Iczer
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- Oct 27, 2010
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Sorry, this ended up being an epic post rather than a fishing report.
So I've decided since I have my own aluminum boat now I would take bass fishing more seriously. I have been doing a lot of reading from various websites and books and basically everything I can get my hands on. i'm the type of person who loves a great challenge and right now there biggest challenge is to go to a new lake and first find the bass and second catch them. I live 5 minutes from a lake that I used to fish at many years ago so I decided with a few days to myself to hit that lake and see if I have learned anything from all this reading.
The first thing I did was take a look at the DNR topo map of the lake to find out what it looks like properly. After pouring over the map for a few hours I decided to take a drive to the lake with my lighter spinning pole, my baitcaster and a bag of plastics and cranks/topwaters. I didn't bring the boat because it was late and I wouldn't have time to do all the boating stuff necessary to make it worth while so I just walked around the shore where I could near the boat launch and after an hour I had produced 2 bass, both 8 inch, from the shore just as it started to get dark. I planned on going back in the boat in the morning. Mother nature decided to throw me a curveball and it stormed early in the morning which delayed me a bit but after all was said and done I launched the boat about 9am and sat there at the opening to the main part of the lake going "Uhhh, where do I start?"
I immediately started on the NW shoreline just off the boat launch where the shore turned towards the lake to make a small cove. I started throwing a spinnerbait, probing the shallower water for active fish then switched to a banjo minnow setup with a weight to make it sink a bit faster ... still nothing, then switched to a 4" yum dinger on a 3/0 hook. Nothing, so I moved along to a few similar areas which produced nothing. After doing this along the shoreline for about 3 hours I scored my first bass, 6 inches, on the banjo minnow that was hiding up under some lilly pads. After that one I couldn't get any others to bite so I moved on ... this continued for the rest of the day until about 3pm when the weather started to look ominous so I headed back towards the boat launch. When I got there I decided to throw a few more casts while waiting for the other boaters to load their boats. On a whim I tried a square bil shallow running crankbait that resembled a pearch and BAM I had a nice 10 inch bass (https://i56.tinypic.com/2r6n11e.jpg). Trying to reproduce what I did with the crankbait yielded me no more bass but along the outer edge of the weedline a 16" pike hit the bait (https://i54.tinypic.com/2ivjwra.jpg). The other boaters cleared the docks so I made my exit just as a heavy thunderstorm rolled in. I went home and was trying to remember the times and presentations I had used and how it related to what I had read. All the reading about crankbaits having to bash and bump into stuff to elicit a strike was dead on so I felt like I made progress.
Sunday came and the weather was gloomy but the forecast showed no rain for the rest of the day so I headed back to the lake and got on the water around 10am. I immediately headed strait for the place I had caught the fish from the day before and worked that same cove area for about 2 hours but had no luck. The night before I had read a lot of articles about structure fishing and the topic that kept popping up was fishing points so I decided today that I was going to work on fishing the points of this lake and see if I could find the fish that "should" be there. I found a point that was also part of a public beach so I parked my boat about 30 yards from the shore in 22 feet of water and started fan casting the area with a Strike King chartreuse & red bleeding bait spinnerbait. When I got to the right side of the point where the drop came up into 5 feet of water from 20 I landed my first bass of the day (https://i52.tinypic.com/2hcm1ph.jpg). I kept working back and forth across the point and about 15 mins later on the opposite side of the point I landed bass number 2 (https://i56.tinypic.com/123y554.jpg). Bass number 3 came on the same side as the first in the exact same area (https://i53.tinypic.com/2n7dsuv.jpg). After the third bass the bites stopped so I moved on looking for other points to try and reproduce the same pattern. None of the other points I found produced any bass, so after a few hours I decided to go back to the point where I had scored the three fish. When I got there and anchored the boat I noticed a lot of top water activity along the right side of the point and behind me. The bass were feeding on minnows and they were on the surface all over so I cast my spinner right into the middle of the action and a bass took it seconds after it hit the water (https://i52.tinypic.com/241ugwx.jpg). I quickly threw back to the same spot and BAM another bass took it instantly (https://i55.tinypic.com/e6ypsl.jpg). I decided all this picture taking was costing me more bass in the boat so I threw out again into the splashing frenzy and caught another. The feeding bass were moving closer to the shore up one side of the point so I again threw into the mass but the wind took my lure into some thick above surface vegetation and I was snagged. Noooooooooooo! I had to unanchor and motor over to where it was snagged but as i rounded the vegetation i forgot to slack the line and it broke off. I searched for the lure to no avail for about 15 mins so I tied on a heavier spinner of the same kind and color but could get no takers. Thinking the smaller bait was more effective I switched to a blue/yellow spinner of the same size as the one I lost and cast into the frenzy again and again but none would hit it. I tried other baits, banjo minnows of a few colors, a yum dinger, other spinner baits of same size but different colors but nothing. Finally calling it a day I headed for the boat dock to head home around 5:30pm.
To cap the day off, which was awesome by the way, I hooked the boat up and as I jumped from the boat to the dock I landed on some slippery part of it and nearly busted my ankle! Its all swollen and I can barely walk on it now but I don't care, I had a great day of fishing wooooo.
