Larry A. Smail's Blog

I am burnt to a crisp as the old saying goes. Not really, but I did increase my tan quite a bit. I spent much of the day on the Allegheny River with my friend, Frank “Muskie” Maus. I always enjoy the time together as we chase around that elusive fish, the Muskellunge!

Da Man! Frank Maus.

Frankie had two follows, and one strike the previous day, so I had hoped the fish would be in the mood to be caught this day.

We began by casting surface lures  attempting to entice one of those big fish to attack in power.  We traveled to several points along the waterway fishing with this technique. Frank had one swirl behind the lure. I began hoping for additional action.

Later, the trolling took the scene further attempting to have a fish become hungry and attack the lures in a vengeful manner. Unfortunately, we could not locate any muskies this day other than the swirl behind the lure. I jinxed the man!

However, we saw a lot of wildlife during the excursion. We saw deer including two fawns at the river’s edge. A long line of Canada Geese were viewed in a single file. We saw a lot of waterfowl. One hen mallard had several baby ducklings following her movements up river. On a recent fishing trip I saw, probably, this same hen with at least eight babies. Wonder what specie devoured the other ducklings?       

Fox Squirrel running after Frank’s lure hit the water near it.

We saw a couple of softshell turtles sunning themselves on rocks. We saw a Bald Eagle!

Much of the morning was foggy or involved with cloud cover. However, after noon the sun came out with lots of heat. A stated, my tan lines darkened!

Lure action!