What can I say about the action down here on Pool 5? It’s awesome, it stinks, it’s fantastic to where in the world are they. Another words inconsistent BUT!……. There are a few things working that not many people doing.
I have spent every day that I went out up near the dam in the morning to see if anything has really changed. I have still found that the action up there has been okay. Most of the fish up there still have been the saugers. But the big fish are up there. A few guys(contractors) on the dam have been working on the dam and have told us that the big fish are all in the the rollers surfacing like carp. They have gotten a few but it been tough. One being 8lb and the other one they thought pushed over 12lbs. So our biggest battle right now has been trying to compete with the shad that have been scouring the tail race area.
After looking the dam area over for the first hour or so everytime out I decided that getting away from the shad could only benefit me. So I headed down river and started looking for some good current going over one of my wingdams. It was one of the first wingdams on a bend in the river. That one wingdam was taking the most current. Which within minutes I landed this first beauty. This one hit a blue/pearl with whitle speckle Kalin on a H20 Jig 1/4 oz in size. A quick picture and back she went. I worked the area for another 20 minutes and thought maybe a different presentation would work. I threw one of the ol man’s Fisherflick jigs on and about 5 casts later landed the one in the second picture. The camera died so I brought it back to the bait shop for the ol man to take a picture of it. After some pictures were taken I put it in the bait tank for a couple hours and guess what I found when I came back in. Yep! You guessed it. We found this fish had spit up over 11 shad that were about 4" long. All I want to know is how can one eat so much.
For pool 5 my best suggestion would be spend a little time at the dam just in case they are hitting there. If not, head down river. I have been spending lots of time down river and found the action to be much better. Most of my time has been lead coring the main channel. Once the fish have been located I have slowed down and jigged over the top of them. Between a friend and I last week we had over 17 Keeper walleyes. Don’t be afraid to explore.
Thats all I can tell you about Pool 5 right now. Until next week good luck and let us know how you do.
Nice report Jarrad. Those fish are unbelieveably fat. It’s surprising that a fish with that many shad in its belly will even look at food.
How far down stream are you running before starting the leadcore routine?
I have been all the way down to the next dam and concentrated mostly on the lower half of the system. Finding areas that have side cuts have been the best areas.
I hope you put me on some fish like that next week. I’m looking forward to seeing you again.