Anyone catching ‘gills?

You don’t hear too much about people targeting pre-spawn ‘gills. Anyone getting them? Tips for this time of year?

It’s time.

Look for circles (Beds) in the sand up near shore.
Any over hanging trees providing shade in the shallows has always been a go to for me.

Just old fashioned slip bobber with a piece of crawler on a tiny tube jig or a flu flu.

I’m probably not telling you anything you don’t already know.

Thanks, just thought it was a bit soon-65 degrees near me last weekend.

tim hurley wrote:

You don’t hear too much about people targeting pre-spawn ‘gills. Anyone getting them? Tips for this time of year?

In May alone, my partners and I have caught in total over 325 fish on two outings. They included sunfish, bass, pickerel, yellow & white perch and crappie. Both days we found schools of crappie, sunfish and white perch. The usual multi-species lures were used: soft plastics rigged on light ball head jigs.

Today should be interesting….

Temps were 66-68 Friday north metro. I didn’t see any beds in yet. Not much biting after wind and rain. The water was churned up and cloudy.

I meant to say Thursday in the above message.

Gills and crappies on beds this weekend off the dock. I have a small dead fall that they are hanging around. Cane pole and plastics.
It’s been a very good bite.

2’ of water

Attachments:

1. 

   IMG_1265-scaled.jpeg
   

That water looks pretty clear. I don’t know what would do without plastics. Next I have to try them under a float.

got 15 nice gills this morning in southern WI, could have caught plenty more but that was enough

Just cause you don’t hear about it doesn’t mean people aren’t catching em
Not much different set up then crappies..

They catch and don’t jump on here and brag!?!?
OK 10 you may be right.

Caught about 30 today.

Spoon always tells me
Anyone have a water temp?

We had 64 in the backwaters yesterday.

I could kick myself for not getting after them yet. Mostly just dont find the time and when I do the weather is bad.

Wind and bright sun are the worse combinations when it comes to holding boat postion and searching areas. The weather forecast, as usual, was totally wrong: mostly cloudy and wind less than 10 mph. In fact there was a bright hot sun and wind gusted to 20mph, averaging 15 mph. The pads held fish, but inaccurate casting because of the wind, made it impossible for casting accuracy due to wind blown line bow. Not good when casting 1/32 and 1/24 oz jigs.

The only thing that saved the day was hitting fish in 3 FOW one shaded cove – sunnies galore! Plus my partner landed a 3 lb LM. in the pads. 30 fish was not a good day but at least the sunnies slammed our lures and gave a nice fight along with crappie, yellow perch and bass that I caught in shallow water.

To bad the boat’s going into the shop tomorrow or I’d be fishing in the cool rain under a cloudy sky with little wind.

Attachments:

1. 

   IMG_4839.jpg
   

Bluegill feeding on the cicadas falling into the water. We did well twitching small cranks that looked like cicadas on the surface. Match the hatch.

Nice LMB!

Sylvanboat wrote:

Bluegill feeding on the cicadas falling into the water. We did well twitching small cranks that looked like cicadas on the surface. Match the hatch.

I could see a little rebel crickhopper being perfect for that. They even have a popper style w/ same body and a few colors.

Pic
Weird won’t load

Third try

Got some eaters, love to watch that bobber pop down.

Yep

Attachments:

1. 

   20240910_183828.jpg
   

You better blur out that bass or you gonna be in trouble. Double trouble if you caught him on a sucker.

JEREMY wrote:

You better blur out that <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>bass or you gonna be in trouble. Double trouble if you caught him on a sucker.

why’s that?

Just a vibe I picked up in the fall pattern thread

2 weeks ago in a dark lake I could not get one on shallow structure-trolling shallow basins is now worth trying. Crappies for sure are suspending deep more than they were.

A buddy just got me into trolling crankbaits. Other than bass, this crappie got hooked in 6′.

Attachments:

1. 

   IMG_5346-1.jpg