carp caught by month. Anybody who looks at this chart should really ask one question. Why on earth does this idiot bother fly fishing for carp anytime but June and July? First off, May was really stellar, particularly for big fish. I just had bad luck with weather in May this year and didn't get allot of time on the water. August really went better than it looks as well. I just had my worst month in terms of landing percentage ever. Otherwise I worked hard for the carp for the rest of the year but it was worth it.
You may notice that I am ofer in December. Geesh, less than 10 days to go to catch a fish in every month of 2011. It aint looking goodn for our hero.
June is probably skewed due to the big c trip as well. Nice to see the soft hackle make an appearance on that list!
ReplyDeleteAs for numbers...very cool to see it laid out like that. I Don't have the patience to set that up, but I am more of a gray guy than black and white anyway. I like the mystery, and I like that my memory can lie to me! I don't blog about every trip just to leave myself something to be unable to look back on...
My guess is your 2012 big c trip will look a lot different than 2011!
Yeah, I actually skipped blogging about my best day ever which happened this year just a week or two after I got back from the Big C. I felt at the time like that one was for me and me alone.
ReplyDeleteThe soft hackle was simply deadly on post-spawn and mid-spawn shallow slow cruisers both here and there this year. Thanks for introducing me.
It is too early to get pumped about Big C 2012. Way too early. Still happening.
OK McTage,
ReplyDeleteVery nice. I to have flies that accounted for most of my fish in 2011, well, predominately an egg pattern, total heretic I know. But you all have given me fire for trying new flies for longer than it takes to mutter, "I wish I had an egg on," or I wish...a carp bugger on." Ugh! Luckily I have plenty of choices as I do enjoy my tying. Me also, I still have yet to catch a December carp. Got my fingers crossed on even a chance. (could go to fish the LA River)
And, time to wish everyone a Merry Christmas! Gregg
Interesting Post!
ReplyDeleteGregg - We all get stuck on a couple of patterns. It is really hard to shake things up once you get confidence in what you know. In 2010 I swore to fish nothing but other peoples patterns. In 2011 I went a bit in the other direction and fished mostly my own. Both ways were fun.
ReplyDeleteBryon - You know, I went to OU and I caught my first warmwater fish in Eldorado KS during a summer internship. I wish I knew then what I know now because it looks like you have some great warmwater action in your kneck of the woods.
Wow, bar charts on a fishing blog...quite impressed. I have a feeling our hero can pull one out of the hat for December if he tries. Happy Holidays McTage!
ReplyDeleteAh yes T!. For my next trick I will pull a pie-chart out of my hat. Merry Christmas to you too!
ReplyDeleteInteresting stuff, McTage, especially the chart on fly patterns. Gonna try to keep better records on that kind of stuff this year myself.
ReplyDeleteTy - I would love to see something like that on the grassies you get into ocassionally. Although come to think of it I think you said you get almost all of them on your pheasant tails?
ReplyDeleteYep, mostly pheasant tails, but that's because it's the fly I use for commons. If a grassie comes along I'll cast to it without bothering to change flies. Sometimes the grassie will eat it. This year I'm going to keep a rod strung up just for grass carp when I'm out chasing the commons. Got some grass carp flies tied up. Just need to try them out.
ReplyDelete