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072814- MY VIRTUAL FISH COOLER FOR THIS OUTING.... ALL CPR 'ED
072814- So today started out terrible weather-wise… a strong line of thunderstorms had just passed the night before and this morning greeted me with increasing wind speed up to 22mph … I hate that. I lose boat control and I intended on doing some slip floating. I picked a small lake and knew I could find at least a little protection somewhere along the shoreline. My instincts told me to go.
Once at the lake I fired up the Lowrance and motored out to the drop off first thing. Instinct maybe… I usually start shallow and work my way out. I scanned the drop-offs and the basin and marked quite a few tightly packed schools of fish in about 25 ft deep in 30. I marked waypoints on my sounder then returned to the schools once I was satisfied with scanning a decent perimeter to fish. Nothing! They were gone! So I thought the best place to meet a roaming school was in an inside bend along the first break that start at 9 ft and drops steeply to 27 ft.
Casting around the boat produced sporadic bites. The wind was playing havoc with my line and I couldn’t feel the jig. While looking at the sonar random schools wandered by and I lowered an ice fishing jig tipped with a wax worm into the school and raised it quickly enticing a bite and a hooked fish! Just like ice fishing I love it. They were crappies about 6 inches. This was a good sign at least I knew some panfish were out deep. I moved over a large 6ft deep weedy flat. I snapped my jig off a submerged weed and a fish smacked it and after a great battle on my micro ultra light I landed a keeper pike. I notched up the lure size and the flat gave up another pike and a 15” largemouth. Ordinarily I would be greatly excited but these fish are not what I came out here for. I tried further in towards the earthen dam and no results with bobber and bait.
So as the late afternoon progressed the weather slowly started getting better. The winds were subsiding and changed to the west. I continued picking off little panfish from schools at about 20ft deep. I then moved the boat within casting distance of a sandy point that projected from about nine ft deep and dropped off to 27 suddenly. I casted the earth worm tipped ice jig over the point and let it settle at 9ft. a fish picked up right away and took off taking line and breaking water with some nice jumps. A hefty 3.2 lb largemouth settled angrily into the net and quickly released after a few pics. I continued catching many blugills on the ice jig and crappies on panfish assassins from that point ill dusk. Largest gill was 8.5 and crappie of 12.4”. lost to 10” class gills at the boat. One while talking on the phone with my wife!
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Comment by David, aka, "McScruff" on July 29, 2014 at 3:37pm
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Ten cents a grub? Ouch is right!
Time to start a meal worm farm!
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Comment by Slip Sinker on July 29, 2014 at 2:02pm
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They want 10 cents a piece for them up here... ouch....as long as the water temp is over 60 - 65 it works great for me. No luck at all ice fishing with it. I really like the pink maggots as a tip or single hook under a bobber.
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Grubs? I know the fish around here tear them up whenever I toss them in.
The other day I found that my zucchini has finally succumbed to the squash borers. When I opened the marrows, they were infested with feasting grubs, which I took straightaway to the pond. The fish go nuts for them - they dont hesitate to nail em as soon as they hit the water.
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I probably have my best track record over all with grubs
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Do you find the Gulp! products to out-perform naturals on a consistent basis?
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thanks guys
forgot to add that the ice jig was more effective with gulp pink maggot rather than grubs or earth worms
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Comment by John Sheehan on July 29, 2014 at 5:40am
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Great report Ken!
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Nice!
Wind from the West, fishing is best.
Great tale, full of useful detail. Thanks, Ken.
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most of the fish hit this rig.... crappies wouldn't touch it
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a pic of a crappie vertically jigged from a school roaming at 20 ft deep over 28.5 ft.... sweeeet
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