Jackson: Take the time to find your favorite fishing pond in the suburbs

Before I launch into this week's tale of fall fishing, I again must caution Daily Herald readers that fishing success is easy to achieve if one plans carefully and takes time to explore small ponds and lakes in the suburbs.

In a recent column, I wrote about throwing surface and subsurface lures into shallow areas of a pond in western Hoffman Estates, where I scored with largemouth bass.

As with past columns on local fishing, some readers were adamant that I name or pinpoint the ponds I fished.

I did that one spring after I caught and released beautiful crappies from a park district pond. That particular location was ravaged and literally cleaned out.

In fact, a resident living adjacent to the pond had to contend with trespassers who were eager to get to the water and obviously didn't care about anyone else's privacy.

So now here's a second installment of my local exploits in which hefty sunfish and bluegills were available as well as small bass.

This next pond is in Barrington. No restrictive signs were visible, nor were there any fences to block access to the water.

This time I carried two rods: a Grandt all-American light model (6-foot), and a Grandt medium weight spinning rod (also a 6-footer), with enough backbone to handle large bass lures.

Dipping in to my box of antique lures, I spied an old Heddon Mouse with its scared back and sides. The scrapes were from various encounters with pike and bass.

The other "soldier" was a semi-shredded Snagproof frog that saw its better days on Bangs Lake. Added to those relics were some Cubby Mini-Mites (for bluegills).

The air temperature on this trip hovered around 70 while the water temp in the pond's shallows was a few degrees below the air reading.

Instead of casting I decided to sit, rest, and observe the water for signs of action.

I didn't have to wait long. A "healthy" splash off to my right indicated a fish was feeding on or near the surface. I waited for a couple more seconds and was able to witness another bit of surface activity.

I rigged the Heddon mouse on the spinning rod and subsequently made a cast just a foot or so up from the splash circles. Nothing going on. I made two more fast casts to the same area and a largemouth came up and grabbed the mouse. The fish wrapped the line around the cattails and tried in desperation to escape.

This was a beauty, 4-pounds to be exact, and the digital rarely offers any falsehoods.

After releasing the fish, I moved 50 feet to another spot where I stood in stood ankle deep in the water. I purposely wore high rubber boots because the banks were soft and oozing water.

This time I shot the frog into the heavy cover along the banks and kept retrieving it, making lots of noise. I caught four more bass, none of which went over or even close to a pound.

It indicated to me that the pond bass were still hungry enough to chase just about any kind of surface bait.

Again, please don't ask me where this action took place. You can create the same adventure by having patience and a willingness to explore the area waters.

Go find your spot, and be mindful of the neighbors.

• Contact Mike Jackson at angler88@comcast.net, catch his radio show 7-9 a.m. Sundays on WGCO 1590-AM (live-streamed at www.1590WCGO.com) and get more content at www.mikejacksonoutdoors.com.