Pool 6: Long Walk for Super Shallow Gills

It’s been a long time coming, but I finally made a long walk trip on pool 6. I’ve had some journeys on pool 8 that put on some cumulative miles, but lack of time along with easy and productive options near by have kept me from branching out as much this season. I’m glad I was finally able to break that. Around 1 o’ clock this afternoon, Zac and I hit the ice. Using google maps, we found a good sized bay on the backside of an island. By the looks of the imagery and the steep, defined banks with hardwood trees, I would have guessed the depth to be in the 4-6 feet range. Once we arrived in the area, I had good feelings, and knowing that the area is very un-pressured had me thinking quality. Holes were drilled in a line down the center of the bay, and the marcum was placed in each of them. Seeing 3-3.75 feet consistently, I was a little discouraged. To someone like Dave Koonce, this must be a scour hole, but to me, it is about the limit of what I like to fish for shallow water. My fears were dashed quickly though, with a nice 7-1/2″ bluegill that smacked a # 12 diamond jig with a purple plastic tail on a slow fall.

It wasn’t long before Zac caught on and began catching a few decent fish as well. Action wasn’t fast and furious, but it was definitely enough to bring me back to the area for further investigation. The area had great diversity, with pondweed and coontail being present for vegetation, along with plenty of shoreline wood cover, not to mention, very close proximity to the main channel. I did manage to ice several perch in the mix, one of which I took home (not a giant by any means.) I have a good feeling that the closer a guy gets to the main channel current and the break that accompanies it, the more and larger perch a guy might catch.

If nothing else, it sure is nice to get out and walk through the woods, especially with a knowledgeable companion like Zac, who identified various plants, trees, and rocks along the way. As a geoscience major, Zac has a lot of knowledge about how different areas of the river and bluff country are shaped. As a freshman, I’m taking a gen-ed geology class myself and have become very interested in it. We had some great conversation about the different sloughs that we were in and how they became the way they were. With a little insight, it’s amazing how close you can get to guessing the exact water depth and bottom content based on patterns that the different parts of the river tend to follow.

Overall it was a fun 3 hours on the ice. We took home 14 very nice bluegills, all of which were 7-1/2″ or better. The big fish of the day hit my diamond jig around 4 pm and turned out to be a thick, beautiful gill just over 8″. The biggest key today was using waxies instead of just plastic (my standby so far this year has been plastic) along with a slow lowering of the rod down to eye level with the fish. Rarely would a fish come up and take the offering if you let it sit still or pulled it away. But often times they’d inhale the bait as you slowly wiggled it down onto their blunt, fat, gill noses Make sure that your knot points perpendicular to the hook shank, allowing your bait to stay horizontal. This, along with squeezing the juices out of every waxie to make them more supple seemed to be the difference in catching a few, and icing a bunch.

I hope everyone enjoys the weekend ahead. I’ll be heading Eastward in the morning…(oh shoot it’s already morning ) to see the girlfriend and on the way home might hit up some open water and try to get the first bass of ’11 out of the way. Hopefully I can put up a unique winter largemouth report shortly! Until then, good luck and GO PACKERS!

-Cade