The Good, Bad and Ugly at North Shields Ponds

July 10 and 12, 2012

North Shields Ponds is a great destination for people that want a chance to fish multiple bodies of water in one afternoon/evening.

Just north of Vine on Shields Street, the Ponds' parking lot is on the west side of the road.

Right off the parking lot sits the first pond, though it was no more than 8" deep, so I didn't even throw a line in.

If you follow the trail back a few hundred yards, you'll walk along the Cache La Poudre River and end up at the two other ponds.

One is quite small, the other, much bigger.

I've had luck fishing out of each.

My favorite spot on these days was a small trail between the two ponds, where I could fish each one by simply turning around.

On this evening--I arrived around 4 p.m.--the fishing was fast and furious.

One bluegill jumped on my yellow Rooster Tail within five casts, and came in at around 6".

Many more followed, biting on anything and everything--as bluegills are known to do, especially shiny objects--and I caught six on the day.

Two liked the little baby rainbow trout spinners, another few bit on Kastmasters.

Interestingly, I caught every one of the six fish out of the small pond, and zero out of the larger pond.

The first time I went with Anderson, we caught a combined three bluegills out of the larger pond.

When I went on July 10, I saw a ton of wildlife.

Birds of many variety are there roosting, singing away and lots of fish. But this day there was also a little turtle, that surfaced for some food right by shore, a deer and lots of muskrats in the water. Watch out for them and if you see something visibly swimming along the surface, it's one of them, so don't accidentally hook a muskrat.

There are many rumors floating around that big largemouth and smallmouth bass live in the North Shields Ponds as well, and when I went back two days later, that's what I was fishing for.

This time, I showed up around 6 p.m. and with my brother Alex.

I went to the same spot as before, though I had much less luck overall.

Alex, on the other hand, caught three small bluegills, the first ones he had ever reeled in.

I came up empty handed, and when he left around 8 p.m., I stopped at the Cache La Poudre River and threw a couple casts in. The water was a dark, oily black, and while many fish were surfacing, I again caught nothing.

So, it was one great day--if you enjoy catching bluegills--and one very bad day--including getting my backup reel completely tangled in the near-dark and North Shields Ponds.

Have fun and good luck everyone!