probably the last fishing trip for a while.  went out of lee street on the saginaw river in down town saginaw.  The river has been busy with Freighter traffic lately.  I was t sure where i was going up river or down bound but, after checking AIS boat nerd site.  The 670 ft M/V Saginaw was unloading stone at the Old GM dock. which, is basically as far up river river as they can get before the shipping channel ends. Where the saginaw was docked is roughly 15-18 miles from the mouth of the river and the saginaw bay.  

 

after passing the M/v saginaw  and catching a nice walleye on a lbs 1.5 square bill.  the saginaw blew her whistle made the turn and started her journey back to the saginaw bay and lake huron.  it took her almost 3 hours to reach the mouth/bay. 

 

I did manage to catch another 3 lbs bass on a black and blue spine craw. good day to end on for a while. 

Back in the saddle, cowboy aka @OmegaDPW.

 

Thanks for those photos, @Mbirdsley. This might surprise you, but I don't encounter freighters in Maine bogs.

 

@Susky River Rat: Is a blue marsh a freshwater marsh?

 

@BrianMDTX: Congrats on the new pond.

 

@Jmurphy87: I barely recognized you on a boat and wearing a shirt!

 

@IcatchDinks: Ouch! Did you remove it yourself and if so, how?

 

@BassSteve: Beauty!

 

@throttleplate: I like how you often fish differently than the rest of us.

 

@Bazoo: What a good dad.

 

 

 

 

 

 

10 minutes ago, ol'crickety said:

Back in the saddle, cowboy aka @OmegaDPW.

 

Thanks for those photos, @Mbirdsley. This might surprise you, but I don't encounter freighters in Maine bogs.

 

@Susky River Rat: Is a blue marsh a freshwater marsh?

 

@BrianMDTX: Congrats on the new pond.

 

@Jmurphy87: I barely recognized you on a boat and wearing a shirt!

 

@IcatchDinks: Ouch! Did you remove it yourself and if so, how?

 

@BassSteve: Beauty!

 

@throttleplate: I like how you often fish differently than the rest of us.

 

@Bazoo: What a good dad.

 

 

 

 

 

 

no problem.  i was kind of figuring most people didn’t have lower lakers in their local fishing hole 

Experienced one of best days on the water ever. I lost count of the bass I was catching but for 7 hours I was getting 2-4 pounders left and right like this guy. 

 

 

I also caught a 7lb but no picture. It was windy and it was either crash into the rocks were the fished pulled me and get the picture or throw it back and run the trolling motor. On top of that I got two 2-3lb catfish,  7 crappie and 5 big bluegill.

 

 

@ol'crickety I had to clip that single hook off the treble and force the sharp point all the way through my hand and pull it out that way. Got to avoid ripping out a chunk of myself on the barb that way. Definitely considering going all barbless after that experience. Not so fun. First time I've ever been hooked past the barb. I've been stabbed by hooks several times, but never that deep before. 

@ol'crickety it’s actually not a marsh at all. It’s a flood control lake that is extremely hard to fish because it’s a flat open water tub with no structure. 

I went from 2 to 6 last night.  I caught 10 Bass, mostly small.   Pictured are the first and last.  I caught 6 like the first one at the same point.  After all were that size I decided to leave Bass to find Bass.  The Bluegill spawn is going on, but hasn't really got the attention of Bass yet.  I saw a big fish chasing Bluegill on sonar.  It turned out to be a 15 pound Flathead Catfish.  (in the other species thread)  The last 4 Bass were scattered in lay downs.  Lay downs are hard (at least for me) to fish at night but the nearly full moon helped.  The wound on the last ones side didn't look like it came from spawning.  I wonder if a Heron had tried to get it.  

 

@Woody B: Woody, you wrote a bit back about how bass are IN wood, not near laydowns. Two questions:

 

How often do you snag?

 

When you hook a bass, how do you get it out of the tree?

Went fishing before church this morning at the pond I've been frequenting the past couple days and finally hit paydirt. I knew this pond held some decent fish, and I think I finally got to them while they were active. A 2" Rapala floating minnow worked as a jerk bait did the trick. I landed four bass, losing two right at the bank. (I think the hooks on the little bait are a bit too small.) I also caught a little crappie, a nice surprise since I didn't know they were in that pond. 

 

The largest bass was 17" long, had another at 16". I didn't measure the other two.

 

 

 

 

 

 

ICD, your catch rate and catch quality are improving. I'm proud of you and happy for you! When I was young, I fished a farm pond where the bass loved the 2" Rapala. Good memories.

38 minutes ago, ol'crickety said:

How often do you snag?

 

When you hook a bass, how do you get it out of the tree?

