Geovani casting in the basin at the outlet by the road. No easy pickings here today…
Charles Pond covers 14 acres and is located next to Route 127 (Five Islands Road) in Georgetown, Sagadahoc County, Maine (see The Maine Atlas and Gazetteer map 7 D1). This location has proven to be an excellent early ice-fishing destination for me in the past (click here and here for examples). The pond was stocked earlier this fall with 150 7” brookies (about 11 trout per acre) and 75 13” brookies (= about 5 trout per acre). I am eager to connect with those larger one-pounders this morning.
Charles Pond is entirely undeveloped and quite pretty.
A number of my blog readers have asked me about locations in southern and central Maine where one can catch trout from shore in the fall using waders and without the need for a boat or fancy electronics. Charles Pond is such a place, as are many others. This little gem falls under the South Zone “general fishing laws”, i.e., the pond is open to ice and open-water fishing between January 1 and December 31 under the general law bag limit (i.e., two fish per day) and length limit (minimum of 6”). All legal forms of bait and artificial lures are allowed at this location at all times. Click here for the rules. The pond has a maximum depth of < 7 ft as determined based on past fishing experiences. A depth map is not available.
My first brookie of the morning , in full spawning colors!
The entire shoreline around Charles Pond is undeveloped (i.e., no houses, no yards, no fences, no docks) and unposted, and much of it is accessible by foot. Normally, I would use my hip boots or waders to fish directly from within the water, but I’m accompanied by my 11-year old grandson Geovani. So, I’m sticking to fishing with him strictly from dry land. Enough breaks occur in the riparian vegetation along the shore to make it possible for him to fish without constantly getting tangled up in branches and bushes.
The second brookie this morning is a ripe female.
We arrive at the outlet of Charles Pond at 7:30 am. The morning is quite chilly (lower 20’s), with the forecast calling for full sunshine with low wind but temperatures only rising into the lower 30’s. We are dressed accordingly! As expected, we also have the whole place to ourselves. We notice that the northern half of the pond is actually skimmed over with a thin layer of ice which soon melts under the rising sun. That means that the water temperature in the rest of the pond is in the mid-30’s at best. I’m not sure how active the trout will be to chase after a darting spinner… We use our ultralight spinning rods and small reels spooled with 6-pound test monofilament to start fishing around the basin by the outlet with a fabulous #2 Mepps spinner. I removed one of the three hooks from the treble and flattened the barb on one of the two remaining hooks to minimize harm to the fish. This location is a popular spot in the fall because it is easily accessible and right next to the road. My hopes of quickly putting Geovani on some easy trout are dashed after 30 minutes of constant casting fails to yield a single hit, let alone a fish. We are going to have to work to catch trout this morning! We start walking upgradient along the western shoreline, hitting every open spot in the vegetation we find along the way. I finally hook and land a male brookie in spawning colors after 45 minutes, followed by a ripe female half an hour later. I have lost Geovani by now, but he is a good sport about it and gets all excited when I bring in these fish. I catch a tiny 7 incher in the basin on our way back to the car. I regret that Geovani did not get a single bite, but am nonetheless glad to have caught my target fish under less than ideal conditions. And his time will surely come!
The results: I caught 3 brook trout (largest = 13”) in 2.5 hours of hard fishing.
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