@softwateronly: I caught back-to-back 19-inchers once in my life (2023) and will die with a smile on my face just thinking about those two beauties, but with your feat of multiple 20-plus-inchers in 30 minutes, you should die doing this:

 

 

@OHBuckets: It was generous of @A-Jay to share one of his bass. 

 

12 hours ago, king fisher said:

the small bass was 12 1/4 inches and completely disappeared when the big bass hit it.

 

Am I the only one who has reread ^this^ sentence several times simply to savor it?

18 hours ago, IcatchDinks said:

 

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. 

Try 6 lb stren if you haven't already!

1 minute ago, Pat Brown said:

Try 6 lb stren if you haven't already!

 

6 lb. Stren used to be my only line. You can cast even light lures into the next county with it. However, fishing bogs ended my marriage to Stren 6 lb. test. Bogs are a harsh mistress and will brook no light line.

12 lb power pro?  That stuff is like ultrafine razor sharp frog hair!

25 minutes ago, Pat Brown said:

12 lb power pro?  That stuff is like ultrafine razor sharp frog hair!

 

I use Cabela's brand 30-lb. braid that I bought many years ago. It works, although I did have it break last night on a cast, but that was my fault since I hadn't retied in too long, I could see it was fraying at the knot, and I'd caught a LOT of bass on that knot. 

I was on the water long before the sun came up. Clear and warm with a nice 10 mph breeze. Started out at the south end of the lake.
 I Tried the pad crasher for awhile , and had one half hearted blow up that I missed. I went to the Bama bug dinger and  immediately caught 2 good fish.  Then I moved to the southeast corner of the lake , and caught another good one on the dinger .                   I picked off a couple fish on the horny toad in the deepest hole in the lake, and one on a red bug truck worm , then began fishing around the east side of our island , hunting for shade. Got several on the June bug speed worm and lost several in brush piles. Came around the south end of the island and switched to a watermelon seed super fluke, and caught a few going up the west side of the island, including these 2…                     I caught a couple more on the fluke as I headed home , and stopped at the north deep hole on the way home. I had switched to a Houdini super fluke because it was so bright, and got this 4.25 pounder to close the morning.          It was the best day I’ve had in several years on my lake. The lake is clearly rebounding since the otter has been gone the better part of the year… Ended up with 16, with a 16 pound bag for the top 5…

It was one of those rare days where nearly everything went right! Got a good case of bass thumb to go along with it lol .

Happy Memorial Day everyone!

Ain't it cool when EVERYTHING works!

 

 

 

                                                      

4 hours ago, Pat Brown said:

Try 6 lb stren if you haven't already!

Thanks! I definitely will give it a shot. 

Mike!!!

26 minutes ago, N Florida Mike said:

..  Th         .        

It was the best day I’ve had in several years on my lake.

Ended up with 16, with a 16 pound bag for the top 5…

It was one of those rare days where nearly everything went right!

Got a good case of bass thumb to go along with it lol

.

Happy Memorial Day everyone!

Nice Done Sir !

Congrats

A-Jay

My brother in law, my brother, and I went fishing in the rowboat this morning. My brother in law slaughtered the crappie, I caught mostly small bass, although I did get my first top water catch of the year on the bone colored whopper plopper. (About dang time!)

 

 

 

 

 

Then we took the kids fishing at the river behind my brother in law's house (the Flat River). The kids all got hooks into something. I caught several little smallies, my niece and nephew (bro-in-laws kids) both caught rock bass. And then my brother's five year old landed a super healthy 15" smallmouth using ultralight gear. We cooked and ate it. (Pls don't kill me, C&R only Crowd. It wasn't my decision.)

 

 

ICD, I hope you all enjoyed that bass. I don't think you'll get any grief at BR. 

I had a rare holiday off.  I went early.  I caught 4 between 5AM and 9AM.  The lake was already getting full or recreational boaters so I called it a day.  (FWIW I'm not a fan of all the pleasure boaters, but I suppose they have as much right to the water as I do) The Bluegill spawn is starting but the Bass are still scattered between post spawn, and summer.  I think the hot cold hot cold weather as well as all the rain messed up the Bass spawn this year.   I saw very little Bass action during the Shad spawn.   The water has really warmed up.  It's 9 degrees warmer than it was 9 days ago.  (81 degrees this morning)    Oh well, back to work tomorrow.  

