Post by mwardncsu on Jan 22, 2018 10:37:14 GMT -5
Weather: Just below freezing to start, warming to the upper 50's; mostly sunny, windy - 10-15 from the NW
Water: 42-46, visibility of several feet
Techniques: everything - big gizzards (10-12") on freeline planer boards, 6-10" gizzards on light-lines & light-line boards; small to medium alewifes on downlines & lightlines; casting swimbaits; jigging flukes; dynamite (ok not really - just wanted to see if you were paying attention)
Time Fished: 7:15ish till 3pm
Cooler Tech: Gatoraide G2, Diet Coke, BoJangles Sausage/Egg & Chicken biscuits, Krispy Kreme blueberry mini-creuler donuts
The Smith Mountain Lake Marine Rescue & Fire Dept was holding their 1st ever Striper Tournament to raise funds for a new building and they were doing this in a Catch-Photo-Release format so Tyler and I wanted to support their efforts - plus get a chance to fish a tourney for a change
My buddy Mark was going to jump on with us to round out the crew.
I headed out on Friday mid-day to try and find some bait - we had had 4-5" of snow at the lake on Wednesday and the mids to backs of many of the creeks were frozen so I could not get to where I wanted to in several creeks - and it wasn't for not breaking some ice to try....
I finally headed back down the lake and hit up a creek that typically holds bait this time of year and was rewarded with the jackpot - 1st throw gave me 30 baits - I was running late to get on a conference call so I didn't have a lot of time - a few more throws yielded blanks, but as I started to head out the screen blacked out again so I decided I would be late for my call - the next throw gave more than needed
Cold shocked and all....
I ran them over to the shed tank to offload and warm up a little and chill out for the night.
Mark and I went to the Captains Meeting on Fri and then headed out that evening to try and net some alewifes - they were not on our 1st go-to light so we went back to the creek I got bait in earlier in the day to see if we could net some big baits - the creek was still full of bait and we pulled a few bigger ones of of the mix while the deck was turning into a skating ring on us. On the way back to the house I hit one more light and got three or four dozen small to mid-size ales so we put it back in the slip and called it a night.
Morning came early - lines in was 6am but we decided we were not starting that far before light - picked up Tyler around 6:30 and he was bearing BoJangles biscuits - we loaded a few select baits from the shed tank and headed off to fish about 7:15
There was a guide in the first creek we were going to pull, and another boat working the mouth of another near-by creek - we marked a few scattered fish from 30-40' in the main channel so we setup with downlines and light-lines and pulled a while - but the wind started to pick up and it was a mess so we gave up on that after a while Moved up the lake to another creek but the water temp dropped to around 41-42 and we pulled a bank towards the mouth and into the creek but didn't see any bait nor fish - so we picked up and moved on back down the lake and fished the creek where all the bait was - figured if there is food there may be fish.... we had a few nervous baits - and then I saw a board pull down like it was hung so I started reeling on the rod to try and pull the bait free - but it sort of pulled back a little... picked up the rod and felt the smallest bit of shake - reeled the board on in to find a 6.5 basketball of a largemouth on the hook
Nothing else came in that creek - so we threw the net once to feel like we accomplished something
We moved further down the lake a good ways - finding water closer to 44 - pulled some banks mid-way in a creek where we've had luck but nothing was going on.
Mark had some intel on the other side of the lake of a jigging bite, so we picked up and made a big move - we arrived in a spot with one or two boats and then just a few minutes later there must have been 10 other boats in there. We were marking some very scattered fish but nothing we were able to jig on, and they didn't hit any ales on down & light-lines. We moved on to another near-by deep water spot for a little while - marking a few fish but no action so we decided to start working our way back up the lake.