 

I don't snag that often, or at least lose lures.  Spinnerbaits are good, I can usually "feel" them out of snags.  Siebert Bladed jigs work great too.  I think something is different about them.  I'll lost a Chatter Bait or Jack Hammer within my first few casts.  For some reason I can "snake" the Siebert Fogy right through them without snagging.  Gamakatsu makes a weightless, weedless wacky hook that will bring a wacky rigged stick worm though the trees pretty good too.  

 

For me I suspect luck plays a role in getting the Bass out.   It's my theory that the Bass are coming up most of the time to get the bait.  Largemouth, especially ones 3 pounds or bigger have a tendency to jump as soon as I set the hook.  A quick horizontal rod jerk will "surfboard" them.  As long as you keep moving them fast enough they can't "get traction".   I get them out of the cover,  move the boat away, then let them fight in open water.  

Only had a couple hours this morning. Air temps were low 60’s at launch, and a stiff breeze out of the east which isn’t ideal. I had a short strike on a Plopper and lost one by the boat on a swim jig. The only catch of the day was this one by 6poundbass.

 

 

Thanks, Woody. I didn't know they jumped and the surfboarding technique is something I hope I can remember to use. 

2 hours ago, ol'crickety said:

ICD, your catch rate and catch quality are improving. I'm proud of you and happy for you! When I was young, I fished a farm pond where the bass loved the 2" Rapala. Good memories.

 

Thanks! I think the 2" is a little lighter than I would like. It's hard to get it to any sort of depth, but I think if I put larger hooks on it, it will give it just enough weight to give it the action I want, and help remedy the hook-up issues I mentioned. 

 

I was actually quite surprised at how effective it's been at getting strikes. I almost never use it. 

No doubt, that 2-incher is hard to cast. I suggest you go only slightly larger with hooks. Too big and they'll impede its action. 

I still do it better on the susky. 

Well I don't what is going on but I hit a large local pond and caught 30 bass (at least that's where I decided to stop). I only caught 2 or 3 keepers though.  It was a two hour dink fest but it was fun. 

 

And I caught another massive bluegill, around 11 inches if I measured it correctly.  

 

 

 

I finally caught a good one on Saturday.  I was going to do some work this weekend, but my wife told me I should go fishing.  I always try and do what I am told so I put the kayak on the car.  I didn't plan on going until late Friday afternoon, so I wasn't gong to have time to go to a lake I wanted to try.  So I went to my old favorite, which has let me down so far this year, but was worth giving one more try.

 

I got to the lake early Saturday morning, and started fishing at first light.  The water temp was 74, wind calm, and water clarity was around 2 foot.  The water was at a perfect level, and any other year I would have had greet confidence.  There were two other anglers in a small boat, that went to the other end of the lake.  I was glad they passed the best fishing spots for this water level.  They must have been there before, when the water is up, and the far end of the lake is a flooded pasture.  I new they wouldn't be at the far end of the lake for long, so I was in a hurry to try most of the visible cover before they came back to the deep end of the lake.

 

After a couple hours I had caught a few one pound bass but hadn't had a decent bite.  The other anglers came by and reported they were skunked.

 

At 10:00 AM the afternoon winds came early.  By 11:00 the other anglers had left, and I was really wondering why I was still there.  The wind was blowing 20 MPH. and I hadn't landed a bass over 1.5 pounds.  I was working hard to get even one good cast into one of the offshore trees, before loosing control of my kayak and having to reposition.  The bass wouldn't hit my moving baits which was odd for this much wind, so I had to try and fish soft plastics.  I ended up catching a 4 pound bass on a Skinny Dipper so the day wasn't going to be a complete disaster.

 

By 6:00 PM I was tired and thinking about calling it a day.  The wind was blowing to hard to set up my tent, and I was even contemplating cutting the trip short and going home.  I decided to stay and fish hard until dark, after all that is what I came there to do.

 

I peddled over to the tree I had caught the 4 pound bass from and made a cast with a T rigged June Bug Ole Monster I had just put on.  First cast I hooked the 8.1 pound bass in the picture.

I landed a couple other 2 pound bass on the Ole Monster, then fished a rock bank with a square bill until dark, landing a bass around 3 pounds.

 

I am so glad I didn't give up.  Sometimes all it takes is perseverance to catch bass.  That and a lot of luck is what I count on most of the time.  The wind died about 10:00 PM and I was able to set up my camp.

 

The next morning I started off with the Ole Monster, and landed a 5 pound bass along with a few small 1 pounders and hooked a big bass I wasn't able to get a look at.

 

The wind started early again on Sunday.  This time of year has the strongest winds, but I have never seen it start blowing before noon.  I had to leave for home around 12:00 so I was in a hurry to fish everything I had planned on casting to.