 

I was driving home from my earlier adventures when I received a call from my wife: her brother and his wife were coming into town to do some shopping and were planning on doing some fishing afterwards and would we like to join them? 

 

Well, sure! 

 

So I landed three more bass to cap off the day and now I owe my wife something fierce for all the time she's granted me to chase my favorite hobby this weekend. 

 

 

 

My nieghbor Leon called and had a new topwater frog he wanted me to see . I had fished all morning and was relaxing but he’s always so excited about fishing  I met him down at the property line. He had had 2 blowups but missed them. He insisted that I try with his combo and frog. It casted probably 125 feet.

Boom! Fish on ! 😄 

He couldn’t believe it…

 

Best of the weekend!  From the pier at the in-laws, I chucked it maybe 35yds and it's still only about 7' deep.  Came on 7" flush w/ a 3/8oz free rig, had a bit of a belly on her, I'm thinking she was an early spawner and also an earlier recovery.

 

scott

 

 

Took a trip way out east with my brother to a pretty good lake for a john boat sesh. With a few days past the full moon, overcast skies in the forecast and a late moonrise, we had high hopes. But once we got there, the fog was so dense it was like fishing inside a storm cloud. Normally that would be just fine, but just like my local spots, this place has had an early explosion of lily pads, but worse than that, trolling motor battery-killing pondweed was everywhere, so we had to row. Could barely see past the front of the boat with the blinding pea-soup fog which meant every wake bait casted out ended up stuck in pads or pondweed that would not easily give up a lure. Headlamps reflecting back on us just made seeing out farther worse, so we ending up blowing up spots and killing time retrieving pricy swimbaits.

 

We finally committed to running only soft plastics through the jungle and on the bottom. Eastern north shore lakes on this island are often a few weeks behind mine, so I was unsurprised to get the tell-tale bumps and short strikes of nest guarders. We finally rowed into a small, clear patch in very shallow water way up the lake, so my brother winged out a Tiny Tum crank down wake. Got a nice fish right away, and on the very next cast to the very same spot he got a smaller fish which we assumed was the male of a mating pair. We were both whipped by then, so we rowed back, tossed down some geritol, and called it a night. When only one of us lands something, we're content with saying that the boat didn't get skunked. There isn't much that beats time spent with my brother, so it's all good.

Been slammed at work and had to work the past few Saturdays. Not alot of fishing done. Weather and water have both warmed up considerably. Got out Saturday and Sunday with no luck. I am the lead mechanic at a commercial HVAC/R shop. Which means I also have a bit of a managerial role as well as being a mechanic. Both days we were getting slammed with calls so I spent more time on the phone and helping the other mechanics out than fishing. It was frustrating. Talking to other guys out, no one was really having much luck all weekend. 

 

Monday I finally got on some fish. Only two but better than nothing. 

 

Nothing big. Nothing special. But this season I'm really dedicating myself to improving on certain techniques. Both these fish were caught on a weightless t-rigged creature bait. A technique I really want to improve on. Iv found a few things. One, I can skip a wacky rig or t rig quite easily. Which is big time. I know it's crazy to think. But my first ever bass was caught on a t rig worm, then I quickly moved on to other stuff. Due to a few different reasons but to keep this from being a novel, I'll just leave it at that. My first fish was actually caught in a cool way, at least for me. I always see you guys talking about "line watching" when talking about jigs or t rigs. Well that's how I caught this fish. Saw a boil and made a few casts, felt nothing but saw my line moving sideways. Set the hook and boom. Fish. The second fish was caught by figuring out a sort of pattern. I was casting to shoreline cover with no luck. But maybe 10-15 feet off the shoreline was some submerged vegetation and I kept seeing movement. Started targeting that. Boom second fish. Had a few more bites. Caught a few pickrel. 

