St Croix Sturgeon – 12 September 2007

Larry Haugh, DTRO and myself got out for a fun evening of sturgeon fishing. We managed to boat a total of 31 sturgeon, 2 sheepshead, and 1 carp. St Croix water temps are coming down and it seems to be triggering the sturgeon bite. We had a brisk south wind between 13 – 15 mph and it had the boat swinging a bit but it did not seem to affect the bite.

We tried a number of baits (shad, nightcrawlers, cut sucker, fathead minnows) and bait combinations and they all were working. We had excellent success with fathead minnows. We were hanging 3 minnows on the hook and pinching one off to get the juices flowing. The sturgeon were eating them up. Once we saw them hammering fatheads we all switched to fatheads until we ran out at about 11:30pm.

Here is some statistical information on the night from the Catch Log:

Best Baits:

Fatheads: 17

Crawler/Shad Combination: 14

Crawler/Fathead Combination: 2

Crawler: 1 (Carp)

Probably not enough info to draw any conclusions from since we all switched to fatheads until we ran out.

Best Time Frame:

8:00pm to 9:00pm: 4 fish

9:00pm to 10:00pm: 9 fish

10:00pm to 11:00pm: 11 fish

11:00pm to Midnight: 7 fish

Midnight to 00:15am: 3 fish

Size: (Total of 31 sturgeon caught)

20″ to 24″: 1

25″ to 29″: 7

30″ to 34″: 18

35″ to 39″: 4

40″ to 45″: 1 (largest fish of the night was 41″)

Lampreys: 3 fish had lampreys attached

Interesting Steve!

Our bite didn’t start until 11 pm…or maybe it was just the moving of the boat??

The last sturgeon was 43 and the largest.

Channels, sturgeon and eel all came in on shad athough we had worms and shrimp out.

I don’t know what’s better, catching fish, or Steve’s boat.

I enjoyed a piece of heaven last night, I’m mega jealous and hope to someday be able to have a setup like that.

I thought you guys looked busy out there!

We ended up with 7 sturgeon 4 channels and 1 sheepie

Biggest sturgeon was Daves 48 incher

The days catch was

Dave – 3 channels ranging from 5 to around 8 lbs

4 sturgeon ranging from 48 inches to 35

Marc 1 channel 11.4 lbs my PB

3 sturgeon with 2 over 40 inches and a little 25 incher that came in a double with one of the 40’s.

1 sheephead

1 plastic cup that jumped out of the water to somehow get me soaked

We mainly used shad. [image][/image]

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I don’t know what’s better, catching fish, or Steve’s boat.

I enjoyed a piece of heaven last night, I’m mega jealous and hope to someday be able to have a setup like that.

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Couldn’t have said it any better.

Got out there last nite too. The total for our boat was 9 sturgeon(largest being 39″) and a sheepy. Most action came on shad and crawler combo with plain crawler coming in just behind. The bite really picked up after 10:30. The wind sure was blowin! Nice rig Steve!!!

Quote:

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1 plastic cup that jumped out of the water to somehow get me soaked

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That plastic cup was a classic! It was a standard plastic Kegger type cup that he hooked by the rim. He thought he had a fish coasting in until it hit the surface of the water and launched into the boat from 15′ away!

I thought I was goin to have to perform CPR in the boat.. either that or drag Marc back into the boat after he about jumped out

Awesome job on catching the fish everyone! I think the reason why our fish were larger(and lacking in numbers) is we were using really large shad. We were actually cutting off the tails on many of them to keep them from being flathead size. Maybe the larger bait was keeping the little guys away?

I will pick up some fatheads for the next trip out… Thanks for the tip Steve!

Nice job out there guys! Looks like the night bite is better than early evening. We left shorty after we saw you and only caught 3 sturgeon. Crawlers only, none with the crawler/shad combo.

My sister and buddy both got their first sturgeon ever, so that was fun see.

Thanks for the detailed report.

Little late to the game, but here’s a couple photos.