Quality fishing like we have been experiencing this year on Pool 14 has me fired up for the future of our beloved sport in my area! When targeting larger fish, we now have a very real opportunity at a trophy fish on any given outing.
The slot limit covering all Illinois/Iowa sections of the river has positively improved these chances ten fold or more. We have been concentrating on finding the bigger fish the last couple of outings and have not been disappointed. Fish in the 20-25″ range are becoming commonplace, and are falling to a variety of presentations. My big fish for the year came 3-waying a stick bait on the face of a wingdam. On this day I was using a 1 oz. jig fitted with a paddletail plastic as the drop weight, commonly refered to as the “Dubuque Rig”. A great many of my larger fish this year have come on this rig, with either live bait, a crawler harness, or a crank on the back line. Slipping across the wingdam face and trough in front with my electric, this rig allows me to change depth quickly while providing the fish with two baits in one pass. When a concentration of fish can be found in one particular section of the dam, I generally like to drop the anchor and work that area casting cranks, pitchin’ jigs and plastic or bait, and even throwing out one “dead stick” line in front of the dam with a leech or crawler on a short leader and floating jig.
On our last outing, the river had been churned up from the recent heavy rains, so we opted to slow troll a variety of rattling cranks and spinner rigs on some backwater break lines to produce fish. Putting some sound into the equation was the key to our success with the exceptionally muddy water. Although the fishing is tougher during this time, a little experimentation and persistance can still put some nice fish like the last one pictured in the boat.
For those wishing to find a few fish for the pan, the main channel wingdams fished with jigs and live bait, or livebait rigs behind an egg sinker will give you a good chance of boating some 15-18″ fish once the water clarity improves a little, and the chance is always there that the next cast may bring you the fish of a lifetime! You won’t know until you hit the water and give it your best shot.
Please remember to let the big pigs go, and we will have a trophy fishery for years to come. The big girl in the first pic required a couple hours in the livewell with an oxygenator running, then a release in a slack water area with some extra TLC, but with a little extra time and care, even a seriously stressed girl can be revived and successfully released.