Pitchin,Draggin,or Vertical ? Next to,”are the ramps open” and “are they biting” ? Is one of the most frequent questions asked here.I am happy to share that “yes” is the answer to all of the above!
Suckerslayer was nice enough to ask me to hop in the boat with him late thursday afternoon.We decided to try out some new ideas as well as the standby presentations.I was looking for a few eaters for a fish fry.That sure didnt take long,one pass vertical jigging 4 different plastics,and with superdoos & paddletails with orange and black jigs got that job done!
We then decided to try a pass dragging upstream in the same location that we had just went vertical in.We didnt go far and the fish responded very well to a 3/16th jig and purple ringworm with chart pepper being a close 2nd.We also noticed that we didnt catch quite as many dragging,but size and quality was far better than the vertical fish.On suny bright days,colors like firecracker chart with orange jigs have been clearly the favorite.Lower light pattern preferences have been oystershell,cotton candy and pro-blue have been more productive.
The last hour of the day was setting up on one of my favorite pitching spots.Very slow to start out.Just a couple of fish so spot # 2 would get a visit. After setting up, the first few casts didnt show much improvement,but then like a light switch,they turned on! No monsters for us this evening, but if I recall correctly,we had at least 3 doubles on at the same time !
Why is this time of year one of my most favorite times to fish Pool #4 ? We were the only boat out there enjoying this evenings fantastic bite.Even though I live here,this body of water just amazes me with the number and quality of fish that make themselves available to us in so many different year-classes! Without a doubt,Pool #4 is a VERY special fishery!
I hope everyone has a great holiday season and hope to see ya on the river!
Dean,
.
These river reports are killing me! Glad to hear you got out on the water–I can not wait to get back over there!
Awesome report
Jeremy
dean, you’re killin me. if it wasnt for the little matter of that 7 hour drive……
but good to hear the report and see you made quick work on the fish fry supply.
got a good fix of my own tuesday. ramp was a little scary and bite started slow, but the sun came out about noon, i switched to pyrokeet hed with firecracker/chart ringie and popped them pretty good for a couple hours.
and a happy holidays to you, too
Thanks for the report, I am really missing that river. I need to get there soon
Side bar: What kind of motor is that you are running?
What a great day on the river!! I think I gained about three years worth of fishing experiance fishing with Dean for one afternoon. He really knows how to put fish in the boat!!! Thanks again Dean.
To answer you question Farmboy, that is a Prodrive outboard. I sure get some funny looks walleye fishing with a mud motor
, but it gets me from point A to B. I don’t know how to post a link but here is video we took carping last spring. http://www.putfile.com/rwparamedic
Nice report Dean!
That certainly is a dandy sauger your holding up.
Boog
Excellent report.
Drewsdad and I will be down there tomorrow.
Hopefully we can get in a couple hours of fishing there before the wind howls and the temps drop.
Thanks for the info! And any motor that gets you fishing is OK in my book
Great Report Dean
Here’s a good saugar from today. Dick Doreman got this on draging a chart Superdoo upstream in 14 FOW. Well done Dick!
Hey Dean , I need you to hop into my boat sometime and educate me .
Here’s another good sauger from today. The bite was real good until about 11:00 then it slowed down to 2-4 fish a pass. Most of our fish came from 22’to 25’fow, white, firecracker, and chartruse pepper superdoos were best for us today. Thanks again Dean
Way to go guys it must of been fun.
Hey Dean with all the warm temps the last couple days you got the sunscreen for sale yet?!!
Dean,
Very nice report, and am glad to hear you putting the hurt on a few fish…
Have a Great Christmas
Jack
Great report guys
Didn’t happen to run into any channel cats by any chance?
Great report!
With weather like we’re havin you might start to see afew more guys back in the boat. 
It’s good to see your smiling face Deano! Merry Christmas!
What a great day down on P4! The weather was beautiful, and the fishing was on fire!!
I got the latest and greatest info from Dean, and as usual, he was dead on.
Erick Andersen beat me on the water, so I found him up by the dam, dragging jigs down stream. I had a 2 rods already rigged up for dragging. As we finished the first pass, and multiple big saugers in each boat, we knew this day was going to be awesome.
I was using 3/8’s bfn precision/everts jigs in yellow, black, and orange for dragging.
For plastic colors I had the best luck with bfn ringworms fire cracker/chartreuse tail, purple/chartreuse tail, oyster shell, Everts purple, and Everts silver black paddle tail.
Like Hawg said earlier the dragging bite was awesome up until 11ish, then it slowed up. So we ran back to the resort, had a bite to eat and went back out.
It was time to go vertical, grabbed the jig rods rigged with 1/4 bfn/Everts heads with the plastic colors that we used in the morning. That’s just what the fish wanted, slow things down a bit.
All day the fish were just smashing the plastics. There were many times I had to get the pliers out to get my jig back!
Throughout the day I don’t know how many fish were caught, I lost count somewhere in the mid 30’s
That was just what this cat needed, nice weather and the fish just smashing your offering, a nice way to start the holiday weekend. A big
to Erick and his buddy, it was a blast fishing next to you two all day.
If you’re boat isn’t put away yet, you have to get yourself down to Everts.
I hope everyone has a great holiday!
Jami
On Fri 12/21 there were 3 of us in my boat (black Lund with white 70hp Johnson tiller). It is interesting reading about the hot plastic colors used in the other boats – they were predominately lighter colors. But for our boat the darker colors were by far the best on that cloudy day. We had 6 lines out, therefore a good chance to experiment and compare colors. Purple ringworms and black super-doos were the hot colors for us throughout the day.
It is interesting how different plastic colors can be the hot color in different boats. There are so many other factors involved (location fished, jigging style, jig head weight/color, drift speed, line, etc) — but that is a big part of what makes fishing fun.
Dave Gulczinski