Night bassin is the thing right now, which is fine with me considering it's been over 100 degrees for a few days. Not a whole lot biting, but I have had a few quality fish in the last week. 4.1lbs tonight. Yee haw.

Went on a family camping trip this last weekend. Didn't get to do as much chasing blue cats as we were hoping due to the weather but still got the boys out for a little bit. I also took the boat out both mornings by myself while everyone was still sleeping. I could have caught a smallmouth every cast if I wanted to catch sub 12" fish. For some reason, the bigger fish liked the Laguna Shrimp TRD TicklerZ.

Caught a couple walleye

including one from the bank while I was waiting for a catfish bite

Caught several catfish from the bank at our campsite, but they were channels every time.

I had one spot that I'd done well in the past, so we drove the boats to it the last morning and it was pretty non stop bites, but I was having a hard time converting bites into fish.

I think this is the reason why I was missing so many bites.

Went out last night for another 90 minute trip.  It rained all weekend and the water was high and muddy.  90 degrees, bugs were on, and the bite was off.  My first fish of the evening would have been my best but I lost what looked to be a 2 or 3 pounder a few feet off the bank on a squarebill.  That should have been my clue to just go home then.  Tried a few different presentations and couldn't get anything to work besides slowing down to use the drop shot again and ned rig.  They were only producing dinks and bluegills. 

 

Best of the evening on the ned rig.

 

 

Luckily, the night was saved seeing a turkey strut his stuff for a few hens across the field, and watching deer walk in front of a rising strawberry full moon.  Last night was a good reminder to just try and enjoy being out, even when the bite isn't great.  Total for the evening was 6 bass and 2 big bluegills.

 

1 minute ago, hokiehunter373 said:

Went out last night for another 90 minute trip.  It rained all weekend and the water was high and muddy.  90 degrees, bugs were on, and the bite was off.  My first fish of the evening would have been my best but I lost what looked to be a 2 or 3 pounder a few feet off the bank on a squarebill.  That should have been my clue to just go home then.  Tried a few different presentations and couldn't get anything to work besides slowing down to use the drop shot again and ned rig.  They were only producing dinks and bluegills. 

 

Best of the evening on the ned rig.

 

 

Luckily, the night was saved seeing a turkey strut his stuff for a few hens across the field, and watching deer walk in front of a rising strawberry full moon.  Last night was a good reminder to just try and enjoy being out, even when the bite isn't great.  Total for the evening was 6 bass and 2 big bluegills.

 

Gosh that’s pretty

 

Not a bad day fishing either!

Went to a new lake to wade and bankfish in park rapids minnesota area. Arrived at lake 1pm and got home at 1am.

Caught a ton of rock bass, couldnt keep them off of whatever I threw.

I only caught 2 small dink bass so i went for the bluegills and they were hot on the tiniest lure jig with a tiny platic shrimp dunked in yellow spike it on a slip bobber.

t

 

Wife caught a nice walleye and she didnt want to pose with it so i held it up for the photo, she also caught another walleye earlier along with a couple largemouth and a few brownie and of course pike.

She out fished me today catching all her fish from shore using a rapala rip -stop. She was so happy with the last big walleye that she was singing when she was cleaning it at the waters edge.

 

Fishing with some buddies.                                                          

49 minutes ago, throttleplate said:

Caught a ton of rock bass, couldnt keep them off of whatever I threw.

I've experienced that more than once.  I swear that you just keep catching about 3 or 4 fish, and they rotate on which one is biting until you stop fishing for them.

Got one on the swing impact fat in black , on the fall.

9 hours ago, gimruis said:

I've experienced that more than once.  I swear that you just keep catching about 3 or 4 fish, and they rotate on which one is biting until you stop fishing for them.

Have you ever eatin a rock bass? I searched it and some folks say its flakey white meat and tastes good while others say it tastes muddy and when cleaning the fish look out for parasites in a yellow form of a bump.

Saturday night was a nice dinner with friends and drinks after so a very late night. My wife had a couch day to recover on Sunday so I went fishing to last years favorite lake. I fished it earlier this year at 52 degree water temps and didn’t touch a fish. Last year I took multiple 4+ lb fish and had some great days, so I know the fish are there. I was surprised I couldn’t figure them out pre-spawn.

