I have been taking my boy to a couple stocked ponds the last two weekends, and while the fish have been eating his worms on a bobber, I have found that watching what the fish do is still very important even in a stocked pond.
Case in point: Last weekend I caught more on a fly rod then most were catching on worms and powerbait. primarily, when the fish were on the surface, I looked for the bugs on the water and tried to match the size and color; when the were just barely rolling the top of the water, I threw on a wet fly and pulled short jerky strips, when there was no surface activity, I put on a copper john and let the fly sink for 10 to 15 seconds before making a slow retrieve. Kind of like fishing in a back eddy on the river.
The worm and bobber guy to my right would see a trout rise and throw his bobber in the swirl, with six feet of line and a sinker below the bobber, he would catch one or two to the 5 or six we were catching by tossing a dry to a swirl area and giving it just the slightest touch of a twitch every 5 seconds or so.
Funny I just read the fishing rivers or still water thread, and while I usually fish rivers, I have been thinking about getting the boat out next weekend to fly fish from it up at the lake. This last couple weeks has been a lot of fun catching and releasing those little 8-10 inch rainbows and browns. My boy is now almost as addicted as his dad.
