I have one area that I really want to improve upon and haven’t been able to crack the code.
I’m an older fart that understands how open you have to be to new tricks, so here it goes. Late May through June on clear water lakes – Post spawn and later transition. I’ll get on a paticular clear water lake a couple hours before dark and start pitch’n jigs/leech or minnow, plastics, and or cranks pending frontal conditions. I’ll catch dinks with some consistancy. Like many clear water lakes, you get the flurry at dusk. Then they shut down. I’ll move in and fish tight to shore (1′ or less out to 8′ or so) I’ll make a pass down the shore pitching jigs, pass back with cranks, anchor and fish live bait….some nights turn on and do very well….others, not so good. The part that really has me stumped is how often I will click on a light when I go to leave and see the hundreds of eyes stacked tight on the shore. Sometimes they are up in a 1′ of water and other nights you see them out in 3 or 4 FOW. I’ve experienced this on a northern WI lake for the last 17 years. I have spent many all nighters out there waiting for them to turn on. Most nights, they don’t. Very consistantly they seem to shut down 1-1/2 hours after dark and get very tough to get a bite for the rest of the night. Dynomite prevents catch and release, so that hasn’t been an option.
I see a lot of huge pigs in this lake. I C&R many 6-8lb eyes and have watched many larger ones cruise on by while I’m packing up. Lake is loaded with rusty crabs, leeches, very few perch, and a lot of toothy muskies. Caught many 5lb eyes with massive scars. But for some reason, when the eyes move from holding areas along the weeds to rocky shallows, I have a very hard time enticing them to bite….any ideas?