I made my first IDO report a couple of weeks ago and even though I posted a photo of my PB I referenced how I’ve struggled this year to catch any quality fish. Well, I’m happy to report that has turned around for me. Last night I was able to take two co-workers, Josh Schulenburg, also a Lake Wisconsin fisherman, and Zach Dellsman along with me. I met fellow IDO’er Stu at the boat landing going out at around 5:30 p.m. Nice meeting you in person Stu. Zach was going to be joining us around 6:30 p.m. So I headed to a spot fairly close to the landing and it only took about 5 minutes for Josh to land a 28″ 9 lbs -8 oz walleye on a chartreuse jig and 3″ twister tail.
Josh was fishing in 10′ of water behind the boat and I was pitching a black blade bait to the shallows and working it back. After his first fish I was ready to pick up my jig but figured I’d give my blade at least a few minutes more. Then I picked up about a 24″ walleye that went around 5 lbs on the blade. After a few stripers I picked up another nice pre-spawn 22″ walleye. Then Zach called from the boat landing. We kept our 3 big fish to show him and he about had a heart attack. After a couple of pictures all were released. Back to fishing and a few more stripers, then a couple more smaller walleye before Josh had to switch to a blade bait because he could’t stand it any longer.
We kept making drifts through the same sand flat picking up a fish or two evry pass. Right after landing a 20 lb carp I casted back out and thought I had another carp but was finaly able to horse this fish to the surface and saw it was no carp! This walleye went 29″ weighing 10 lbs 9 oz.
That spot finally wore out so we headed to the dam. We were able to catch a lot of smaller fish up there but no big ones even though I knew they were there. We were still catching fish but finally surendered at midnight so we could work in the morning. All of our bigger fish came pretty early in the evening and I think all but Josh’s 28″er were on blade baits. Met Jack at the landing on the way out and I’m really enjoying meeting some IDOers in person. If pool 4 keeps it up I’m going to have to tell the wife we’re selling everything and relocating to the house for sale above Evert’s.
