Last week was our annual vacation to a small lake just North of Mille Lacs. We were there a week earlier than usual and it was a late spring. I was surprised by the lack of weeds and the remarkable water clarity of the lakes we fished. This meant we had to adjust our tactics slightly.
The weather was brutal….high winds interspersed with heavy rains. We had one nice afternoon, and I used that time to apply a fresh coat of paint to the boat trailer (Much easier to do with the boat out of the way, and what would I do with the boat if I was at home?)
The Bass are going nuts, to put it simply. We had tremendous results by concentrating on the warmest water we could find ( 64 degrees) and the best of the early weed growth. Different presentations worked, everything from Spinnerbaits to Bass Bugs and other flies. But hands-down the best offering was a wacky-rigged Senko. My wife had a stretch where she hooked 8 Bass on 8 casts; it was that good. What fun! For you warm-water fly fishermen the most consistent fly for me was a cone head purple Bunny fly.
The Mayflies were also hatching right at dusk, and when they were the most active the bigger Bluegills would flood into the shallows to take advantage. There were a few rises but I think most ofg the feeding activity was actually taking place below the surface i.e they were chasing nymphs and not the duns. I couldn’t get much interest in topwaters but they would climb all over a #10 olive wooly bugger. We kept a few for dinner.
As I said the weather was tough….Thursday I found a small protected pocket that was stacked full of Bluegills and Pumpkinseeds, and I was having a ball playing C&R with my 6 weight fly rod. Then we saw lightning and ran back to the dock. As my wife was getting out of the boat, she looked at me and asked “What am I hearing? What is that sound?”. I realized it was the gust front associated with that distant line of thunderstorms. The wind went from 5 mph to 60 mph in about 15 seconds. I had the boat tied up to the dock, and then tied to anchor rope to a big tree on shore just in case. It was a wild few minutes before everything slowed down again.
The pictures show a few of the better Bass we caught, the best one right at 20 inches. The dog was 28 inches long and I landed him on my Limit Creek ML rod, an 1/8th ounce jig dessed with a Super Doo, and 6# line. It took a while!
Rootski