 

I'm really happy with how this season is going. Iv gained a ton of confidence in jigs, wacky rigs, and now t rigs. I had success in seasons of the past. But always felt one dimensional. Or lacking in a ton of techniques. Alot has really came together for me so far. Learned a ton this season. Honestly, probably learned or had the light bulb "ah ha" moment more this season then I'm my past 2 seasons combined. That's what it's all about, learning and experience. Very very very happy with the way things are going

I caught 28 and the biggest five were about 18 pounds, as there were at least five 18" or longer, but the best part of the evening was simply being close to 68 years old, but still on the water, still in a slender, tippy canoe, still hearing the owls hoot, and still smelling a distant fire. I am a north woods girl, born in the suburbs, but happiest on dark and distant water. See the third photo of the grass, third pic down? That's were they were. It was too windy for me to fish the reed stump fields, so I tried grass in a protected bay and did okay.

 

I did catch a skinny 17.75-incher and put her on the bump board because she was too thin for a good lip and grip showing. I hoped the bump board might make her seem a bit thicker. It didn't.

 

The last bass looks smallish, but she wasn't. A couple of them took line under my canoe, which is always exciting and challenging. I lost a few nice ones too. I nearly always do.

 

P. S. - I'm fishing a pal's pond this week. It has potential for a bigger bass than my pond. I haven't caught a bigger bass yet, but fingers crossed as I'm fishing it again this evening. However, I'm starting to worry. There are more and more weeds and the bass are so strong. I lost some nice ones last night to weeds and as the summer progresses, that'll happen more and more. I hope to fish 3.5 hours this evening instead of last night's 2.5 hours. Hoping the wind lets me!

 

 

Visits to a couple of the Grand River bayous, Friday last week and this morning.  These are backwater areas connected to the lower Grand as it nears Lake Michigan, consisting of a variety of drowned creek mouths and old segments of river course.  KVD has said that the lower Grand River system was one of his favorite places to tournament fish when he was coming up.

 

Bayou 1, on Friday, had 70 degree water already. 

I caught 13 bass, most in the 13-14" range. About half came early on a buzzbait, then a bunch more on a spinnerbait, with a couple of jig fish sprinkled in.  Didn't take any pics of Bayou 1 fish, because I kept waiting for a bigger one that never came.  However, one of my favorite spinnerbaits was bitten off by some variety of large toothy beast, which I never saw, but felt for a few exciting seconds. 

 

Then, I got a few this morning on Bayou 2.

 

Some buzzbait action at sunrise produced a handful in the 15"-18" range:

 

Then things slowed down.  The next three hours produced a few smaller bass on a frog and spinnerbait.

 

Just before putting in at 10am to end my morning, I got another nice one on the last cast:

 

Which put my count at 8 for today. 

 

OK, now I need to go back to work....

A little pre-work pond fishing produced one tiny dink. But I caught the stupid thing three times. I refused to take his picture the first couple times, but after three attempts he finally got his photo taken and he finally left me alone. Saw very little action aside from him. Had a decent fish on the end of my line for a second, but he had sideswiped the bait and was barely hooked. A headshake freed him. 

 

Well my bfs gear got me a nice little bass lol. Hey at least I caught a bass and the other stuff I caught is in the other species thread.

I've kept my canoe at a pal's pond this week. The fishing was suddenly harder, as the reeds rose overnight and the lily pads are getting thicker. I caught 31 bass, but likely lost 40 or more. They dive, hook on a reed or lily pad stem, and shake free. I lead with the four best bass, followed by a golden light shot, then one of a smallmouth, which are never big but always beautiful, then the sunset, and finally, one of the smaller bass. 

 

I did apply @Pat Brown's advice and @T-Billy's advice to turn the fish with brute force and once they're on the surface, surfboard them to the canoe. When I remembered to do that, their tactics worked pretty well, but I didn't always remember because everything happens in a second. 

 

I'll fish my pal's pond one more time this week and next week, I'll fish two bogs, one where I caught my PB and the other where I caught three six-plus-pounders in 2023. 

 

I heard a turkey gobble and an owl hoot and saw a fox and two deer. The third bass down is a tank, huh?

I got these the other day.

 

This is the biggest crappie I've ever seen!

 

 

Beautiful sunset. If you're wondering, that thing on the left, its a knife lanyard.

 

Got these this evening on the way to bible study. He's coming back, don't let him catch you with slack lines!

 

 

Got out from 6:45-8:45. Several little smallies and two big drum. Motor started acting weird just as I was running up the rapids back to my truck but it smoothed out thank goodness . 12 yr old harbor freight special that sits outside, might need some maintenance 😂 

 

also had to wear my wife’s purple life jacket…..

really fits my contours…….