11/13/16 - Super Moon / Super Fish
Nov 14, 2016 9:35:50 GMT -5
seajay, Jason54, and 5 more like this
Post by mwardncsu on Nov 14, 2016 9:35:50 GMT -5
Weather: Cold as a witches *** to start.... right at freezing I think and a bit of a breeze which made it that much more enjoyable - but late morning as the sun finally got up in the sky and the wind laid down it got into to upper 50's or higher and we were shedding layers of clothing
Water: 51-63, visibility of a couple of feet most places - fish caught in 53 & 61 degree water
Techniques: Pulling assorted sized gizzards on freeline & light-line planers and a couple of light-lines along main channel banks and inside a couple of major creeks
Cooler Tech: A couple of Diet Cokes, Gatoraide G2's in "red", a few water for Tyler and several packs of peanut butter crackers. Pit-stop for lunch around noon for a cheeseburger & fries.
After my hectic solo trip on Sat evening, had plans for Tyler to jump on with me Sunday morning to lend a hand. Had a tank full of "silver dollar" gizzards ready to roll and figured we'd hit the same creek I caught the fish in the evening before, but with the cold temps we decided we'd just fish a while in my creek and let things warm up a tad before making a run up the lake a little ways.... We hit the water around 7:30 I think and started a pull - only had a couple of nervous baits and one hit on a light-line to show, and a couple of nice sun-rise pics to show for it.
Moved on to the creek where I caught the fish the evening before and we found a few that wanted to play, but broke two one and missed a couple others in that creek - found an overall slower & less aggressive bite than the evening before - not overly surprised with the cold snap & the full moon the evening before. Around 10 it warmed up enough that we decided we would do looking for some bigger bait so off in search we went..... found the bigger bait (well, really all the bait) had moved deeper - but we succeeded in loading the tank with some large to mongo baits.
Fished the stretch near where we caught the big bait and had some nervousness but nothing that seemed to want to play. I was doing a water change on bait tank while Tyler was pulling a bank and he decided to kick the speed up a notch - well, as I had a bucket of water in one hand the bank-side planer tears off away from the boat so I grabbed the rod with my left hand and it loaded up - fish on!
Offered the rod to Tyler but he declined..... mistake. The fish peeled drag as it (fortunately) swam away from the bank towards the channel - I knew it was a decent fish but as it got closer to the boat and its back surfaced it looked even better - Tyler called it as he netted it in the boat - a citation - 38" and 21 lbs
We worked that area a while longer without more than a nervous bait so a little before noon we reeled in the boards and headed to grab a burger & fries for lunch before heading back out for the afternoon bite. We hit a couple of places, missing a couple of fish and then setup for a long pull on a main channel bank in a stretch where there is a bit of a ledge that comes up from 60' to 15'-20' or so. A little ways into that pull we had several baits come up at once and get nervous and then on down a little futher one of the boards did one of those funny slow pull downs like a catfish sometimes does... Tyler let it take the bait fora few seconds and then set the set the hook - the fish was bull-dogging him - digging into the bottom and feeling just generally "heavy" - Tyler said a few times he thought he might have the fish foul-hooked/
It eventually ran out towards the channel and over near the inside board on the other side of the boat - which happened to be a light-lined planer with a silver-dollar gizzard. All of a sudden that rod doubled over and I thought Tyler's fish had gotten tangled in the line, so I pulled the rod and put it into free-spool to prevent it from cutting his line & fish.... then Tyler said that line was going a different direction than his and I must have a second fish - locked the reel back down and we had a double going on. He finally got his fish to the boat as mine was pulling drag and fighting me hard. He just landed his and was able to get it out of the net as I brought mine to the boat..... turned out Tyler should have let me grab that 1st rod..... his went 14 and mine was another citation - my longest SML striper to date at 39.5" (almost 39.75") and 20 lbs.....
]
We knew we should have just called it quits for the day but we doubled back over that stretch a second time without any action and then headed to the creek where I got into the fish the evening before to see if the evening bite would be on, especially with some larger bait in tow.
