Sometimes a person just has to listen to the walleye guys. 
Over the last week or so, they’ve been reporting channel cats as plentiful as sheepshead. So, when the Favorite Wife wanted to go fishing, I made sure I had my Sonny’s stink bait, suckers and night crawlers along with a few bullheads.
Using the crawlers, we had overwhelming success…with sheepshead. I finally gave up on them…although it was guaranteed action.
Sonny’s produced the most channels, although non were over the 5 pound mark. It was a great searching bait. If we didn’t have a fish in 15 minutes, it was time to move on.
Sonny’s also kept action in the boat with bites or fish ever few minutes.
The better fish came from the 4 to 5 inch crushed suckers. We…er I would cut off the tail hook them through the head then step of them. Once in an area the Sonny’s was working, the cut suckers worked very well for the channels from 4 to 15.5 pounds.
MY picture of my 10 pound channel didn’t turn out for some reason. 
But the 15.5 pound big lipped, grayish-blue male that the FW caught did….for some reason. 
The FW picked up the rod, set the hook and while reeling him in said “what ever it is, it’s small.” This guy didn’t roll like a normal channel, but stayed down and once to the boat …did not want to come up and really put a bend in the St Croix rod. Deb did a great job of pumping, then reeling in the line and repeating…until she saw this guy. Then it was off to the front of the boat…kinda scared the bejeebers out of her…which I took some enjoyment out of. 
If you want to get your kids on some hard fighting fish, take out your favorite girl for some action or just want to feel a few tugs yourself, now is the time to get in on the channel bite.
Check in with Dean for current hot bite locations before launching. 
