Elwood fishing report 5/31/07

My father and I headed to Elwood to fish near the bubble with the incoming water. As Brian R recommended it is extremely shallow where the bubble is so we moved off that by about 100 yards to a decent point. Started fishing shortly after sunrise. Threw some hard baits and a rod a piece on the bottom with a nightcrawler. Never caught a fish on the hard bait and the bait rods were keeping us busy. The odd thing was that we caught 2 drum and 10 cats but never any wipers or walleyes or basss or anything like that. I have caught the occasional cat at Elwood before but not just cats. I did get my personal best ever catfish. 35 inches in length and 22 inches around the belly. NGPC says the fish should weigh about 20-22 pounds. Don’t own a scale so whatever it was it was big. I will email Robinso the photo to see if he can post it for me.

Craig

Congrats on the big cat! Thanks for the report!

Thanks Craig I can’t wait to get down there

Real nice fish. Maybe someone could grab the photo and lighten it up a bit for ya. Did you take him home? How’s the water comin in looking?

if you want wipers, fish the bubble, bigs ones, and there are a lot of them, last nite, excellent,

I kissed her and sent her back in the water with absolute joy!
My first 20+ pound fish in Nebraska and what a hoot it was!

Thanks B for posting it. It was taken with a camera phone at 8am under cloudy skies so it is was tough to the get the photo to lighten up but via the picture in email it looked at least way better then it did on the phone. Anybody can lighten that up has my blessing!

I am glad to hear the wipers were going Seth. Were you fishing after dark or just in the evening? And were you literally at the bubble? I figured it would be too shallow there as you can literally see current 45 yards away from the bubble trying to get in the rest of the lake which led me to believe it was extremely shallow there.
Craig

SBE. in the evening, and right in the bubble,

We got out there on day 2 right about the time the thunderstorm hit and fished till dark. We REALLY tore the walleye and wiper up that day on soft plastics. Friday though was a completely different story, they were hardly touching any lures or soft plastics. Everyone was bringing them in on nightcrawlers, shad sides, and chicken liver. I just took a peek down there yesterday and it didnt look like people were having much more luck than the day before. To anyone who did make it out there, friday i was the one wearing the trash bag lol than the alma track sweatshirt, saturday the same sweatshirt. I talked to a lot of people out there this weekend from places back east, Im sure i talked to a few of you lol

p.s. I have no confirmation of this but the elwoodian’s are saying 25 feet before its over, the C.O. from north platte had heard the same

Civil Engineer Cory Steinke reported that recent rainfall has not directly benefitted water levels at Lake McConaughy because the rain has fallen east of the lake. However, high flows in the South Platte River resulting from upstream have allowed Central to avoid releases through Kingsley Dam for several consecutive days.

The lake, Steinke said, is holding steady at around elevation 3219.4, but inflows have fallen to about 19 percent of the historical average.

“The lake had started dropping by this time last year,” he said. “Since there’s not yet demand for natural flow by any downstream canals and the higher South Platte flows should last for at least the next few days, we might catch up to last year’s lake level by the end of next week.”

Steinke also reported that Central had received permission from the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources to divert some water into Elwood Reservoir to help the lake’s fish population. The DNR permitted diversions into the reservoir as long as flows in the Platte River remain above target flows established by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

• Conservation Director Marcia Trompke reported that rainfall for the first five months of 2007 has far exceeded the 30-year average in the Bertrand, Holdrege and Minden areas. Precipitation recorded at the Bertrand office since Jan. 1 comes to 16.12 inches, compared with an average for the period of 9.22 inches. Holdrege has measured 18.83 inches, compared with an average of 9.09 inches; and Minden has received 21.21 inches, compared with an average of 10.06 inches.

I would say that I’m happy you guys are getting into some fish over there, but……EVERYone but me is catching fish over there. I just got home from there, fished from 6pm till about 2am, and we trolled up one nice wiper on a Flicker Shad, and that was IT for the day. We live bait rigged, threw cranks, pulled cranks, jigged….nothing really seemed to work. I’m thinking it’s possible I wasn’t up shallow enough today. I imagine with all the water flowing in, fish are moving back into coves and up in the grass and stuff. I hung lights out tonight over the side as well and didn’t get a sniff of anything. I guess I did see one wiper dart through the lights, but that was it. I don’t know what the water temp was today, but I’m thinking it probably dropped a bit with the rain and lower temps. I think it was 69 last week, so I’m betting it was around 66 today or so. But hey, I can’t catch fish over there, so I’m probably wrong on that too.

The water has really come up nicely, and the ramp looks real good. I watched a couple trucks put their rear tires in the water to load boats, and they pulled right on out with no problems. A guy was there bowfishing when I got there and they had a buffalo that went 49 pounds, and another one that didn’t look much smaller. He said they put more rock down earlier in the week, and judging by how far the trailer was out there, he might just be right.

Water is going to continue to be diverted to Elwood until the the flow at the three checkpoints on the Platte fall below 800. Strait from the horses mouth on Saturday

Pray for another big rain out west on Wednesday so the diversion can continue for a few more day

Fished on Saturday about 10am until noon. Caugt 10 wipers the smallest being 20 biggest was about 29. Also caught a 22″ walleye, a nothern, and no it wasn’t a musky, and finnaly a 30″ carp. So it was a great 2 hours of fishing.
Matt

Fished Sunday heard it wasn’t as good a day as Saturday, but caught a few wipers, walleye, and catfish. My son caught a 21 1/2 pound cat. The wipers are VERY skinny and the other fish aren’t to fat either. Sure hope they keep putting water in.

I’ve heard a lot of people say the wipers are skinny. Mine looked all right, but that lake is definitely in trouble. I hope the bait hasn’t already crashed.

Welcome to the board, Dude!

Here are a few pictures of some of the fish we caught at Elwood on the Friday before Memorial Day.





Hope we can make it back out there within the next couple of weeks. I might even try sneeking out there this saturday afternoon.

Welcome dude

Those walleye sure don’t look like they are starving. YUMMY

Those aren’t bad at all, Chad! All I know is I know where you caught em….and you must be the only ones that can catch fish off that point!

The fishing pretty much died off today, nothing but cats, tons of carp, and a few pike and muskie. I got a 34 in muskie the other night my first cast but that was it. Its a bowfishermans paradise out there right now with the water up in the weeds.

Damn, if YOU’RE not catchin em….I might not go!!
I’m thinking it’s a shallow water paradise up there now. Start throwing stuff up into the backs of grassy coves that are now in the water.

I assume the water is still comin in? I haven’t heard otherwise.
You work Sunday night? Sat night?