It was after 1pm with a 3pm deadline and two largemouth to the boat to show for our day.... Tyler and I decided it was time to do what we do best - find a nice sunny bank in a creek off the main channel and drag the biggest baits we had. We had both eyed one creek on the way down the lake and decided we had nothing to lose at that point on our way back up. We pulled about 1/3 of the way into the creek and put out the biggest bait (around 12-13") we had, and a 10" shad on lines and put them shallow, tight to the bank. We hadn't been pulling in there for more than a hundred yards or so when the board took a quick tug back - then several more pulls and it burried - Fish On!
Tyler fought the fish to the boat and it was pulling a bit of drag so we figured it was decent - then I saw it come up and could tell it was long...... wasn't sure how big but when I got it in the next I knew it was close to citation size (37") - sure enough it came in a 36.75" by our eyes - though the tourney guys called it 37". The skinniest almost 37" inch fish we've seen - weighing in at only 14 lbs - we figure it was a lone wolf that got separated from his pack and was so happy to see a bait swim by that he had to eat ours - we're glad he did
We got his photo session done and back in the water and kept pulling - we had several very nervous baits in that stretch and figured we were going to pick up one or two more, but even after doubling back and pulling out we had no more action.
Time was getting tight, so we ran to the check-in point to drop Tyler off so he could confirm his fish and Mark and I ran to make one more quick pull in a nearby creek - turned out to be a bust but we had to try (the format of this tourney was a "individual" event, each person could turn in three fish and the top three fish of the tourney would win 1st - 3rd... technically someone could have won all three places, and with three of us on the boat we could have each placed as well - yeah, a little odd on the ability for one person to win multiple places....)
Well, turns out that one fish was all we needed - it took 1st place with 2nd going to a 32”ish fish and 3rd to a 31”ish fish if I recall correctly. Good to see one of our Striper Club members, Duane Noell take 2nd place - he and his partner had been pulling umbrella rigs, and 3rd went to Tommy Moore, one of the guys that has fished almost all of our Striper Mafia events.
Certainly happy to pull out a win with as tough of a day of fishing as it was for us - the jigging guys seemed to get more numbers overall - but they were smaller fish - fortunately for us (and fortunately it was a one-fish format). We were mostly happy to be able to support a Catch-Photo-Release format event and to help raise some money for the department. Good day in the end!
Water: 42-46, visibility of several feet
Techniques: everything - big gizzards (10-12") on freeline planer boards, 6-10" gizzards on light-lines & light-line boards; small to medium alewifes on downlines & lightlines; casting swimbaits; jigging flukes; dynamite (ok not really - just wanted to see if you were paying attention)
Time Fished: 7:15ish till 3pm
Cooler Tech: Gatoraide G2, Diet Coke, BoJangles Sausage/Egg & Chicken biscuits, Krispy Kreme blueberry mini-creuler donuts
The Smith Mountain Lake Marine Rescue & Fire Dept was holding their 1st ever Striper Tournament to raise funds for a new building and they were doing this in a Catch-Photo-Release format so Tyler and I wanted to support their efforts - plus get a chance to fish a tourney for a change
My buddy Mark was going to jump on with us to round out the crew.I headed out on Friday mid-day to try and find some bait - we had had 4-5" of snow at the lake on Wednesday and the mids to backs of many of the creeks were frozen so I could not get to where I wanted to in several creeks - and it wasn't for not breaking some ice to try....
I finally headed back down the lake and hit up a creek that typically holds bait this time of year and was rewarded with the jackpot - 1st throw gave me 30 baits - I was running late to get on a conference call so I didn't have a lot of time - a few more throws yielded blanks, but as I started to head out the screen blacked out again so I decided I would be late for my call - the next throw gave more than needed
Cold shocked and all....I ran them over to the shed tank to offload and warm up a little and chill out for the night.
Mark and I went to the Captains Meeting on Fri and then headed out that evening to try and net some alewifes - they were not on our 1st go-to light so we went back to the creek I got bait in earlier in the day to see if we could net some big baits - the creek was still full of bait and we pulled a few bigger ones of of the mix while the deck was turning into a skating ring on us. On the way back to the house I hit one more light and got three or four dozen small to mid-size ales so we put it back in the slip and called it a night.
