Sight fishing July gills on the muddy Mississippi River. Yep ~ you read me right. Pods of eel grass that fingered up through the rocky bottom are serving home to gills right along the main channel. Clarity has been so good a white or orange Mini Mite tipped with a pinch of crawler is as visible as the words of this report. Drag the presentation up along side a pod of eel grass in 2 to 4 feet water and watch three or four or more gills come screaming out of the grass to do a little more than just say “hi” to Mr. Cubby. Kept my nearly 4 year old son entertained for nearly 3 hours. Don’t know what it is about seeing a fish thump a bait. Whether it be a 5 lb LMB thumping a top water or little gills scrambling for a Mini Mite. The only issue was the size of the gills. 7 inchers were tops. Kept four out of a lot of fish for a sandwich.
Found some crappie hanging tight to cover in 6 feet of water on the second stop of the day. It took a BfishN pink flu-flu tipped with a minnow before any papermouths would give in to the temptation. A good little trick to use against tight lipped crappie is to lower the presentation on top of a submerged yet visible log. Then slowly drag it off the log letting it bounce down the side of the log into the depths. I don’t know why this is more effective on given days versus just lowering your offering next to the log. My son’s fish came in at nearly 9 inches and had the CARS pole bent pretty good. I actually thought he had a bass for a minute.
Ton of boats out there this past week. Error on the side of caution folks. Witnessed some pretty questionable boating practices by both recreational users and fellow fishermen. Oh yeah….Massive fly hatch the past 2 nights. The sun was cooking them by yesterday afternoon that left an odor any pig farmer would have been proud of.
……send some of that clean water down to us.
