4/12 PM

[Brian]

I fished from 1-8. bait was fairly easy for me too... I threw on some bait balls but they were all very small, so I went in the shallow water in the back of a creek and I filled my boat with mud and moss and had to sort through a zillion tiny ones to get some nice gizzards. I decided to go try again in deeper water to clean my net and a guy in a flats boat pointed me to a pile of nice 8-12" gizzard shad in clean water

When I first put bait in the water in the mouth of a big creek above the bridge, we got a lot of swirls, splashing and evasive maneuvers from the bait and had a couple of boards jerk backwards but no hookups, I had a very frisky bait on a free line straight out the back and he got chased for minutes without a scratch. I pulled him in to make sure he was OK and I swear he was trying to shoot the bird at me with a pectoral fin After a 7-8 of these chases, I added stingers and the action stopped... I don't know if that was a coincidence or not.

I switched to about half with stingers and half without and still had no action until I was ready to leave around 7pm when we caught a very fat striper in the mouth of another creek (on a non-stinger bait). I thought it was going to be a 36" or better fish from the way it was fighting, but when I got it to the boat it was 30" with a pot belly. I didn't have my bogas, but it was as heavy as my 10' cracker so I'm guessing 14-15 lbs

Dodged the skunk but I think with the full moon I was just fishing at the wrong time.

[mwardncsu]

We saw a lot of the same this evening - the fish seemed to want to show themselves and play, but not actually eat. We were also fishing stingers in our big bait (on shad 10"+), and we've noticed that sometimes when they get rolled or swipped the stinger will get knocked out (not that you know it at the time) - and when it happens the chase seems to stop - I guess the fish pick up on this odd thing dangling behind their prey......

Good to see you out there putting that new ride to good use - glad you dodged the skunk! I'm thinking the issue was less the moon and more the folks water skiing, jet skiing, tubing, pleasure riding, etc..... you'd have thought it was July..... ahh, just what we have to look forward to....

[Brian]

Was there a pontoon boat convention today? I think every pontoon boat on the lake was cruising around

I usually park the boat for the summer when the traffic picks up, and it's looking like that will happen pretty soon though the cold snap next week ought to give me a little more time... (know in the summer you can get up early and fish until traffic picks up, but that's too much like work!)

[wvbassmaster]

What I don't understand is way come in a Cove nose of boat in the air turn around go back out and make a tsunami wake and wave.Like I can wave back I am holding on for my life both feet and hands!! Nice fish on your birthday by the way.

[2013skiff]

I understand the logic bigger the bait bigger the fish but all I was using Saturday when I had some luck was 3 to 4 inch gizzards and when they hit the bait the didn't play around and ate it...wish I could've too a pic of the biggest fish we caught on Saturday it hit so hard that the hook,shank and all went threw his mouth and was on the outside corner of his mouth...surprised his rough mouth didn't cut my line...thanks lee

[Brian]

I was pulling big and little bait. I always try to have a mix out there because I have no idea what the fish want