I made the trip this past weekend to the Rainy.
We extended our weekend by getting the boat wet on Friday. As it turned out Friday was the best day in our boat for numbers. I spent most of the day pulling around a ¼ ounce fathead tipped jig. When fishing some of the deeper holes, I upgraded to a 3/8. It didn’t seem to matter much if I was dragging up or down stream. I played the wind and spent most my day pulling downstream.
We spent a little time playing around in the ice floes, where I had to fish vertically. I pulled out a BFT precision jig with firecracker chartreuse tail ringworm and did very well. A good reminder is to not be afraid to shorten up your ringworm up a half inch to full inch if you are having problems with short strikes. This was critical to increasing my hooking percentage.
I tried ripping some blades vertically with no luck. Really this doesn’t mean much because I’m not a blade fisherman in any fashion. Now if someone like Dean says the blade bite was dead..take very good note.
I’m not sure what happened, but in a matter of an hour when the ice cleared the bite died. I would like to get input on this situation. I theorized that they were attracted to the contrasting light penetration.
We did not get a sturgeon, but on Friday I have never seen so many sturgeons caught on the Rainy. It wasn’t uncommon to watch two or three simultaneous sturgeon battles.
Saturday we decided to spend most of our time within two miles of the Birchdale landing. I didn’t find the fishing to be markedly better downstream to justify negotiating the congestion. There seems to be a pack mentality that the bite is better downstream. I understand there is logic in intercepting them on their upstream journey, but the results don’t always reveal it’s advantageous. Within the first hour of the day my boat-mate caught is personal best that hit the tape at an even 29 inches. I think I was more excited netting the fish than he had catching it. It gave me some healthy adrenalin shakes. He was true to form and cool as a cucumber. Saturday the bite was slower than Friday.
Sunday we decided to get out for a couple hours in the morning before we fought the winter storm. The bite was even slower than Saturday. We caught a handful of fish and headed down the road.
As we drove by the Big Fork and Little Fork River they looked very solid. I didn’t see any sign of weakening. I would project an increasingly better bite this week. We have projected highs in the 40’s all week.
Good luck to all hitting the river!
Sully
