51 minutes ago, MN Fisher said:

It's gotta be a fluke.

 

No, it was a crankbait! Flukes look like this:

 

 

j/k!

 

I was going to make a separate post for these but unfortunately I hit my limit for pictures on that one also.  So instead of making 3, maybe 4 new topics I’ll post the remaining pictures here in this thread.

 

Now, where were we…

 

Day 4

 

My Boy caught his biggest of trip this day.

 

 

Day 5, some more exploring, some more fishing.  

 

There were a couple patterns we started picking up on.  The first were flats with mixed cover, either a rocky bottom with some patches of isolated weeds, or weeds with some patches of rocks both with adjacent deeper water.  The second was shear rock faces/bluff banks the were getting hit by the wind/current or in the shade especially during the middle of the week when we had a run of warm sunny days with bluebird skies.

@bp_fowler: Dude, where were you fishing? Those are solid fish!

 

 

Just now, ol'crickety said:

@bp_fowler: Dude, where were you fishing? Those are solid fish!

 

 

A place called McGregor Bay, it’s kinda between the North Channel and Georgian Bay on Lake Huron. 

Okay last one.

Unfortunately I did manage to break both of my new Tatula Casting rods during the trip.  My grandpa used to joke the if you left me alone for too long with an anvil I’d find a way to break it. 
 

Honestly though I was upset, I didn’t really miss them all that much since I only caught a handful of fish, cranking or with other power techniques.  Most of my damage was done with Medium and Medium Light spinning setups. Particularly 3.5” stupid tube and 3.3” Keitech.

 

Here’s the part where I have to eat some crow.  Previously on these boards I’ve been open in my disdain for the Ned rig and the Drop Shot.  Mostly because the Ned rig is a nightmare to fish in my typically weedy home waters and until this trip I’ve never caught a single fish on a drop shot. However when conditions were tough I leaned on these techniques to catch fish and in fact a few of my best catches of the trip were with them.

I guess you could say I’ve seen the light.

 

Here’s some more drop shot/Ned fish

2 minutes ago, bp_fowler said:

Mostly because the Ned rig is a nightmare to fish in my typically weedy home waters

 

Me too. I'd be plucking weeds all day instead of unhooking bass.

 

2 minutes ago, bp_fowler said:

I’ve never caught a single fish on a drop shot

 

Same here, but I do think they'd work in my weedy waters since it would be sinker in the weeds and not the lure. 

 

3 minutes ago, bp_fowler said:

Okay last one.

 

I enjoyed everyone of them.

 

4 minutes ago, bp_fowler said:

Unfortunately I did manage to break both of my new Tatula Casting rods during the trip.  

 

Other BR anglers report breaking rods. I've never broken one. How did you break them?

2 minutes ago, ol'crickety said:

 Other BR anglers report breaking rods. I've never broken one. How did you break them?

Well with three folks in a small boat we had been doing a pretty good job avoiding each other’s rods on the back swing but my dad caught the tip of my MH with the tip of his musky rod and my rod lost that battle. 😅

 

The cranking stick however I’m not really sure. My theory is that my braid developed a loop and when I went to launch my crank bait, that loop caught on the rod guides and managed to rip three of them out.

I got 12 cookie cutters today,  all Spots, between 14 and 17 inches.  First and last pictured.   I've been lazy lately.  I lost a decent Largemouth (guessed 3 poundish) on a jump.  After losing it I checked my spinnerbait hook and it was about as sharp as a ball point pen.   I also broke off my line once because it's too old.  No fish was involved, my DT6 hit a rock, and my line broke near the rod.  I was able to grab the line and retrieve my lure.   I'll be changing line and sharpening hooks this week.   

 

 

Managed to grab a couple hours at the pond today. Only caught one bass on my last cast, but it felt good get my hook into a fish again. 

 

Snuck in a quick boat sesh with my brother between on and off rains. We met a few dudes in yaks packing up at the launch who said it was a brutal bite. Half the place was covered in a thick green mat of snot algae, and there were at least 100 swans milling around. Rain-cooled water had Pickeral on the move again, and we got some bites out in the middle over nearly topped out weeds throwing a Berkely Grass Pig in Swamp gas. After enough of that, we switched over to fishing pads on the edges. Finally got a solid bite throwing the super versatile and effective yet absurd 3.6" Fish Arrow Heavy Poop right before dime-sized raindrops chased us out.

 

Le Poop bass.

@IcatchDinks: It's good to see you fishing again.

 

@PhishLI: That's a good lookin' poop bass!

Smallies and a bonus walleye who is now frozen . My

buddy fishing a few miles down river got a walleye, sauger, and yellow perch 

 

On 5/1/2024 at 9:03 PM, bp_fowler said:

Went out to the public pond today to take my new spinning set up for a little test drive.

