To paraphrase an occasionally overwrought local baseball announcer, ice in the Denver metro area is gone and it ain’t coming back.
The time has come for warm- water enthusiasts to shake off that long siege of cabin fever and head for the water. After spending long months sharpening hooks and watching other people catch fish on TV, there’s no holding back – certainly no reason to.
In sharp contradiction to the calendar, an early bass bite arrived last week on many area ponds, where a combination of sun, warmth and wind provided a welcome boost to water temperature.
Don’t let the current cold snap rattle you. Action will heat right back up to match the next jump in temperature. Winter officially might hang around for another couple of weeks, but that doesn’t mean fish won’t bite, given the proper place and tactic.
Which is why Troy Coburn and several other local bass enthusiasts found themselves at the same spot Saturday, a reclaimed gravel pond along the South Platte River in Adams County, to give the season a friendly nudge.
Since bass fishermen generally keep thermometers on boats, not in their pockets, nobody had an accurate count on water temperature. But somebody stuck a finger in, estimated 40 degrees, and got no disagreement.
Largemouth bass aren’t supposed to come out and play until the water pushes toward 50. But something wild and wonderful is afoot in local ponds with good fish populations and a proper dynamic for late-afternoon heat percolation.
“The best bite comes from around 4 p.m. until dark, when the water has reached its maximum warmth for the day,” said Coburn, an Aurora resident who’s under a full head of steam after leading the 2005 Denver Bassmasters tournament series.
It helped that the pond these bass guys targeted seldom reaches a depth past 6 feet, susceptible to rapid warming. To complete the equation, they chose a shoreline where a stiff breeze piled up the warmest surface water and, as a twin blessing, the sun beamed brightest against the shore.
“The temperature will be a couple degrees warmer here and that can make all the difference,” Coburn said.
True to the script, a scattering of small fish were landed earlier in the afternoon. Then, with the sun scurrying off toward the southwest, Aurora resident Lance Tillotson landed a fat 3-pounder, then another.
Things got better from there, Coburn caught a fish pushing 4 pounds; bent rods became the order of the day as bass slammed lures with growing aggression.
“If you think this is good, you should have seen it last year,” Tillotson said. “You could stand right here and land 30 bass in a couple of hours.”
Therein lies the crux of a good news/bad news story told all too often in Denver metro fishing circles involving waters that come open to the public following years under lock and key.
“I saw a lot of fish leave here last year,” Tillotson said. “I’d be surprised if this lasts very long.”
This observation prompts a revisit to the eternal problem of fragile places smack in the middle of several million people, many with no abiding ethic or even a thought about maintaining angling quality.
As a glance at the handy Division of Wildlife booklet, “Fishing Close to Home,” will attest, the metro is pocked with dozens of small lakes and ponds, each with the potential for various warmwater species: bass, perch, bluegill, crappie and catfish. Entities such as Adams County and the city of Thornton in particular have taken giant strides to open a series of gravel ponds in the river corridor.
With few exceptions, these start out good, but end up bad. In nearly every case, the culprit is overharvest in the absence of specific regulations designed to balance the overwhelming pressure inherent in an intense urban environment.
In far too many locations, the central issue becomes whether we want to allow harvest or be able to catch fish on a sustained basis. Put another way, if few fish are left to catch, what’s the point? The matter grows more poignant when we consider that urban waters are central to the recruitment of young anglers, who need action to maintain interest.
Many fish managers believe that broad-based creel limits aren’t popular with the public. But, then again, neither is not catching fish.
Charlie Meyers can be reached at 303-820-1609 or cmeyers@denverpost.com.