Morning came early - lines in was 6am but we decided we were not starting that far before light - picked up Tyler around 6:30 and he was bearing BoJangles biscuits - we loaded a few select baits from the shed tank and headed off to fish about 7:15
There was a guide in the first creek we were going to pull, and another boat working the mouth of another near-by creek - we marked a few scattered fish from 30-40' in the main channel so we setup with downlines and light-lines and pulled a while - but the wind started to pick up and it was a mess so we gave up on that after a while Moved up the lake to another creek but the water temp dropped to around 41-42 and we pulled a bank towards the mouth and into the creek but didn't see any bait nor fish - so we picked up and moved on back down the lake and fished the creek where all the bait was - figured if there is food there may be fish.... we had a few nervous baits - and then I saw a board pull down like it was hung so I started reeling on the rod to try and pull the bait free - but it sort of pulled back a little... picked up the rod and felt the smallest bit of shake - reeled the board on in to find a 6.5 basketball of a largemouth on the hook
Nothing else came in that creek - so we threw the net once to feel like we accomplished something
We moved further down the lake a good ways - finding water closer to 44 - pulled some banks mid-way in a creek where we've had luck but nothing was going on.
Mark had some intel on the other side of the lake of a jigging bite, so we picked up and made a big move - we arrived in a spot with one or two boats and then just a few minutes later there must have been 10 other boats in there. We were marking some very scattered fish but nothing we were able to jig on, and they didn't hit any ales on down & light-lines. We moved on to another near-by deep water spot for a little while - marking a few fish but no action so we decided to start working our way back up the lake.
It was after 1pm with a 3pm deadline and two largemouth to the boat to show for our day.... Tyler and I decided it was time to do what we do best - find a nice sunny bank in a creek off the main channel and drag the biggest baits we had. We had both eyed one creek on the way down the lake and decided we had nothing to lose at that point on our way back up. We pulled about 1/3 of the way into the creek and put out the biggest bait (around 12-13") we had, and a 10" shad on lines and put them shallow, tight to the bank. We hadn't been pulling in there for more than a hundred yards or so when the board took a quick tug back - then several more pulls and it burried - Fish On!
Tyler fought the fish to the boat and it was pulling a bit of drag so we figured it was decent - then I saw it come up and could tell it was long...... wasn't sure how big but when I got it in the next I knew it was close to citation size (37") - sure enough it came in a 36.75" by our eyes - though the tourney guys called it 37". The skinniest almost 37" inch fish we've seen - weighing in at only 14 lbs - we figure it was a lone wolf that got separated from his pack and was so happy to see a bait swim by that he had to eat ours - we're glad he did
We got his photo session done and back in the water and kept pulling - we had several very nervous baits in that stretch and figured we were going to pick up one or two more, but even after doubling back and pulling out we had no more action.
Time was getting tight, so we ran to the check-in point to drop Tyler off so he could confirm his fish and Mark and I ran to make one more quick pull in a nearby creek - turned out to be a bust but we had to try (the format of this tourney was a "individual" event, each person could turn in three fish and the top three fish of the tourney would win 1st - 3rd... technically someone could have won all three places, and with three of us on the boat we could have each placed as well - yeah, a little odd on the ability for one person to win multiple places....)
Well, turns out that one fish was all we needed - it took 1st place with 2nd going to a 32”ish fish and 3rd to a 31”ish fish if I recall correctly. Good to see one of our Striper Club members, Duane Noell take 2nd place - he and his partner had been pulling umbrella rigs, and 3rd went to Tommy Moore, one of the guys that has fished almost all of our Striper Mafia events.
Certainly happy to pull out a win with as tough of a day of fishing as it was for us - the jigging guys seemed to get more numbers overall - but they were smaller fish - fortunately for us (and fortunately it was a one-fish format). We were mostly happy to be able to support a Catch-Photo-Release format event and to help raise some money for the department. Good day in the end!
