Post by djkimmel on Jul 18, 2005 0:53:42 GMT -5
Drove over early Saturday morning to St. Clair to meet a friend who is practicing for EverStart. I had already been on Erie recently with another friend who’s also in EverStart, but I just like St. Clair a whole lot more. We get along better.
The weather forecast was shaky at best, but we launched shortly after 6 AM to a light breeze and cloudy, hazy skies. We pulled up on a flat in the main river and started seeing bass busting minnows around us. Turned out there was huge school of minnows near the edge that bass were eating.
The morning had the look of an excellent topwater morning – big fun. But, the bass had other ideas as several different topwaters went completely ignored even when thrown right into the hot zone. We also noticed the current was cooking bigtime. We did have several BIG smallies follow certain topwaters, but they wouldn’t break the surface.
After trying to force things, I broke down and put on a jerkbait. First cast and I hook a solid keeper that looked and felt like a floating weed. We blew it on a bigger bass that was following. We caught several 2.5 to 3+ smallies this way, but had several bigger smallies following that we didn’t get follow up bites on.
We tossed tubes deeper for a few minutes and managed a couple average keepers before leaving the area for other options. We tried one drift through a deep channel edge and I caught one pushing 3 pounds on a Carolina rig, but the spot wasn’t loaded. Also hit a couple of the channel markers, but only caught a 2 pounder on a tube off one.
We went out into the lake from the south channel mouth and found several schools of 2 to just over 3 pound smallies. They weren’t hard to catch, but most came on tube baits. Other fast baits were not successful. I did have one over an isolated weed bed whack at a spinnerbait, but I missed it.
We were hearing thunder off to the west by 10 AM or so. It was very gray sounding like the shore was getting hammered. We kept an eye on it, but kept fishing. The bite started to slow. Not sure if the distant storm was doing it, or the scattered weed bed pattern just wasn’t right for the day. An E/NE wind had been blowing rollers for a while, but now the wind was ominously dying to nothing. It was real quiet.
The storm finally spotted me and turned right toward us. We kicked around several ideas on how to fish without getting electrocuted. In the end, we headed up the south channel towards the trusty bridge. We ran along the edge of a really wild looking dark gray edge and one long hanging down curtain in one spot and a short, but evil looking gray curtain cloud hanging down and bearing down right towards us.
We did stop and fish one wall real quick. My friend caught 1 pushing 4 pounds. I sat in the bottom of the boat after seeing a great bolt of lightning coming from the evil curtain. We noticed that the water on the wall showed a mysterious 8 to 10 inch drop. I remarked that somewhere out in the lake, the wind must really be blowing to move that much water.
It wasn’t blowing much at the moment and then the gray curtain was almost on us and the wind went from 0 to 20 immediately. My friend capitulated and we ended up under the bridge. We sat there for a while as the wind began to howl out of the NW and the rain came down. We spent a while under the bridge with 5 other boats as lightning came down all around with thunder rumbling constantly and rain blowing through the bridge.
We eventually pulled over to Walkers Landing from some coffee and a different perspective. When the lightning finally seemed to have moved on we cut through the very shallow Muskamoot Bay and ran up into the Middle Channel. We stopped on one flat and caught 1 smallie on the edge and a couple right up on top, all on tubes. Solid keepers, but nothing to start imagining spending your winnings over yet.
I remarked that the thunder was sounding like it was moving back closer again. That’s when I noticed my line was curling and slowly floating down to the water for the first time in the day. I mentioned this to my friend and he said it wasn’t too bad… yet. We had to get off the water early because of his schedule so I know he wanted to stay out and use all his time.
I told him right after that that I could hear his rod tip crackling when he raised it. He said he didn’t hear… whoops, guess he did hear it now. Then he said he even felt a small jolt. I was already fishing from the bottom of the boat sitting down with my rod low – he’s shorter than me… A few more minutes of floating line and his crackling rod tip and he lifted the trolling motor heading for the ramp before the lightning found us again.
