The Memorial Day weekend usually signifies the beginning of the summer fishing season. Well I was not disappointed. Made a trip to Trenton Missouri, a small community just south of Iowa, to fish a small lake called Leisure Lake. On my first trip out on Sunday morning I was met with calm winds and clear skies. First I tried the top water bite, but there was little to no action on top. So I switched to my standard mode of bass fishing, the plastic worm. I tied on a Culprit Red Shad 7″ worm, pitched it up against the reeds and was quickly rewarded with a strike. Several more casts followed along with the worm getting bit, but my rusty hook setting skills resulted in near misses.
One of the goals I had set for myself this year was to learn how to fish and actually catch them on a jig/pig combo or jig/trailer combo. After all the research and reading I had done on fishing with 1/4 and 1/2 ounce jigs, I tied on the tried and true colors of black and blue. For the trailer I used a Berkly Power Bait crawdad, 3″ red. I went back to the reeds I’d been fishing earlier, pitched up close to them, and BANG!!…instantly I had a fish not only hit the bait, but swam off with it..I set the hook and quickly reeled in what was my second fish on the jig combo. I had tried fishing with jigs in the past, but had little to no confidence in them so gave up quickly. Determined, I made several more casts and again had some quick takes, and then other more subtle ones. I ended this trip with 10 plus fish on a 1/4 ounce jig with the crawdad trailer. Overall I would say I’m off to better success with this bait. I have quite a bit more confidence in it and will keep one tied on.
As morning gave way to noon, the fishing slowed a bit. My brother in law who was fishing the same lake along with me, tied on a small 4″ finesse worm, pitched it in a submerged tree and hooked into a nice bass. I asked what he’d used, looked at my arsenal of plastic worms and tied on a 4″ Berkly Power Bait Pumpkin Seed worm. Using a small wait and hook, I made a pitch into the brush and quickly had a fish on as the worm fell.
As the day progressed we caught more and more fish on this smaller worm. My wife and I went out later in the evening around 6:00PM, with about three hours of fishing or so left to do. We fished exclusively with the 4″ worm and ended the evening up with 28 bass, 1 walleye, and 1 hungry blue gill. On Monday morning we repeated the process and again ended the day with close to 30 fish. Many of my 10 bass on the jig came on Monday as well. Lesson learned here is sometimes going smaller with your bait when the fishing slows can be incredibly rewarding. I also fished my jig combo a bit deeper and had several really nice fish on. I will continue to fish the jig combo and will probably stick to the black and blue colors for a while since my confidence is high with that particular combo. My next outing I hope to fish it again in a smaller lake with big bass potential. Until next time…TIGHT LINES!!
Nice report. I too hope to gain confidence in my jig fishing this year.