Well,My good friend Rich Clarke is leaving tomorrow after 2 1/2 days of Bass fishing… We did very well for the cool blustery weather and post/spawn conditions.
Wed… Brule Backwaters
Always a fun day and never disappointing… we started out fishing deep transition zones off shallow spawning flats or rock ledges. Rich stuck a nice 17” Smallie on the first cast and continued to have a “hot” hand throughout the day. 90% of our bass came on tubes and 10% on topwater. Rich absolutely loves his St. Croix TWS 70MLF rod…we probably caught around 50-60 bass in 5 hrs. I managed big fish with an 19.5” Smallie shown here being released on the right.
Thursday… Faye Lake
The bite on Faye would be tough as the Smallies are just about done spawning and the brite sun finally shone like a furnace. After working the same type spawning flats and finding dozens of abandoned beds we decided to work the deep (15-20’) transition areas from soft to hard bottom adjacent to the flats. I patiently worked my tube and finally felt the telltale “tick” of a bass inhaling the tube. The fish fought incredible hard and Rich finally netted a post spawn 20.25” beauty…she was really exhausted, so I resuscitated her quickly and we passed on a picture.
Rich took my new St. Croix EX (Extreme) 68MXF and cast to the same deep break and stuck another beauty shown here!Needless to say…I didn’t get the EX back right away!
But to really take the cake! I motored over to an area that had some really large beds on it last spring… hoping one of the real Toads would still be nearby on the Transition break… Rich worked his third cast down a steep break and I saw him tense up and set the hook! A huge Smallie came skyrocketing in the air ! Rich played it masterfully and the excited guide slid the net under this 22.25” beauty… Rich has a personal best… The big girl was released after this picture to swim again and get even fatter for next fall where she will definitely top 6 lbs !
On Saturday I got out with another friend…Herb Samme. Herb loves to fish Bass as much as he used to enjoy over 25 years of hockey up in Canada as a goalie…Herb and I hit a great prespawn day on the Menominee River near Florence, WI.
Herb coaxed this one on a big ol Zara Spook…
Scroll down for a few more Smallie pics from our area…as usual, no one else around…just empty cottages. Ya gotta love it!!!
Here ya go!