So I've decided since I have my own aluminum boat now I would take bass fishing more seriously. I have been doing a lot of reading from various websites and books and basically everything I can get my hands on. i'm the type of person who loves a great challenge and right now there biggest challenge is to go to a new lake and first find the bass and second catch them. I live 5 minutes from a lake that I used to fish at many years ago so I decided with a few days to myself to hit that lake and see if I have learned anything from all this reading.
The first thing I did was take a look at the DNR topo map of the lake to find out what it looks like properly. After pouring over the map for a few hours I decided to take a drive to the lake with my lighter spinning pole, my baitcaster and a bag of plastics and cranks/topwaters. I didn't bring the boat because it was late and I wouldn't have time to do all the boating stuff necessary to make it worth while so I just walked around the shore where I could near the boat launch and after an hour I had produced 2 bass, both 8 inch, from the shore just as it started to get dark. I planned on going back in the boat in the morning. Mother nature decided to throw me a curveball and it stormed early in the morning which delayed me a bit but after all was said and done I launched the boat about 9am and sat there at the opening to the main part of the lake going "Uhhh, where do I start?"
I immediately started on the NW shoreline just off the boat launch where the shore turned towards the lake to make a small cove. I started throwing a spinnerbait, probing the shallower water for active fish then switched to a banjo minnow setup with a weight to make it sink a bit faster ... still nothing, then switched to a 4" yum dinger on a 3/0 hook. Nothing, so I moved along to a few similar areas which produced nothing. After doing this along the shoreline for about 3 hours I scored my first bass, 6 inches, on the banjo minnow that was hiding up under some lilly pads. After that one I couldn't get any others to bite so I moved on ... this continued for the rest of the day until about 3pm when the weather started to look ominous so I headed back towards the boat launch. When I got there I decided to throw a few more casts while waiting for the other boaters to load their boats. On a whim I tried a square bil shallow running crankbait that resembled a pearch and BAM I had a nice 10 inch bass (https://i56.tinypic.com/2r6n11e.jpg). Trying to reproduce what I did with the crankbait yielded me no more bass but along the outer edge of the weedline a 16" pike hit the bait (https://i54.tinypic.com/2ivjwra.jpg). The other boaters cleared the docks so I made my exit just as a heavy thunderstorm rolled in. I went home and was trying to remember the times and presentations I had used and how it related to what I had read. All the reading about crankbaits having to bash and bump into stuff to elicit a strike was dead on so I felt like I made progress.
Sunday came and the weather was gloomy but the forecast showed no rain for the rest of the day so I headed back to the lake and got on the water around 10am. I immediately headed strait for the place I had caught the fish from the day before and worked that same cove area for about 2 hours but had no luck. The night before I had read a lot of articles about structure fishing and the topic that kept popping up was fishing points so I decided today that I was going to work on fishing the points of this lake and see if I could find the fish that "should" be there. I found a point that was also part of a public beach so I parked my boat about 30 yards from the shore in 22 feet of water and started fan casting the area with a Strike King chartreuse & red bleeding bait spinnerbait. When I got to the right side of the point where the drop came up into 5 feet of water from 20 I landed my first bass of the day (https://i52.tinypic.com/2hcm1ph.jpg). I kept working back and forth across the point and about 15 mins later on the opposite side of the point I landed bass number 2 (https://i56.tinypic.com/123y554.jpg). Bass number 3 came on the same side as the first in the exact same area (https://i53.tinypic.com/2n7dsuv.jpg). After the third bass the bites stopped so I moved on looking for other points to try and reproduce the same pattern. None of the other points I found produced any bass, so after a few hours I decided to go back to the point where I had scored the three fish. When I got there and anchored the boat I noticed a lot of top water activity along the right side of the point and behind me. The bass were feeding on minnows and they were on the surface all over so I cast my spinner right into the middle of the action and a bass took it seconds after it hit the water (https://i52.tinypic.com/241ugwx.jpg). I quickly threw back to the same spot and BAM another bass took it instantly (https://i55.tinypic.com/e6ypsl.jpg). I decided all this picture taking was costing me more bass in the boat so I threw out again into the splashing frenzy and caught another. The feeding bass were moving closer to the shore up one side of the point so I again threw into the mass but the wind took my lure into some thick above surface vegetation and I was snagged. Noooooooooooo! I had to unanchor and motor over to where it was snagged but as i rounded the vegetation i forgot to slack the line and it broke off. I searched for the lure to no avail for about 15 mins so I tied on a heavier spinner of the same kind and color but could get no takers. Thinking the smaller bait was more effective I switched to a blue/yellow spinner of the same size as the one I lost and cast into the frenzy again and again but none would hit it. I tried other baits, banjo minnows of a few colors, a yum dinger, other spinner baits of same size but different colors but nothing. Finally calling it a day I headed for the boat dock to head home around 5:30pm.
To cap the day off, which was awesome by the way, I hooked the boat up and as I jumped from the boat to the dock I landed on some slippery part of it and nearly busted my ankle! Its all swollen and I can barely walk on it now but I don't care, I had a great day of fishing wooooo.
Every time I go there the west shoreline has a boat on every point. I went down in that SE cove you mentioned, there looked like a public campground there and at the very end was some kind of stream. I had no luck down there but it was also very windy and the chop was bad so I kept bouncing closer to shore and abandon that area.