Managed to catch one little guy, but the rod felt and performed well.

After that my mission accomplished I was about to head home but before I did I made one more cast and to my surprise caught a rainbow trout.

  
Which was pretty cool because I then got to give my new fillet knives a test drive as well.

Haha my Man.. as soon as I saw that rainbow and before I scrolled down I was thinking please tell me you filleted that dude and then.. lo and behold! I like them! I’ll eat them broiled, fried or blackened.. rainbow trout is very good. 

Cloudy, light drizzle and breezy so gave a single Colorado blade spinnerbait a try in submerged timber in about 5 ft of water.

 

Caught a decent fish and several more on a Wacky rig " Cola " .

Every fish this morning was tight to cover regardless of cloud cover.

Unfortunately no pics.  But landed a baker's dozen LMB from the yak on Saturday over the course of 3 hours.  Was forced to leave when the lightning started. Every single one of them caught on the outside weed line to open water and all on a 1/2 oz Dobyn's beast shimmer shad double willow.

7 hours ago, Bird said:

Cloudy, light drizzle and breezy so gave a single Colorado blade spinnerbait a try in submerged timber in about 5 ft of water.

 

Caught a decent fish and several more on a Wacky rig " Cola " .

Every fish this morning was tight to cover regardless of cloud cover.

 Cola as in Jackall Flick Shake?

20 hours ago, alonerankin2 said:

 Cola as in Jackall Flick Shake?

Yes.

Been 3-1/2 weeks since I last got out, but they hadn’t moved far. Did have to switch up baits though - everything coming on Ned today. Water temps still 86-88 here, so no signs of fall yet. Hoping for one more day out later this week before we roll back to 90 starting Sunday. 
 

 

 

 

 

Had a few hours early yesterday morning but of course I failed to properly set my alarm and almost didn’t have enough time to make a trip worth while.

 

Yesterday was a beautiful FALL day up here.  Cool, dry, and breezy; I wish I had more time.
 

Chatterbait for the win.

 

Had a fairly good evening for numbers last night, no clue how many but more than usual for a 3 hour tour. Tried lots of hard baits but only got bit on tiny fluke and small paddletails (top two pics are of the same fish). Water temp was 78-79 which is typically the yearly maximum where we were upriver

On 8/18/2024 at 12:38 PM, ol'crickety said:

 

 

 

 

Other BR anglers report breaking rods. I've never broken one.

Just when you think you know somebody…….

 

i thought you fished hard??

 

id have to guess I’ve broken a minimum of 50 and I’m 40 years old 

This fish had been gorging himself.  Wish he was longer cause that belly was fat!

 

 

They were liking the crankbait in the clear water.  Flat sided was the key.

 

 

27 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said:

Just when you think you know somebody…….

 

i thought you fished hard??

 

id have to guess I’ve broken a minimum of 50 and I’m 40 years old 

 

I fish with telephone poles, which explains why they don't break. 😉

Just had a rad 3 day stint fishing Friday - Sunday with a different spot each day. Weather cooperated nicely the first two days as a cold front was starting to move in but that third day the fish developed a case of lock jaw only picking up a few on a ned rig.

 

The first spot was a major honey hole of mine with low quantity but high quality. It was the day I hooked into a monster but she bent my spinnerbait hook out, darn! Picked up a nice one before it on a double willow spinnerbait.

 

 

The following day I went to a higher elevation 40 acre pond with some hard fighting northern strain Largies. I know these fish well so I decided to target bigger fish with glidebaits and wake baits. Got some decent ones on both with an 5lb 5oz kicker to top it off caught on the rat! Hooked into another 5 or 6 or so on the Swaver but she leveraged the bait on standing timber on the way back to the kayak. Slowly learning these bigger ones.

 

 

The last day I launched at an even higher elevation lake looking to get into some smallies and ended up catching largies and green sunfish instead hahaha. The bite was veryyyy slow but I managed to find them on the rip rap dam using a ned rig. Some big green sunfish hammered it and got a few quality largemouth. I really want to see this place in spring since around summer time its drawn down 30 or 40 feet making it tricky to locate fish w/o electronics I believe.

 

Glad to have had such a dope few outings and learned something each trip. Crazy how these greenback and bronze critters can both make you feel ontop of the world and also humble you like no other in the same day. Good fishing y'all

 

 

Not a giant like the 2 I caught last week, but it still put up a nice fight and gave an aerial display. It actually popped off the hook right at the bank edge so I dove on it like a fumbled football lol.

 

Fumble, recovered by the offense!!

 

Scale went back and forth between 2.24 and 2.33 staying on 2.29 lbs the longest, so I'm calling it 2.29 lbs.