Sunfish and the Eno Clean Up

The hot weather has really killed the fishing for July. Most of my recent fishing attempts have resulted in a skunking. I was wondering if I was going to go a whole month without catching a fish. That isn't unusual for one of the really cold months but in the summer that is strange. A member of TFF sent out a message that there was going to be a clean up on the Eno River. The Triangle Fly Fisher's recently adopted a stretch of the Eno and I felt this would be a good opportunity to get some exposure for the club and do some good. Before the clean up I met some friends to do some fishing. The Eno continues to be my favorite place for sunfish. There has to be 5 sunfish for every square foot of water. I created a video of some of the fishing but it doesn't do it justice. I need to get out with my better camcorder and really show how many fish can be caught in just one small 20ft stretch of water. Here's some of the footage from the recent trip.

After the fishing Chris and Jeff decided to get an early start on the clean up. When we arrived at the clean up site there was about 15 people kind of meandering around and looking for things to do. There was a news crew and table with food for the volunteers. The organizer got everyone together and explained there was going to be 4 teams and people were going to be spread out along the river. The goal was going to be extracting any large unbiodegradable materials. We entered the water armed with gloves and buckets. The wading disturbed sediment and caused clouds of dust to fill the creek. It made seeing the bottom difficult at times but we were still able to find a lot of trash. One tire was severely stuck in the ground. We had 4 people trying to remove it but it wouldn't budge. We think either it was some how intertwined with another tire that was on an axle. It wouldn't surprise me. I did find a racing tire with the rim still in it.It was disturbing how much trash there was in just a small stretch of river. In about 100yds I found glass bottles, cans, a toilet lid, plunger, anti freeze, various metal and tires. Tires of all sizes. The biggest one we found was what looked to be a tractor tire.The size and weight of the tires made us have to get inventive with how we were going to get them out of the creek. Pulling them up the bank with some rope seemed to work well but sometimes the weight of the tire was just too much.

Clean ups take some work and they aren't the first thing you want to do on a weekend but there is a good feeling that comes out of doing them. There's something about knowing the little things you do are making the water cleaner. It's a rewarding experience. It's hard to admit but it's pretty amusing too. You never know what you'll find. Click here for the News Story.