Morning at the West Brookfield SouthPond - Afternoon at Quaboag
With a 3 days long (Memorial Day) week end, Don and I could have picked the best day of any of the 3 days…but it did not go that smooth since I could only go on Saturday and the weather wasn’t great. We went to Quacumquasit (South) Pond in the morning and moved to the Quaboag river around Noon time.
SouthPond - Pond or Lake?
The Quacumquasit (South) Pond is really nice pond (lake?). It goes as deep as 70 feet, lots of sand (really cool beach) and does not have really any structure (too bad). You can fish for trout (some guys were catching trout from the beach!), bass, big pikes (there was recently a record size pike pulled off the water), lots of fish to play with.
Boat Ramp - Launch Area
The boat area is bit tricky: look at the 2 pictures below, you should definitely take your time and maybe have someone outside the truck to help you go down smoothly the first time you get there.
Also, watch out for the duckies down there! These 2 ducks were enjoying a day at the beach and did not feel moving one inch!!
3 hours of fishing: a few hits - no catch
We haven’t been lucky that morning, maybe we should have tried fishing for trout because the other fishermen on shore and on boats where pulling them out all morning long! We tried using spinnerbaits, plastic Yamamoto Senko worms and even watermelon lizards, and…nothing. Several hits there and there (which could have been from trout actually) but that was it. So we decided to get the boat back on the trailer and move a few miles down the road, back to Quaboag pond for the afternoon.
Stormy weather on Quaboag: could we get lucky?
We moved up on the Quaboag river to try to locate some lilipad areas like this one and use our plastic to find the largemouth bass:
We did not get any right away, but we were getting nice hits on watermelon plastic lizards. Still the hits were not bringing any fish in the boat. We took a quick lunch break and the weather started to get really stormy, which i was exciting about because it was probably going to wake up the bass.
The weather cleared up 30mn later; since we are well-equipped now (not like the first few years!!!), rain is not a problem anymore for us (but not for the few guys in t-shirts flying by on the river, trying to reach the boat ramp as fast as possible!!!). As long as we do not forget our rain gear, of course (which has happened to me once)!
Bass are FINALLY hitting!
Not sure if the thunderstorm helped (i believe it did), but the bass started to hit our lizards. The wind picked up a bit also and helped us drifting down the river quickly, offering opportunities to cast in so many different spots. We missed quite a few fish in the afternoon, lots of keepers (god damn it!), but here are some pictures of the ones we got on board:
Conclusion: bad start - good finish!
Another day when we only catch fish late morning, and all afternoon long! I am not sure if this the time of the year, luck or the weather, but I like it! No need to wake up anymore when the sun rises, I can sleep in a few more hours and enjoy a great day of fishing and, a nice evening out without falling asleep at the dinner table!!
We ended up catching around 10 to 12 bass which isn’t bad considering the fact that we did not catch one fish at the South Pond. Oh, one other thing I do not want to forget mentionning: South Pond is a beautiful place, but the nice beach, sand and clean water make it a great spot for swimmers, beachers, jet skis and other water activities….So, go there early in the morning (if you want to catch some trouts!) or forget about it!
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