A little Friday Froggin' on my day off.....

So I decided to brave the heat and go out for some froggin' at a nearby pond. I launched at 6:15am and had a plan to target the pockets in the lily pads and shaded banks of the shoreline. Here is the pond and its general appearance....


The plan was to use the BioEdge Frog Wand on a Black Stanley Ribbit and follow up with the Clone on any misses. I never picked up the Clone rod that day......it seems that I somehow managed to leave it sitting at home . Oh well, the Black Ribbit it is!!  I missed a couple right away due to bad rod position at the hook set, but ended the skunk in the first 30 minutes with this healthy little 16" chunker....


Followed him up in short order with another feisty one....


Another few casts in the same general area results in another spunky 16" bass.....


His lil' brother showed up in short order on the shaded side of a lay down and wanted to try the Black Ribbit as well.....


Then the excitement began - all the strikes so far had been the moderate "slurp and pop" you hear from top water frog bites. As I rounded a small tree that was sticking out over the water, I made a cast to a couple stray pads sitting away from the shore and was promptly greeted with a massive "FLUSH" and "eruption" strike - the tell tale sign of a big ole' bucket mouth strike.

I saw the strike and knew if was a better fish that any so far. It took me about 45 seconds to get the ole' girl in but she had inhaled the Ribbit and was none too happy to say the least. I ended up landing my personal best Largemouth Bass out of a kayak - a 21" hawg!!!!


I have landed bigger ones from shore but never in a kayak - not anymore!!! My Black Ribbit is getting pretty torn up at this point, and the sun is getting higher in the sky, so I decided to switch to a brown and orange colored Ribbit.

Shortly thereafter, I heard a loud ruckus in the pads near the shoreline, so I paddled over and noticed the tell tale swirl activity of a feeding bass. So I made a soft cast just past his spot and landed it on a pad. I didn't even have time to get one full crank down before he clobbered it!!!

At this point, I am thinking I have hooked into another nice one. So, I pull the rudder up and paddle over through the thick pads only to find this at the end of my line.....


I am thinking to myself - what a waste......then I look at my Ribbit........


He had hit the frog so violently, he popped the hook clean out of the frog, ripped the screw lock off of the Zoom Horny Toad hook and straightened the screw lock . Pretty cool I thought.

Anyway, I started making my way back to some other spots I had not fished as well as I wanted to. Throughout the day, I promised myself that I would stand anytime I started to get the slightest bit uncomfortable (I also left my inflatable donut ring at home as well ).

I actually felt more balanced standing on my 2010 Ride's seat pad versus standing on the deck in front of the seat. As the wind started to pick up, I thought, "What better way to fish than let the wind do the moving while I do the casting." After a few minutes, I re-worked a smallish patch of scattered lily pads and coaxed this guy into biting the Ribbit.....


All in all a great day - I saw so many turtles, bass fingerlings back in the shallow coves behind the lily pads, a small group (5 in total) of White Herons and a few Blue Herons.....like this guy.....


I called it a day after that - the paddle was scorching to the touch, I was getting pretty hot in the 103 degree heat and I needed some lunch.

Still an awesome day if you ask me - much better than work I always say......