Chequamagon Bay Calling

I could hear Chequamagon Bay calling me over and over again this Spring, so I just had to get up there again to this very special place. It’s been three years since my last trip up there, and I just couldn’t wait another year to get back. I know the temperatures have been way ahead of a normal Spring this year, and I was just hoping that we were not too late.

A friend of mine, Pastor Jason Miller, from church was needing some time off for a couple of days, and he had been talking to me about trying to get together in the boat. It didn’t take long for me to put this trip together and we were headed out of town early Tuesday morning for our two day trip.

We arrived in Ashland by 10:30am, got our keys to the hotel, and headed right out to the Bay. There was a threat of some rain later in the day, but it sure looked good for the first couple of hours. We did have some distant thunderstorms by late afternoon, and some steady rain during the evening, but never too much to make us want to get off the water.

We used light to medium action open face spinning gear with eight pound test to throw our presentations. A lot of different choices would work: small jig and pigs, tubes, and small worms. But the bait I like the most is the 4 inch Senko, with a very small 1/16 oz bullet wt (for casting control in the wind), rigged on a 2/0 to 3/0 EWG hook. We targeted mainly 2 foot to 4 foot shallow sandy areas, that usually have old sunken wood on the bottom.

It probably took about an hour or so til we were able to get to an area that was holding some fish, and it didn’t take Jason very long before he felt the strength of these great Smallmouth. The Smallies up in the Bay AVERAGE 18 inches (honestly), and we were able to catch about a dozen each the first afternoon. Jason just about never wiped that smile off his face after his first 18" + Smallie, and I know he is still smiling about our trip.

Our second day on the water started after a midmorning breakfast and on the water by 9:30am. We keep trying new areas and would find GOOD FISH in most of the spots we tried. We had three doubles on our second day, pandamonium, and bent rods, and both of us chasing and following fish around the boat, laughing, and netting awesome fish two at a time sure makes for some lasting memories. We ended up with 5 fish over 20 inches, 5- 19’s, 13- 18’s included in our 50 fish caught in two half days.

Thank-You Jason for making the trip with me, you are a real Blessing to many people, and hope we can do it again soon.

Jack

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