 

Sunday I thought would be a great topwater bite. Overcast, light breeze, good temps. I had a popper, frog, and weedless spoon all on at one point before I decided that it wasn’t happening. The lake isn’t very big (120 acres or so) and there is a quarter mile stretch of steeper bank that always holds fish.  50’ from shore you’re in 25’ of water but how it drops changes. There are some tiny flats that are 1’ deep for 10’ from shore. There are some places where it is 4’ right on shore and drops from there. The grass starts growing where the bottom is about 12’ from prior experience but this time of year the grass is visible (4’ water visibility) in about 8’ bottom depth. After two fish hitting on the outside edge areas and nothing in the inner pockets I decided a Texas rigged beaver pitched to every outside edge was the plan.  I picked 7 keepers in that quarter mile with two 17-18”. It was slower working that stretch than I often do, but I think that’s what the day called for. I fished that same stretch for a bit to start and nothing was hitting topwater or chatterbaits. 
 

after this trip, I’m thinking about a trip that is just plastics. Have a toad on top, a swim bait as a moving bait, and a Texas rig to pitch cover. I’d probably take a wacky spinning rig too. Maybe do it on a lake I know decently well.  Sounds like an interesting challenge of a day.

 

 

10 hours ago, throttleplate said:

Have you ever eatin a rock bass? I searched it and some folks say its flakey white meat and tastes good while others say it tastes muddy and when cleaning the fish look out for parasites in a yellow form of a bump.

 

I've had rock bass. Not bad. Very similar to other sunfish. I've heard you do wanna watch for parasites, but I've never seen any yet.

10 hours ago, throttleplate said:

Have you ever eatin a rock bass? I searched it and some folks say its flakey white meat and tastes good while others say it tastes muddy and when cleaning the fish look out for parasites in a yellow form of a bump.

 

No, and I don't even care to catch them either lol.  I think they're actually listed as a "rough fish" which is the same class as carp, bullhead, suckers, etc.  Kind of a disgrace to the bass family if you ask me.

 

Take that with a grain of salt because I very rarely eat any fish anymore.  It might be worth a try if you get into them thick again though.

Day burrito...Night Burrito...and $30

 

And an obligatory night jig fish...

 

 

 

 

 

scott

 

 

scott

Only caught a couple of little guys. After hours of fishing, I switched to a Rebel floating frog crank, and finally found some action. Both of these guys chased it up into 3 or 4 inches of water and would only bite it when I stopped reeling. Saved me from getting skunked. 

When in doubt throw the wacky

 

Nothing special out of me, caught 3 fish in 30 minutes on a black and blue jackhammer with a beast coast blade runner trailer. I didn’t weigh the first fish probably a pound or less next was 1.72, next was 2.40lbs. I then decided to make myself throw the jig, I am good with most other feeling presentations. Like plastics and stuff but not that good with a jig, took a while to get a bite and blew it. Hooked the fish fought it for a while and then it came off ? then I fought back and finally got a small one on a jig at 1.44lbs. Better than nothing but it just takes practice and hard lessons I guess, only way to get better though is to keep persevering and learning from failures and mistakes along with what works.

On 6/14/2022 at 11:59 AM, gimruis said:

I've experienced that more than once.  I swear that you just keep catching about 3 or 4 fish, and they rotate on which one is biting until you stop fishing for them.

They were relentless biting in the high sun in 3-4 feet clear water as i was wading. They grabbed the arashi popper, jerk baits.

At first i was havin fun catching them but then i went for bluegills changing baits to an ice fishing jig with tiny plastic on it and they still were a pain in the XXX so i had to move and i still caught them in with the bluegills.

 

rock bass attack areas.

 

Tried two spots this morning. The pond was a bust. I had two blowups on a Scum Frog but failed to set the hook. Got to learn to wait a few seconds before setting that hook, especially with braid.

 

I left the pond to hop over to the river. Bait of the day there was a 4” Green Pumpkin Stik-O rigged weightless. Casting upstream and letting the bait drift on slack line was the deal.

 

Struck gold this weekend on the boat. Got 15lbs in the span of 24 hours. A 4lber three 3lbers a handful of 2s and 1s and a bonus smallmouth, the smallmouth was especially exciting only because they've just been introduced to our lake recently and there's not a whole lot of them. 

 

Had 18-19 pounds for 5 fish last weekend, fun fishing with two buddies on our high school fishing trail.