It wasn't.... well, at least if you don't count a smallie that ate a 10" gizzard....
Only three striper and the smallie to the boat for a long day of fishing, but we had our chances at maybe another 6 - and if you're only going to get a few, might as well make them count! Maybe Fall is finally here!
Water: 51-63, visibility of a couple of feet most places - fish caught in 53 & 61 degree water
Techniques: Pulling assorted sized gizzards on freeline & light-line planers and a couple of light-lines along main channel banks and inside a couple of major creeks
Cooler Tech: A couple of Diet Cokes, Gatoraide G2's in "red", a few water for Tyler and several packs of peanut butter crackers. Pit-stop for lunch around noon for a cheeseburger & fries.
After my hectic solo trip on Sat evening, had plans for Tyler to jump on with me Sunday morning to lend a hand. Had a tank full of "silver dollar" gizzards ready to roll and figured we'd hit the same creek I caught the fish in the evening before, but with the cold temps we decided we'd just fish a while in my creek and let things warm up a tad before making a run up the lake a little ways.... We hit the water around 7:30 I think and started a pull - only had a couple of nervous baits and one hit on a light-line to show, and a couple of nice sun-rise pics to show for it.
Moved on to the creek where I caught the fish the evening before and we found a few that wanted to play, but broke two one and missed a couple others in that creek - found an overall slower & less aggressive bite than the evening before - not overly surprised with the cold snap & the full moon the evening before. Around 10 it warmed up enough that we decided we would do looking for some bigger bait so off in search we went..... found the bigger bait (well, really all the bait) had moved deeper - but we succeeded in loading the tank with some large to mongo baits.
Fished the stretch near where we caught the big bait and had some nervousness but nothing that seemed to want to play. I was doing a water change on bait tank while Tyler was pulling a bank and he decided to kick the speed up a notch - well, as I had a bucket of water in one hand the bank-side planer tears off away from the boat so I grabbed the rod with my left hand and it loaded up - fish on!
Offered the rod to Tyler but he declined..... mistake. The fish peeled drag as it (fortunately) swam away from the bank towards the channel - I knew it was a decent fish but as it got closer to the boat and its back surfaced it looked even better - Tyler called it as he netted it in the boat - a citation - 38" and 21 lbs
We worked that area a while longer without more than a nervous bait so a little before noon we reeled in the boards and headed to grab a burger & fries for lunch before heading back out for the afternoon bite. We hit a couple of places, missing a couple of fish and then setup for a long pull on a main channel bank in a stretch where there is a bit of a ledge that comes up from 60' to 15'-20' or so. A little ways into that pull we had several baits come up at once and get nervous and then on down a little futher one of the boards did one of those funny slow pull downs like a catfish sometimes does... Tyler let it take the bait fora few seconds and then set the set the hook - the fish was bull-dogging him - digging into the bottom and feeling just generally "heavy" - Tyler said a few times he thought he might have the fish foul-hooked/
It eventually ran out towards the channel and over near the inside board on the other side of the boat - which happened to be a light-lined planer with a silver-dollar gizzard. All of a sudden that rod doubled over and I thought Tyler's fish had gotten tangled in the line, so I pulled the rod and put it into free-spool to prevent it from cutting his line & fish.... then Tyler said that line was going a different direction than his and I must have a second fish - locked the reel back down and we had a double going on. He finally got his fish to the boat as mine was pulling drag and fighting me hard. He just landed his and was able to get it out of the net as I brought mine to the boat..... turned out Tyler should have let me grab that 1st rod..... his went 14 and mine was another citation - my longest SML striper to date at 39.5" (almost 39.75") and 20 lbs.....
]
We knew we should have just called it quits for the day but we doubled back over that stretch a second time without any action and then headed to the creek where I got into the fish the evening before to see if the evening bite would be on, especially with some larger bait in tow.
It wasn't.... well, at least if you don't count a smallie that ate a 10" gizzard....
Only three striper and the smallie to the boat for a long day of fishing, but we had our chances at maybe another 6 - and if you're only going to get a few, might as well make them count! Maybe Fall is finally here!
