Found a break in the weather and work and home schedules, and spent a couple days at the Dells. Launched at Rivers Edge on Sunday at 10 am or so, and spent the day trying to find a pattern for eyes, pretty much to no avail. Tried deep, tried shallow, plastic, meat, hair, pitching, jigging, dragging,and only a few shorts (eyes and sauger) to show for…one here and one there, but no numbers at any location. Water was moving pretty quick and af few ice flows around, as the ice in the dam area was still breaking up and coming down. Boat traffic was pretty light. The pike however, were cooperative, and we got a few of them on Sunday up to 29 inches. After trying to find the eyes again for a couple hours on Monday morning, we decided to spend our last few hours chasing what the river was willing to give up.
Dragging or pitching plastics in back eddy areas with sand bottom, in 5 to 10 fow was the ticket. The Firecracker Moxies I picked up at the Madison Fishing Expo seemd to be the favorite on a 1/4 oz jig. Not sure what the water temps were, as my winter boat is pretty Spartan, but was told that the Pike were in their spawning areas. We boated about a dozen on Monday with most in the 25 to 29 inch range. also had a good number of misses and bite-offs, so the action was fun.
And for those looking for an early outing in this neck of the woods waiting for the ice to leave local lakes, you ought to check out the Rivers Edge mid-week special. 83 bucks including tax (split by two guys)gets you two days of launch, a motel room, and two 16 oz T-bone dinners at their great restaurant, plus coffee and donuts the next morning. If you’ve never fished this stretch of the WI River, the setting is a sight to see, especially without the tourist traffic and duck boats running up and down the river,and operative fish are the frosting on the cake.
March 8, 2011 at 1:06 pm
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