 

 

My biggest at 3.5 even.  C and C custom baits micro football jig.  The dinks only wanted the ned, bigguns wanted the little jig.

  

More fish on the Micro football jig, fishing behind my two buddies:

Weighed low three, high two's:

 

PB smallie at 4.10:

PB lake Largemouth, 5 even:

 

 

1 minute ago, HaydenS said:

Had 18-19 pounds for 5 fish last weekend, fun fishing with two buddies on our high school fishing trail.

 

 

My biggest at 3.5 even.  C and C custom baits micro football jig.  The dinks only wanted the ned, bigguns wanted the little jig.

  

More fish on the Micro football jig, fishing behind my two buddies:

Weighed low three, high two's:

 

PB smallie at 4.10:

PB lake Largemouth, 5 even:

 

Nice!!!!

My wife was game for a 400AM start out of the driveway and she ended up being quite the good luck charm.

 

First rat fish of the year.

 

And the second.

 

Fatty on a spinnerbait.

 

Another spinnerbait chunk.

 

Hit like a torpedo and I assumed I snagged a submerged log I didn't see.

 

Another good one.

 

She doesn't like to touch the fish but enjoys catching them. For the good luck, I'll allow it. ?

5 hours ago, NorcalBassin said:

My wife was game for a 400AM start out of the driveway and she ended up being quite the good luck charm.

 

First rat fish of the year.

 

And the second.

 

Fatty on a spinnerbait.

 

Another spinnerbait chunk.

 

Hit like a torpedo and I assumed I snagged a submerged log I didn't see.

 

Another good one.

 

She doesn't like to touch the fish but enjoys catching them. For the good luck, I'll allow it. ?

20” spots? Oh yeah 

 

 

                           

Got served some humble pie last night.  Wanted to try some stuff besides what's been working for me this year so I started off with the frog.  No dice.  Threw a swim jig around.  Nothing doing on that either.  So got the drop shot out and caught one.  Had a couple short strikes but the evening was looking bleak.  Switched back to the frog and was working the edge.  Of course I had a good blow up right as I paused to itch my face.  Clumsily tried to set the hook while the rod came out of my hand and I missed the fish.  Continued with the frog with no other luck.  Had a hard runner on the drop shot but it must not have ever had the hook.  Hour in and only half an hour of light left.  I figured I should try the wacky rig which I haven't thrown in a while.  Got 2 pretty quick but they were just little ones.  Made a frustrated chuck to the middle of the pond and was waiting for it to sink.  Reeled up my line and there wasn't a tick, wasn't movement, but it just seemed tense.  Made a weird hookset because I wasn't sure what was going on and didn't expect anything because of how the night had gone and felt a pull like I'd never felt before.  I had the rod bowed over hard, 6# line so I'm just trying to keep it tight and let the fish work.  She's running to my left and peeling drag.  2 or 3 seconds in and the fish makes a hard turn to head straight away from me to the center of the pond and the reel is just screaming.  Half a second after that she's gone.  My hook and senko came back to me.  I didn't snap off, hook wasn't bent out, worm was passed over the hook an additional time, and I'm wanting to snap a rod in disbelief of what happened.  My guess is I basically hit the fish when I cast and it picked it up right after impact on the water.  My only mistake was my half-a$$ed hookset and I guess when the fish redirected whatever bit of skin I had was able to come free.  There are no catfish in this pond that I'm aware of; there are snappers, which I've never caught so I don't know how they feel when you hook one.  I didn't get a single look at whatever it was and I guess part of me is hoping it was a snapper to avoid the heartbreak lol but I'll never know.  If it was a bass it was an absolute giant that would have destroyed my PB, I'm sure of that.  So I fished the senko a bit more with no luck and decided to break out the dark sleeper which I haven't fished in a while either.  First cast and 3 or 4 pounder crushed it.  I've got it 3/4 of the way back to me, it jumps and spits the lure.  I'm boiling.  Cast again and a dink hits it, that one comes off too.  At this point, all I can do is laugh.  That seemed to help as the next 2 casts resulted in fish which means the dark sleeper got hit on 4 consecutive casts.  So I ended the night on a positive note but man I hope I don't have a night like that again for a while.

 

Another good Smallmouth this morning on the Storm Chug Bug. 
 

 

Match the hatch? Looks like the Smallies around here are eating Hellgrammites.