Mississippi River Fishing Report Pool 4 ‘Eyes

This is a quick follow-up report to the one I added 2 days ago.

Things have changed slightly and by responding with a few MINOR tweaks in presentation I’m able to catch many, many more fish. I figured I’d toss out an observation or two and help out someone headed to the river this weekend, regardless of which stretch of the river they’re fishing.

Dustin gets the tip o’ the hat of the week for mentioning a key tid bit in his last report that made ALL the difference in my catch rates today. He noticed a strong switch in color preference by the fish for a very natural ringworm pattern called Pro Blue. This pattern is a very drab smoke metallic blue over clear smoke and is a pattern we use religiously during the winter months when water clarities are at their highest. Lately I’ve been reporting great success with Purple White and Purple Chart. but that bite has been tenuous at best and certainly seemed to be on the decline. I myself had mentioned a noticeable improvement in our water clarities in my own last report and as I drove to the river this AM I wondered about the reasoning for the color preference the fish showed during Dustin’s last outing. In the end I decided to make a shift to more natural patterns and my group and I today had some BANNER fishing on a day when most reported a fair – horrible bite.

Instead of using those tried and true purples, etc. the fish were offered 3 patterns today that in my opinion are very natural and muted in comparison;

Pro Blue

Fire N Ice

All but one fish today came on a ringworm… we had a solitary fish in the AM on a K-Grub. Mike Flynn is shown above with our largest fish of the day, a very hefty 28 inch walleye that got itself caught on a Pro Blue ringie fished on 3/16 ounce head. <img src="http://www.in-depthangling.com/forums/lake/images/graemlins/smash.gif" alt="" /> In that second photo I’m shown with a pair of the 6 saugers we had today that were over 20 inches. These two here were 21.75 – 22 inches long and ended up eating an oystershell pattern. These were some absolute HOG saugers and were feeding up relatively shallow right in with the walleyes, Throughout the day we caught very few short fish of any species although Don did catch himself a mighty nifty looking redhorse… lol <img src="http://www.in-depthangling.com/forums/lake/images/graemlins/jester.gif" alt="" />

We’re fishing the same areas and depths, we kept the boat positioned well off the rip rap and made long casts to the very edge of the water with these more natural colors. We did fish the purples along side these baits for several hours in the AM and never had a single bump or put a legal fish in the boat. Like Dustin said, these fish are showing incredible preferences in one color over another.

When the skies were cloudy the pro blue and oystershell were the ticket but when the sun would pop out we stumbled on the need to switch to the fire n ice, a more subdued pattern with some glitter in the pour, and we instantly caught fish during the coupld times the sun peaked out when the other colors would go into a funk.

Sorry to wrap this short but I was able to get out the info I wanted to share… I have another trip in the AM and I’m pumped to give these fish another going over!~ The bite was very good today after making these adjustments… if I recall correctly we released close to a dozen fish over 20 inches with some HUGE saugers in the mix as well as a handful of walleye in the 23 – 28 inch range. No matter where you are on the river, take notice of the gradually improving water clarities as we progress into winter and be sure to adjust color accordingly. You will like the results. <img src="http://www.in-depthangling.com/forums/lake/images/graemlins/waytogo.gif" alt="" />

This last photo is a pic of the group, Don Strom, Mike Flynn and Byron with a stringer shot of their fish for the day. The guys were great about weeding out the over 19 inch for as well as any females we could spot but we do have on 18.5 inch sauger in there we REALLY wish we could have released. Some of these fish were so agressive today that they would inhale the ringworms right into their gullets. All but this one were released carefully and quickly but sadly even those with the best intentions end up accidentally kill one they wish they hadn’t now and then.

Thanks for the day on the water guys! I had a great time and look forward to fishing with you ex-navy submariners again in the future.