Post by mwardncsu on Jun 10, 2013 9:03:07 GMT -5
Weather: low 70's rising to upper 70's/low 80's
Water: 76, visibility 3-5
Techniques: Pulling a big gizzard and a collection of smaller/mid-sized gizzards & alewives on boards, and then ales on downlines
My wife informed me that she had planned for striper nuggets for one night while we are up on vacation and that we had none in the freezer. Fortunately I had kept the left-over bait in the tank after fishing on Sat AM and had changed the water a time or two in case I got a whim to fish Sun AM and if the bait still looked OK. Well, Matt decided he wanted to go help catch dinner, and the bait seemed to be holding in OK since most of the bigger gizzards from Fri night/Sat AM were gone, and in fact what was left was turning a nice shiny cured out color, so we decided we'd give it a go 1st thing Sun AM for a few hours.
We were up at 5 and down to the boat as daylight set in. Decided to go down the lake a bit this morning to see if we could get away from the layer of mud that was holding 20-30' deep the day before. Hit a creek that had been good to me in early June before - in fact my 1st length citation came from there three years ago.
We put out the spread and started pulling across the main point and into the creek to hit some secondary points. Was not long before we had the 1st tug on a downline... not what we were looking for, but a nice little channel cat regardless.
Was a beautiful morning....
Matt had another go at a downline....
Uhmm.....
well, at least it was the right species.... 
Pulled outside the creek and along the main river channel with the boards in fairly shallow water (<10') when we got a nice hit - Matt did a great job getting the fish to the boat - 31" / 10.5 lb range
Found another channel cat..... Not certain but it might have been off dead bait - the small gizzards (4" or so) were crap bait - they would die when back in the water after not long and I was probably not checking those frequently enough.
Matt got another one to the boat that came off a downline - 30.5" and around 8.5 lbs! Dinner was served!
Somewhere in there I looked over at the side of the boat where we had out big 12-13" gizzard out and noticed there was a planer board missing and one of the rods was bending...... Grabbed the rod and started reeling - felt like it was off at first - think the fish was running to the boat - kept reeling and fought it towards the boat - Matt was trying to get the net but a lightline that he had been working to rebait got hung up on the net, somehow it dropped through the netting and tangled into a big mess. I tried to kept the fish tight while seeing if I could quickly clear the net but realized it was a lost cause and went for the Bogas to land it beside the boat. About that time the fish surfaced and it was a nice fish - had to be high teens or bigger - and it proceeded to shake its head and throw the hook and planer back at me and swim off
Oh well, we'll be back after it.
Ran into Bigun and had a chat as a fish was blowing up on a board (but never would commit to it) - good to see you out there Bigun!
We moved on and tried another spot that often holds smaller to see if we could pick up a few small fish but the only thing caught was a 10" largemouth
Off the water as the 1st tubers and wakerboarder was making their way out - Good, quick morning with Matt and dinner was good
Also, a reminder - if you are harvesting fish this time of year (or any), let that fish not only fill your stomach, but also help by providing data on the fishery. Consider cutting the head off the fish that are over 26", freezing it and turning it it for use in collecting the oolith bone to use in aging the fish. Currently Saunders Sporting Goods (off Scruggs Rd) has a freeze to collect fish heads. Just write the date and length of the fish on the bag or on something that will not be damaged by water, freeze it and drop it off. Does not take a lot of extra time and provides important info to the on-going management of the fishery.
Water: 76, visibility 3-5
Techniques: Pulling a big gizzard and a collection of smaller/mid-sized gizzards & alewives on boards, and then ales on downlines
My wife informed me that she had planned for striper nuggets for one night while we are up on vacation and that we had none in the freezer. Fortunately I had kept the left-over bait in the tank after fishing on Sat AM and had changed the water a time or two in case I got a whim to fish Sun AM and if the bait still looked OK. Well, Matt decided he wanted to go help catch dinner, and the bait seemed to be holding in OK since most of the bigger gizzards from Fri night/Sat AM were gone, and in fact what was left was turning a nice shiny cured out color, so we decided we'd give it a go 1st thing Sun AM for a few hours.
We were up at 5 and down to the boat as daylight set in. Decided to go down the lake a bit this morning to see if we could get away from the layer of mud that was holding 20-30' deep the day before. Hit a creek that had been good to me in early June before - in fact my 1st length citation came from there three years ago.
We put out the spread and started pulling across the main point and into the creek to hit some secondary points. Was not long before we had the 1st tug on a downline... not what we were looking for, but a nice little channel cat regardless.
Was a beautiful morning....
Matt had another go at a downline....
Uhmm.....
well, at least it was the right species.... 
Pulled outside the creek and along the main river channel with the boards in fairly shallow water (<10') when we got a nice hit - Matt did a great job getting the fish to the boat - 31" / 10.5 lb range
Found another channel cat..... Not certain but it might have been off dead bait - the small gizzards (4" or so) were crap bait - they would die when back in the water after not long and I was probably not checking those frequently enough.
Matt got another one to the boat that came off a downline - 30.5" and around 8.5 lbs! Dinner was served!
Somewhere in there I looked over at the side of the boat where we had out big 12-13" gizzard out and noticed there was a planer board missing and one of the rods was bending...... Grabbed the rod and started reeling - felt like it was off at first - think the fish was running to the boat - kept reeling and fought it towards the boat - Matt was trying to get the net but a lightline that he had been working to rebait got hung up on the net, somehow it dropped through the netting and tangled into a big mess. I tried to kept the fish tight while seeing if I could quickly clear the net but realized it was a lost cause and went for the Bogas to land it beside the boat. About that time the fish surfaced and it was a nice fish - had to be high teens or bigger - and it proceeded to shake its head and throw the hook and planer back at me and swim off
Oh well, we'll be back after it.
Ran into Bigun and had a chat as a fish was blowing up on a board (but never would commit to it) - good to see you out there Bigun!
We moved on and tried another spot that often holds smaller to see if we could pick up a few small fish but the only thing caught was a 10" largemouth
Off the water as the 1st tubers and wakerboarder was making their way out - Good, quick morning with Matt and dinner was good
Also, a reminder - if you are harvesting fish this time of year (or any), let that fish not only fill your stomach, but also help by providing data on the fishery. Consider cutting the head off the fish that are over 26", freezing it and turning it it for use in collecting the oolith bone to use in aging the fish. Currently Saunders Sporting Goods (off Scruggs Rd) has a freeze to collect fish heads. Just write the date and length of the fish on the bag or on something that will not be damaged by water, freeze it and drop it off. Does not take a lot of extra time and provides important info to the on-going management of the fishery.