We didn’t catch a ton, but probably 15 to 18 keepers with a couple pushing four and several at or over 3 pounds. Not too shabby and definitely fun as usual.
The weather forecast was shaky at best, but we launched shortly after 6 AM to a light breeze and cloudy, hazy skies. We pulled up on a flat in the main river and started seeing bass busting minnows around us. Turned out there was huge school of minnows near the edge that bass were eating.
The morning had the look of an excellent topwater morning – big fun. But, the bass had other ideas as several different topwaters went completely ignored even when thrown right into the hot zone. We also noticed the current was cooking bigtime. We did have several BIG smallies follow certain topwaters, but they wouldn’t break the surface.
After trying to force things, I broke down and put on a jerkbait. First cast and I hook a solid keeper that looked and felt like a floating weed. We blew it on a bigger bass that was following. We caught several 2.5 to 3+ smallies this way, but had several bigger smallies following that we didn’t get follow up bites on.
We tossed tubes deeper for a few minutes and managed a couple average keepers before leaving the area for other options. We tried one drift through a deep channel edge and I caught one pushing 3 pounds on a Carolina rig, but the spot wasn’t loaded. Also hit a couple of the channel markers, but only caught a 2 pounder on a tube off one.
We went out into the lake from the south channel mouth and found several schools of 2 to just over 3 pound smallies. They weren’t hard to catch, but most came on tube baits. Other fast baits were not successful. I did have one over an isolated weed bed whack at a spinnerbait, but I missed it.
We were hearing thunder off to the west by 10 AM or so. It was very gray sounding like the shore was getting hammered. We kept an eye on it, but kept fishing. The bite started to slow. Not sure if the distant storm was doing it, or the scattered weed bed pattern just wasn’t right for the day. An E/NE wind had been blowing rollers for a while, but now the wind was ominously dying to nothing. It was real quiet.
The storm finally spotted me and turned right toward us. We kicked around several ideas on how to fish without getting electrocuted. In the end, we headed up the south channel towards the trusty bridge. We ran along the edge of a really wild looking dark gray edge and one long hanging down curtain in one spot and a short, but evil looking gray curtain cloud hanging down and bearing down right towards us.
We did stop and fish one wall real quick. My friend caught 1 pushing 4 pounds. I sat in the bottom of the boat after seeing a great bolt of lightning coming from the evil curtain. We noticed that the water on the wall showed a mysterious 8 to 10 inch drop. I remarked that somewhere out in the lake, the wind must really be blowing to move that much water.
It wasn’t blowing much at the moment and then the gray curtain was almost on us and the wind went from 0 to 20 immediately. My friend capitulated and we ended up under the bridge. We sat there for a while as the wind began to howl out of the NW and the rain came down. We spent a while under the bridge with 5 other boats as lightning came down all around with thunder rumbling constantly and rain blowing through the bridge.
We eventually pulled over to Walkers Landing from some coffee and a different perspective. When the lightning finally seemed to have moved on we cut through the very shallow Muskamoot Bay and ran up into the Middle Channel. We stopped on one flat and caught 1 smallie on the edge and a couple right up on top, all on tubes. Solid keepers, but nothing to start imagining spending your winnings over yet.
I remarked that the thunder was sounding like it was moving back closer again. That’s when I noticed my line was curling and slowly floating down to the water for the first time in the day. I mentioned this to my friend and he said it wasn’t too bad… yet. We had to get off the water early because of his schedule so I know he wanted to stay out and use all his time.
I told him right after that that I could hear his rod tip crackling when he raised it. He said he didn’t hear… whoops, guess he did hear it now. Then he said he even felt a small jolt. I was already fishing from the bottom of the boat sitting down with my rod low – he’s shorter than me… A few more minutes of floating line and his crackling rod tip and he lifted the trolling motor heading for the ramp before the lightning found us again.
We didn’t catch a ton, but probably 15 to 18 keepers with a couple pushing four and several at or over 3 pounds. Not too shabby and definitely fun as usual.
