Post by mwardncsu on Jul 6, 2014 14:51:16 GMT -5
Weather: Again - BEAUTIFUL - starting in the upper 50's 
and rising to the upper 60's or so by 9:30a, no wind, mostly sunny sizes - a little fog on the water to start
Water: 80.5, visibility of a few feet
Techniques: Alewives on downlines (4), light lines (4), light-line float (1), and 6" gizzards on free line planers (2)
Time: 6 am - 9:30 am
My lake neighbor wanted to go out striper fishing with me, so we made plans to go out with he, his dad and another neighbor this morning. In order to maximize my Holiday weekend sleep, I caught bait late the night of the 4th - watched a nice firework show by one of the folks in the cove and then waited until around 11:30 to head out and stayed fairly close to home to avoid as best possible any drunken boaters that may be returning up-lake from the main show. Gilled 1000 2.5" juvenile gizzards in my 1/2 Bait Buster net at my light so went down the lake a short ways to another net. Had to clear out some big gizzards and blue-gill again - and I guess what was a Red Horse sucker before finally getting several nets of nice alewife. Never caught a Red Horse in the net before - this thing was big, but I see where they can go to 8 lbs or so - this one was probably 3-4.
All ales with the exception of 3 or 4 small 6" gizzards so that I did not screw up the ales with big gizzards that were not getting my bites recently anyway I then put the bait and myself to bed - again babying them through to Sunday morning with a partial water change on Sat morning and then late Sat evening - about 1/2 tank each time, adding back salt and bringing the water temps back down to around 66 with each water change (they would creep up to 70-72 - not bad given the cooler than normal weekend).
Greeted to a nice morning sky, We were on the boat at 6 am on Sunday morning and headed out as I was trying to decide where we'd fish. Idling out of the cove letting the motor warm up I noticed we were marking enough scattered fish that I shut the big motor down, dropped the trolling motor and said "let's fish here".
I put out the spread and started to pull - and sure enough it did not take too long to hook up
[
We just worked the channel-side 1/3 of the creek for a couple of hours picking up fish at a fairly steady rate - including a couple of nice little channel cats - then when the bite seemed to die off about 8 or 8:30, we moved out to the mouth and across the channel and then back - picking up one on the other side of the channel and then one or two on the point coming back in around 9a. We were back at the dock about 9:30 for everyone to go about the day with their family - heck - mine were still asleep in their beds when I came back into the house....
Here kitty, kitty, kitty.... nice 8 lb channel cat
Watch that rod right there.......
Catch & release.....
We landed and released 10 stripers and the two channel cats between the 4 of us today (they did let me reel one in
). 4 or 5 were small 16"-18" dinks that release with a fury. The largest two went 8.5 and 10 lbs - we probably should have kept those as one did not release well - but but the time I got the boat 3/4 the way around to net the 1st one that did not release well it took off and swam down. I had fresh fish from the other day in the fridge still and the guys did not want any today so we decided we'd quit before our catch rate of fish over dink size met our limit, but instead of harvesting them wd e've them the chance to swim off for another day. Probably abut 2/3 or 3/4 of the bites today came off the light-lines - one off the light-line float and the rest on the downlines - yet again, nothing on the free line gizzards - even with the smaller gizzards - should be running weight on those planers but have been too lazy to retie....
I can't remember a 4th of July weekend that has been as beautiful as this one...... cool temps (when is in the 50's over night??), very low humidity - perfect - and then I only saw two other fishing boats all morning - one was a buddy that pulled into the creek, we chatted a moment and then he went in search of larger schools - and another was on the other side of the channel pulling boards that we saw "late" in the morning. Beautiful morning, good times with fun neighbors, having some bent rods - not a bad day at all in my book
and rising to the upper 60's or so by 9:30a, no wind, mostly sunny sizes - a little fog on the water to startWater: 80.5, visibility of a few feet
Techniques: Alewives on downlines (4), light lines (4), light-line float (1), and 6" gizzards on free line planers (2)
Time: 6 am - 9:30 am
My lake neighbor wanted to go out striper fishing with me, so we made plans to go out with he, his dad and another neighbor this morning. In order to maximize my Holiday weekend sleep, I caught bait late the night of the 4th - watched a nice firework show by one of the folks in the cove and then waited until around 11:30 to head out and stayed fairly close to home to avoid as best possible any drunken boaters that may be returning up-lake from the main show. Gilled 1000 2.5" juvenile gizzards in my 1/2 Bait Buster net at my light so went down the lake a short ways to another net. Had to clear out some big gizzards and blue-gill again - and I guess what was a Red Horse sucker before finally getting several nets of nice alewife. Never caught a Red Horse in the net before - this thing was big, but I see where they can go to 8 lbs or so - this one was probably 3-4.
All ales with the exception of 3 or 4 small 6" gizzards so that I did not screw up the ales with big gizzards that were not getting my bites recently anyway I then put the bait and myself to bed - again babying them through to Sunday morning with a partial water change on Sat morning and then late Sat evening - about 1/2 tank each time, adding back salt and bringing the water temps back down to around 66 with each water change (they would creep up to 70-72 - not bad given the cooler than normal weekend).
Greeted to a nice morning sky, We were on the boat at 6 am on Sunday morning and headed out as I was trying to decide where we'd fish. Idling out of the cove letting the motor warm up I noticed we were marking enough scattered fish that I shut the big motor down, dropped the trolling motor and said "let's fish here".
I put out the spread and started to pull - and sure enough it did not take too long to hook up
[
We just worked the channel-side 1/3 of the creek for a couple of hours picking up fish at a fairly steady rate - including a couple of nice little channel cats - then when the bite seemed to die off about 8 or 8:30, we moved out to the mouth and across the channel and then back - picking up one on the other side of the channel and then one or two on the point coming back in around 9a. We were back at the dock about 9:30 for everyone to go about the day with their family - heck - mine were still asleep in their beds when I came back into the house....
Here kitty, kitty, kitty.... nice 8 lb channel cat
Watch that rod right there.......
Catch & release.....
We landed and released 10 stripers and the two channel cats between the 4 of us today (they did let me reel one in
). 4 or 5 were small 16"-18" dinks that release with a fury. The largest two went 8.5 and 10 lbs - we probably should have kept those as one did not release well - but but the time I got the boat 3/4 the way around to net the 1st one that did not release well it took off and swam down. I had fresh fish from the other day in the fridge still and the guys did not want any today so we decided we'd quit before our catch rate of fish over dink size met our limit, but instead of harvesting them wd e've them the chance to swim off for another day. Probably abut 2/3 or 3/4 of the bites today came off the light-lines - one off the light-line float and the rest on the downlines - yet again, nothing on the free line gizzards - even with the smaller gizzards - should be running weight on those planers but have been too lazy to retie....I can't remember a 4th of July weekend that has been as beautiful as this one...... cool temps (when is in the 50's over night??), very low humidity - perfect - and then I only saw two other fishing boats all morning - one was a buddy that pulled into the creek, we chatted a moment and then he went in search of larger schools - and another was on the other side of the channel pulling boards that we saw "late" in the morning. Beautiful morning, good times with fun neighbors, having some bent rods - not a bad day at all in my book
