PC gills

Well, Friday was the first day of summer vacation for my daughter, so I took the day off and headed for Palo. Thought about the big river, but figured the water and debris were just going to be too much.

It was a good decision. The bluegills are done spawning and the big males are up guarding the nests. These fellas were nice, thick, 8-9″ fish, with a handful of dinks roaming around as well. We ended up catching probably 50, although maybe a dozen got released into hot oil instead of the lake.

Forgot the camera, but to give you an idea these fish were bigger than my open hand, and maybe an inch and a half across the back.

Nothing like catch and release into a skillet of 375 degree peanut oil…

With gas prices still $$$, messy water on the river, and my success the night before; PC looked pretty good. Larry and I fished the night bite yesterday from the boat; I left “the Rock” at about 5. I came in late to work Friday (fished too late Thursday night!), so I had to stay a little later, Larry got there a little earlier in the afternoon and was pulling some bull gills by the fishing jetty near the ramp. The males are really aggressive right now, he was “amazing” some of the local urchins by catching them on a bare hook.

We basically did some bikini watching to pass the time (not much to see yet) til it got around dusk. I tied on a blue shad JSR-5 and Larry, an unbeliever in Firetiger, reluctantly tied one on at my suggestion.

We marked fish on some sandy points and rocky drop-offs and as soon as we pulled the cranks over them, we nailed two ‘eyes. One was a nice eater and the other a dink. We kept this trolling routine up and Larry pulled two more, using the firetiger pattern. Larry got the big fish prize of the night with a nice 19″.

I kept using the blue-shad pattern until full darkness, then switched to fire-tiger. By about 10:30, they pretty much shut-off. It was weird.

I might head out over there tomorrow night or sometime next week; you’re welcome to join me. There are definately walleyes in PC and apparently they are catchable.

Regards,

Joe

C’mon Joe, I have personally certified that lake USDA-Walleye-Free on several occasions. The sun is starting to get to you bud.

We’ll see about tomorrow night. I still have the boat in the drive, but was thinking there was little chance of getting out again because of the schedule. Tomorrow afternoon I have a family reunion in Arlington, and we usually go to Backbone after that, but if the park is underwater there’s not much point in doing that.

Was trying to talk the wife into taking the kids boating tomorrow afternoon, but flying back on Thursday it looked like Coralville was still well out of its banks. If the wife doesn’t want to go out with the kids, I’ll probably try to sneak in a trip to PC to verify or deny all these claims about walleyes.

If’n I can go, I’ll give you a ring.

Gianni,
I to personally have certified palo to be 100% usda-walleye free untill last night. Got out about 4pm and caught a couple of pearch & gills, seen some small crappies being taken from shore. Soooooooo, sitting right beside my boat a guy nails a good 3 to 4 lb eye (should have been me) oh well, going keep trying, how about you?
Wahly

Until the water goes down somewhere else, do I have a choice?

It’s a good lake, it just takes some patience to learn it. I’m sure others will agree.

How’d you guys do today Joe?

When I parked, I looked for the TRD, but didn’t see it around. Larry gave us a yell while I was cursing my main battery for being dead, but I didn’t recognize him until he climbed aboard the S.S. Minnow and started trolling cranks.

We finally decided that it was going to be an electric motor kind of day, and just worked the outside weed edge. Ended up with better than half a dozen 10″+ perch in the couple of hours we were out. Those buggers just give up the nicest fillets; wouldn’t hurt me if a few more lakes around here had a handful of ’em in there.

Gosh, John, I didn’t realize you had some probs.

I should have stopped by an offered a hand, I have jumper cables and other crap in the truck.

I saw you guys parked over by the edge and figured you were on some panfish, we thought you might catch up with us later.

We were the second boat in the tub; we were trolling by 5:30. We didn’t have much luck, so we rigged up some live-bait three-ways. I used a northland floating jig tipped with a leech. On one of the passes, I got a tremendous strike; I pulled in and my leech was perfectly cut, with about a 1/3 left. I don’t know what could have done that sort of damage other than an ‘eye or a small Esox-type fish.

Short of that, we caught a few perch and bluegills as the sun soared higher and the boat traffic swelled. I was shocked at all the boats out there. Palo is gonna be a night-time trip for me until the weather cools off.

Speaking of which, I fished tonight with my son, we got home about an hour ago. No luck, but I did see a fella catch a 4# eye long-lining in the bay between the picnic pavilion and the universal access pier. So, they’re still in there.

I will be out of town from Wednesday thru next Tuesday; heading to PA for the summer “visit inlaws” vacation. I’ll be back on Palo (after dark) when I return. If you can handle the skeeters (with the breeze they weren’t too bad tonight) its a really peaceful time to be out there, no commotion except for an ocasional owl. Plus, the walleyes are not as timid.

I don’t know if it would help with the battery, but I have a portable battery charger/jumper that I’d be happy to lend to you.

Regards,

Joe Jiacinto

Don’t know why the battery was dead… Maybe the radio was left on again (kids just love switches and knobs). One way or another, it wasn’t up to the task of cranking the outboard. I thought for about 10 seconds about rope-starting it, but then it occurred to me that I wasn’t in a life-or-death situation on a remote Canadian lake and could pretty much cover the entire length and width of Palo in about fifteen minutes with the electric motor. It’s just one of those things.

Hopefully she’s all charged up and ready to go now. If it dies again, I suppose it’s just time for a new battery. The cranking battery is an easy 5 years old, so its time may have just come.

Trust me.
jc