Post by Mike on Apr 27, 2016 17:48:59 GMT -5
Headed down to the dam area with a load of alewives and Jim Mawyer, a long time friend, fishing and VMI college buddy, who had been up since 4 am raring to go. I decided it best to at least wait for good light as there was no wind and tons of debris floating in the upper lake around the house. Normally I would have waited to start fishing a lot later in the morning as there was a clear sky with a bright waning moon overhead almost all night and well into the morning. My experience has been that bright moons overhead diminish the first light bite considerably (many believe they feed more at night under the moon) and that the striper bite is often far better later, in the mid morning time frame.....a pattern that proved to hold true for us this past Monday as well. Upon arrival at the dam I saw a cluster of striper boats and we swung by to check it out and speak to couple there. While there we did mark massive schools of bait, including one huge ball that covered my screen from 10 to 50 ft below the surface.
Decided to head into the mouth of a creek in the lower lake area near but away from the dam where I have had success this time of year in prior years. Jim was on all the rods this trip. Marked decent bait and occasional fish upon arrival at the creek mouth. Put out planer boards, a free line, two float lines and two down lines, all baited with alewives. Things were slow as anticipated early as we only had one brief pull-down around nine-thirty and that fish came unbuckled within a couple of seconds of taking the bait for the second time. Not sure what it was. Drank all the coffee and then around 10:30 everything started popping when we caught our first striper on an inside board (22 ft behind board, 1/16th slip sinker, .6 mph). This was soon followed by another missed fish and a short while later a second striper which Jim boated with great enthusiasm. All stripers were CPR in great shape. Headed over to Lumpkin's Marina and Bar for a late breakfast (Excellent) and then back up the lake to the house above the bridge. Bass fished yesterday.
Decided to head into the mouth of a creek in the lower lake area near but away from the dam where I have had success this time of year in prior years. Jim was on all the rods this trip. Marked decent bait and occasional fish upon arrival at the creek mouth. Put out planer boards, a free line, two float lines and two down lines, all baited with alewives. Things were slow as anticipated early as we only had one brief pull-down around nine-thirty and that fish came unbuckled within a couple of seconds of taking the bait for the second time. Not sure what it was. Drank all the coffee and then around 10:30 everything started popping when we caught our first striper on an inside board (22 ft behind board, 1/16th slip sinker, .6 mph). This was soon followed by another missed fish and a short while later a second striper which Jim boated with great enthusiasm. All stripers were CPR in great shape. Headed over to Lumpkin's Marina and Bar for a late breakfast (Excellent) and then back up the lake to the house above the bridge. Bass fished yesterday.
