My guests for Wednesday were Mark and Julie Collins of Rochester. It was Mark’s Birthday and one of his wishes was to catch a big smallmouth. Julie wasn’t into “holding fish” fish so the snapshot of Mark and Julie is all I can offer.
The weather was far better than the fishing but we did manage a reasonable trip. The first couple of hours offered reasonable action for mixed bag of jumbo white bass, smallmouth and a shallow water walleye. The photo is a nice walleye the hit Mark’s 4” pearl with blue flake Kalins grub swum over a 4’ rock flat. The most memorable part of the later hours was the weather and the scenery. At best, it was one fish every other spot on some smaller large and smallmouth bass.
We were able to fulfill part of Mark’s birthday wish with a 3 plus smallie that fell for the grub swum over a closing dam. There was another opportunity but as the old saying goes, “the big one got away”. Mark had a 4 pound class fish on. The fish was on a wing dam and she gave us a good show when she jumped and through the grub. It was unfortunate but Mark had most of the fight, we saw the fish, but she won the round. Mark did everything right, it just wasn’t meant to be.
A lot has changed in the last week. We saw water temps that ranged from 53 to 60 degrees, and the water level and flow has dropped. The fish have move away from the shallow sand and vegetation and are clearly moving closer to the wintering areas. The most successful techniques for the day were swimming a grub or Mimic Minnow about a foot below the surface. The spinnerbait that was so hot last week only took 2 fish. Even with sub par fishing Mark and Julie had an enjoyable outing with the weather and scenery filling in for the fishing. Believe it or not, I’m looking forward to the next cold snap to get the fish back on the feed. The best is yet to come.