Tyler Holm and I hit the lake up for some fresh air this morning and managed to find some fish as well.
The water temp scaled in at 44 in most areas while 45 and 46 were found where the water was deepest. For some reason the water appeared to be pretty dirty, perhaps construction in Roch or oronoco could have things messed up. Might be a turn-over too. Who knows. We tried many areas before we hit the mother lode. Think lots of steps and you’ll be thinking of the right general area.
Sunfish came from moderately deep water and near the bottom….like within four feet of the bottom. Many came from right on the bottom, but they tended to be smaller fish. Our largest today was taped at just over 9 1/2 inches. ALL of these sunnies, and there were quite a number in all, came to a glow red jigging spoon, either a Scenic Go Devil [1/16] or a jigging demon in the size 6. These were tipped with waxies, but fish were caught on them absolutely bare-hooked today too! Micro plastics replaced waxies at times with equal effectiveness.
The crappies were dandies and quite a few were taken. They wanted larger foods, so 2″ twisters and power minnows fished free line on a 1/16 jighead did the trick. The crappies were not real deep, but were over deeper water. Sunken wood held nothing, but rock on steep shoreline was primo. The trick was to stay in open water and cast to almost the waterline and then gently jig the bait back sloooooowly. The hits were nothing more than a vagrant weight….no pop, no twitch, just weight.
Smallmouth, largemouth, white bass, rock bass and perch also fell vicim today, so I guess we had a successful outing. Tomorrow will find me out there doing this again. We’ll not have this weather for long as I understand, so I just have to make the time now to enjoy it.
