Pool 2 Thursday.

Got out on pool two for a while yesterday. River conditions looked fantastic but the bite was a little slow.

Launched out of Willies as I didnt want to deal with wet feet at Lions. Always a great choice for high water launching. Found this boat not doing so well as leaving their marina. Guess they tried moving it during the winter and something didnt go right.

Few big logs still coming down river and the the flow is up pretty good. Not a lot of grass or leaves in the water so fish lures kept pretty clean. Do watch out for the river cones. Very few seem to be in the right place and there are a number of them bobbing from right below the surface to about a foot up.

Checked a number of back water side channels with little luck yesterday. Water levels are perfect for fish to be in these locations. One thing I did not see is any minnows on these spots. Got a feeling the bait and fish are just holding tight to the bottom right now in these cooler conditions. Once temps warm up they should move up to the shallow breaks and feed.

Did find a few saugers feeding on a gravel point in the back waters. Caught one while trolling by it. Kinda thought it was a fluke as there was pretty good current there. About a hour later I noticed a pile of half eaten minnows laying on the floor of my boat. Figuring it was from that sauger and he must of been on some bait there I went back and it didnt take long to put a half dozen more in the boat. That was about the only bite I found for the afternoon.

Think Im back to working on the boat this weekend and maybe chasing crappies one more time. Got a feeling with warmer temps coming in for next week those fish should really turn on on pool 2.

Thanks for the update Mike. I just restocked my smash Shads and all my fave casting cranks with pool 2 in mind. Bring on the warmer weather.

Got a video of one of those river cones bobbing in and out of the water on my facebook page. Not sure of how to get it on here. Some of them will go from just a ripple on the water to a foot or more out depending on what flow is hitting them at that time.

They should just rename Action stage Good Fishing stage.

What was the water temp Mike? Last weekend some areas were 57, but I’m guessing it has dropped some.

53-54

Was out yesterday. Water temps were 54-55 depending upon where you were. Fished many backwater areas. trolling and pitching. Pewwww..couldn’t get the skunk out of the boat. With the river pretty much peaked yesterday, there will still great smaller pockets and backwaters to fish with slow(er) current/current seams…just couldn’t get hooked up with anything. If I recall…the only thing that I got was one hit. Bring on the sun and some 70’s to warm things up. Surprisingly, with the flow where it is, there was very little debris floating down..

I made it out for a few hours on Saturday morning. It was slow going to say the least. The two fish I caught were super chunky 25’s. Both were caught slow rolling/pausing cranks. I generally run cranks a lot slower than most guys do, and even for me I was pulling them painstakingly slow. Deep diving cranks were key so that I could barely move the bait and let the current keep them at the bottom.

Water temps were right around 54-55. For the first time this year, there was bait in the shallows. I saw them break surface a few times, and could see their wakes as they moved around. Things should pick up through this next week with warmer temps in the forecast.

I took one of my dogs out, and think that she was grateful to get out of the house where she has been competing for attention with the new baby.

-Drew

Glad you found a couple to take the curls out of the line! With all the back water/slack water/seams I trolled, I never once saw any baitfish on the screen or on the surface. Nice to see some showing up in the shallows. With the 70’s coming this week…things should begin to change.

Nice fish Drew. Decided to stick to crappie fishing this last weekend but sure looking forward to pool 2 again this coming weekend. Hoping the rains today set conditions up very well for the weekend.