The weather sure has been up and down in our region, but the fish proved that they were still aggressive in getting easy lunches this past Monday and Tuesday. Monday found my Dad and I in the canal once again looking for fish. We tried our trolling tricks again since water was moving through the canal, but the fish just didn’t seem to be there. We turned our efforts towards crappies, and I wish we would have done that the entire time. During the warm afternoon, which was a perfect day, we really brought the crappies into the boat. We fished a few select areas and found all kinds of small fish, which were still a blast, but the payoffs really came before dark. I got my biggest crappie ever from the canal, which was my biggest overall in 4 1/2 years. These nice fish went 14 1/2″ and 13 1/2″ and were caught relatively close together. What a rush!
These fish were really thick and very healthy. The key was to get the jig to the area you wanted to target, then just let it fall. Nearly every cast garnered an attack. I didn’t have my counter going this time, but I’d say that my Dad and I managed to catch upwards of 100 fish during the afternoon. Like 95% of my crappies I catch, they all lived to swim another day after posing for the camera. The water temp was around 49 in some areas, but I’m sure that’ll change after this week.
My good friends Tom and IDOer Chad Mayer made plans to hit Norton again on Tuesday in hopes of getting on the wiper bite before the weather totally crashed. Chad made the trip all the way from Omaha Monday night, so I was really hoping the fish would cooperate. We drove through some heavy fog all the way down, and once we were on the water, we realized we could only see a couple hundred yards (maybe) ahead of us. That’s ok, we figured…good enough for trollin! Even though we were real surprised to see the water all the way down to 40 degrees (reached 48 in the afternoon), we hit 4 fish right away in the am. Towards noon, the lull in fishing really did coincide with the lunar tables I’ve been paying attention to this year. We found a few crappies in the trees, then decided to get back out there during the afternoon and try trolling them up again. I’m glad we did, as we managed to get 8 more fish, and one nice crappie. A good color choice that I like to follow on cloudy days really produced for us, being gold. But still, one crank really outperformed all others for us. Thanks for making the trip, Chad!
Considering the weather we had on Tuesday, I don’t know that we can complain much at all about our results. In the increasing cold, mist, and fog that never went away, our biggest wiper only went 21″, but they were real aggressive, hard fighting fish that made our trip well worth it. I’m really hoping the weather will hold out a bit longer to get on the water a few more times before things really crash, so here’s to more fall fishing!
We had a great time. It was nice getting out on some unfamiliar water. I’m looking forward to going again. Now, I just need to get some of those crankbaits we were using. Can’t find them anywhere!
Glad you guys had fun, Chad! All I know is, if you find some of those cranks, I hope I get a call from you saying you found a pile of em. You know I’ll go in on some!
Thanks for the great report Brian. Great job on the crappie and wiper and glad to see Chad made it out to fish with you. Got to love the fall fishing. I just brought the new boat home yesterday and can’t wait to get started fall fishing out here in Eastern Nebraska. I think I’m heading North to the Missouri River this weekend. Might even sneak in a few trips close to home in the evenings this week.
Sounds like fun