 

I ended up at my favorite tree from past years, that so far this year hadn't produced, but it is hard not to fish history.  After a few minuets of hard peddling I had the kayak positioned to make a perfect cast.  A small bass bit the tale off the Ole Monster so I got blown way out of position while I put another one on.  The next cast I hooked what I assumed was the same small bass.  When I had the bass close to the boat I saw a flash out of the depths, that looked like a good size bass trying to grab the worm.  I got the small bass a few feet closer to the kayak when a giant bass came up and completely engulfed my small bass.  I instantly put the reel in free spool and watched the line go away from the tree.  With as much experience  I have fishing in saltwater I would have thought I would stay calm and not make any mistakes.  I didn't, I got excited and made a rooky mistake.  When the line stopped going out, I should have waited until it started running off again before doing anything, but I just had to feel if the bass was on the line.  I lightly thumbed the spool, and felt the heavy weight of the giant.  I clicked the reel in gear and was going to set the hook when suddenly the heavy weight was gone.  The big bass had let go, and I had ruined my chance at a fish of a lifetime.  I reeled the small bass back to the kayak, and when it was a few feet away the giant came and swiped at the bass.  Of course I frees pooled the small bass again, but the big one was just showing off, and wasn't about to get fooled again.  

 

All the mistakes I made were ones I never would have done saltwater fishing, but seeing a bass that size made me panic causing me to completely choke, and loose the opportunity of a lifetime.  I don't know how big the bass was, but the small bass was 12 1/4 inches and completely disappeared when the big bass hit it.

 

I had to leave early so I decided to make cast at a tree near the launch.  I hooked and landed a five pound bass, and of course I turned on more last cast into 20, but finally had to call it quits and go home.

 

I am glad to see my favorite lake still has at least one giant that will keep me going back.  Maybe with more perseverance and some more luck, I will catch one.  The lake is not anything like it was, but that only means I will have to work harder.  For now I will have to be happy with an 8 pounder, and a good one that got away story.

 

 

Memorial day weekend was a bit rough figuratively and literally. I've never in my life regretted owning my tracker until this weekend. The lack of length and weight made it a FIGHT just to stay on plane without rattling the teeth out of my head. I worked that throttle probably more times than I have in the past 11 years of ownership. 

 

Fishing was also tough. Saturday we drove up to my inlaws in the morning and by the time we said hi,  got everyone together and set out it was 1pm already. Full sun,  no clouds and not even a gnat fart for wind. Caught 2 ripping a swim jig through weed edges in 5-7fow in about 3 hours. Took me a while to find them,  wasn't sure if they were still sitting near their spawn locations or working their way into summer spots. They were off main lake points but didn't get much time once I caught my 2 with dinner and such. 

 

Sunday was same conditions except I had a little wind.  I was down by the dam Saturday so I made a 30min run up the lake hoping fit less boat traffic but it was a muddy mess. Wasted the first part of my day I there and then spent some time with the family. Did 2hrs before dinner and ran back down to a hump off a main lake point I found on my way out the day before. Fished the points weed edge first with no luck and then hit the hump. Tried spinnerbaits, jig and swim jig over the stumps on the hump and no dice. Then I figured I'd pretend I was Ajay and broke out a jerkbait (I've caught maybe 2 fish in my life on one). Second cast and it got crushed. In about 15 minutes I picked up 4. I just released the 4th and cast my beautiful megabass vision one ten jr+1 in pro blue and hard SNAP. Off she went into the netherworld. Wasted 20 minutes trying to grid search for it but it was gone. Went to tie in another and realized the first guide on my used poison adrena cracked, likely cause of the break so now I'm down a 110 and gotta find someone to replace a guide. Caught 2 more off another rod and then it was time for dinner. Size was nothing great but it was nice to catch on a lure I had little confidence in. 

 

Looks like 3 spots and a LM?

Nice trip @king fisher! Junebug worm > spinnerbait …….

 

@Functional also nice trip, I’d say 4 spots 

26 bass this evening at a pal's pond. Some samples below. In order, a long one, a fat one, the thickest one, and the prettiest one. 

 

 

@king fisher, your account of the lost monster was thrilling. Congrats on the 8-pounder, the 5-pounders, 4-pounder, and the others. 

Got this one at the local heavily pressured place this evening.

 

Feels good to get back on the water, spent the last 8 weeks out of town for work.  Saturday first light was one of those epic feeding frenzies for about 20 minutes.  A bluegill crank down was getting bit on every cast.  After that, a weightless 7" fluke, jig, and free rig were picking them off.  I had a handful over 20" and another in the 18-20" range, one of them could easily have been my lake pb if she wasn't all spawned out, though the pics don't really show it.

 

scott

 

 

Had a recent smallie fest