4/29 through 5/2 on the BW....mostly
May 3, 2018 12:12:25 GMT -5
mwardncsu, R22, and 2 more like this
Post by coheasion on May 3, 2018 12:12:25 GMT -5
Had an interesting few days on the BW fishing. I havent been able to fish as much this spring as I would like so I took a few days off from work for one last hurrah for spring fishing season.
Got a late start Saturday evening and headed out around 6PM to catch bait for Sunday morning. 5 hours and a trip for gas later I pulled into the home dock with 6 baits. To say finding bait was hard is an understatement.
Sunday morning got a decent start by catching another dozen baits on my lights prior to heading out. Started in a nearby creek hoping the pattern from the last couple months was still in effect...and it wasn't. Spent almost 2 hours in that creek without so much as a swirl....so went on the bait hunt again. Was able to fill the tank with 2 dozen more baits over the next 2 hours and by that time the wind was howling and so I headed in to let the gusts subside....which never happened so I did some more work around the house.
Monday, I got up and out early and headed to a creek further down the lake in search of some cleaner water as the brown water was pretty persistent uplake. Fished about 3 hours and still not a bite so I decided to move to the Craddock area and once there I happened upon a 25 inch striper to get the skunk away and I picked up a couple green fish and a brown fish as well. But really not what I was looking for. I decided to try the creek I started in again for an afternoon bite and was soon rewarded with a 31.5" fish and I lost another good fish after about a minute long fight. And that was the end of that day.
So far my fishing week was not going to plan.
Tuesday I slept in a bit as i had some errands to do first thing but I was on the water again in search of bait around 9 AM. i was motoring to a local creek that usually holds some bait when I noticed a few flips in the main channel of the lake......definitely not what I usually think of when I think of gizzard shad, but none of my other bait holes had been producing very well so I thought why not. I slinked over to where I saw the flips knowing this owuld be pointless and threw my 8' net in the middle of the channel over 80 FOW and much to my surprise I came up with a half dozen 6-10 inch gizzards! Whoa!!! a few throws later and I was completely loaded up and ready to go. I decided to change my strategy a bit and tried some main channel points in the area. No action there due mostly to the water still being so brown so I headed back to the Craddock area to see if I could find anything.....nope - a few hours and not even a sniff so I hightailed it back to my side of the lake and tried a smaller creek area that I have had some luck at but hadn't fished in a while. I started in the back of the creek and pulled towards the front...an hour went by with no luck at all and at the mouth of the creek, right on a rocky point, a homeowner stepped out and started telling me how he saw a small school of huge stripers chasing huge shad right off the point that morning. We chatted for a couple minutes and then my bank side board went screaming backwards and I went to set the hook on it. Missed that fish but then a board next to the boat took off...set that hook and had a fish on!! A few seconds later a downline rod went off and now I had a double on with another planer with no fish or bait on it sliding back in the water. I was able to land both fish and both were in the 28" range and were FAT. I ended up catching 10 total fish in the next hour to redeem myself and had a blast. Trying to keep 7-9 rods baited and in the water while fighting fish by yourself is a frenzy for sure!
Wednesday morning I headed back to that same spot and was again rewarded with a lot of action and boated 12 fish between 7 AM and 11 AM with the smallest at 25" and largest at 32". Most fish were caught using smaller 5-7 inch gizzards with a little bit of weight but downlines and no weighted planers also got some action.
All in all it was a great trip and perserverence definitely paid off.
Water temps were from 58 to 65 degrees over the course of the few days and air temps were from low 60's to mid 80's.
Got a late start Saturday evening and headed out around 6PM to catch bait for Sunday morning. 5 hours and a trip for gas later I pulled into the home dock with 6 baits. To say finding bait was hard is an understatement.
Sunday morning got a decent start by catching another dozen baits on my lights prior to heading out. Started in a nearby creek hoping the pattern from the last couple months was still in effect...and it wasn't. Spent almost 2 hours in that creek without so much as a swirl....so went on the bait hunt again. Was able to fill the tank with 2 dozen more baits over the next 2 hours and by that time the wind was howling and so I headed in to let the gusts subside....which never happened so I did some more work around the house.
Monday, I got up and out early and headed to a creek further down the lake in search of some cleaner water as the brown water was pretty persistent uplake. Fished about 3 hours and still not a bite so I decided to move to the Craddock area and once there I happened upon a 25 inch striper to get the skunk away and I picked up a couple green fish and a brown fish as well. But really not what I was looking for. I decided to try the creek I started in again for an afternoon bite and was soon rewarded with a 31.5" fish and I lost another good fish after about a minute long fight. And that was the end of that day.
So far my fishing week was not going to plan.
Tuesday I slept in a bit as i had some errands to do first thing but I was on the water again in search of bait around 9 AM. i was motoring to a local creek that usually holds some bait when I noticed a few flips in the main channel of the lake......definitely not what I usually think of when I think of gizzard shad, but none of my other bait holes had been producing very well so I thought why not. I slinked over to where I saw the flips knowing this owuld be pointless and threw my 8' net in the middle of the channel over 80 FOW and much to my surprise I came up with a half dozen 6-10 inch gizzards! Whoa!!! a few throws later and I was completely loaded up and ready to go. I decided to change my strategy a bit and tried some main channel points in the area. No action there due mostly to the water still being so brown so I headed back to the Craddock area to see if I could find anything.....nope - a few hours and not even a sniff so I hightailed it back to my side of the lake and tried a smaller creek area that I have had some luck at but hadn't fished in a while. I started in the back of the creek and pulled towards the front...an hour went by with no luck at all and at the mouth of the creek, right on a rocky point, a homeowner stepped out and started telling me how he saw a small school of huge stripers chasing huge shad right off the point that morning. We chatted for a couple minutes and then my bank side board went screaming backwards and I went to set the hook on it. Missed that fish but then a board next to the boat took off...set that hook and had a fish on!! A few seconds later a downline rod went off and now I had a double on with another planer with no fish or bait on it sliding back in the water. I was able to land both fish and both were in the 28" range and were FAT. I ended up catching 10 total fish in the next hour to redeem myself and had a blast. Trying to keep 7-9 rods baited and in the water while fighting fish by yourself is a frenzy for sure!
Wednesday morning I headed back to that same spot and was again rewarded with a lot of action and boated 12 fish between 7 AM and 11 AM with the smallest at 25" and largest at 32". Most fish were caught using smaller 5-7 inch gizzards with a little bit of weight but downlines and no weighted planers also got some action.
All in all it was a great trip and perserverence definitely paid off.
Water temps were from 58 to 65 degrees over the course of the few days and air temps were from low 60's to mid 80's.
