Latest Catch Pics Thread

[gim]

20 hours ago, throttleplate said:

I hope the gills stick around for a few more weeks, the crappie bite was terrible as we usually get our limit on them but only caught 3 this day.

Sunfish spawn after crappies do. My guess would be the crappies are done and have moved back to their summer haunts. The sunfish will be doing that soon too.

[OmegaDPW]

40 minutes ago, gimruis said:

Sunfish spawn after crappies do. My guess would be the crappies are done and have moved back to their summer haunts. The sunfish will be doing that soon too.

 

 Mine are gone from the bank already (one hour North of the Florida line). It got up to 98 today and was 78 when I got to the pond at 0700. I stayed for 4 hours and only targeted panfish. Only caught one fish- a 5+lb LMB on a 2 inch black curly tail grub and 6lb line on my ultra-light BPS noodle rod. Can't complain- it was fun reeling him in on that set up. 

[throttleplate]

3 hours ago, gimruis said:

Sunfish spawn after crappies do. My guess would be the crappies are done and have moved back to their summer haunts. The sunfish will be doing that soon too.

 

Looking at minn regs, how do i interpet the possesion limit of bluegills, sunnys, regs say 20 in possesion, does that mean 20 per licensed angler?

[MN Fisher]

1 hour ago, throttleplate said:

 

Looking at minn regs, how do i interpet the possesion limit of bluegills, sunnys, regs say 20 in possesion, does that mean 20 per licensed angler?

Yes - so long as you and your wife both have licenses - you can have 40 total between stringer and freezer.

[IcatchDinks]

River wading today, I found some poor bloke's topwater lure broken off on a branch. Tied it on and caught my largest smallmouth of the year so far my third cast. He's only 15" (I haven't done a ton of river fishing this year.) But boy, did he put up one helluva fight! An absolutely massive explosion on the eat, and then the most acrobatic fight I think I've ever had. Three giant leaps, running this way and that, and then he tried putting another hook into me when I tried to lip him at the bank. (Despite my waders, I was standing right next to the bank when I caught him.) I actually hate the action of that freebee lure, so I'mma put it in a case somewhere and forget about it. 

 

Also, don't mind my derpy Riley Greene Hat. It saved the back of my neck from a nasty sunburn. 

 

I caught several other smaller fish too. I probably would have caught more, but every time I keyed in on some fish, a group of drunken tubers would come around the bend splashing, kicking off against the bottom, yelling, and scaring all my fish away. Of all the kinds of people on the river, tubers are the worst in my opinion. They're always drunk, always loud, always rude. It was a good day, despite the ruckus. Found two lures including the one I caught the 15 inch acrobat on. One of them is a deep diving crank that needs some TLC and maybe a new paint job. 

 

 

Same fish, but with me in the picture:

 

 

 

 

[Swamp Girl]

@IcatchDinks: The Blue Angels, hummingbirds, and Cirque du Soleil can only dream of doing what smallmouth do when airborne.

 

Dang drunks. Why isn't floating down a river enough for them? Why do they have to turn the river into a noisy bar full of too loud people telling stories not worth telling...again and again?

 

That's a chunky bass for a river.

[IcatchDinks]

9 minutes ago, ol'crickety said:

@IcatchDinks: The Blue Angels, hummingbirds, and Cirque du Soleil can only dream of doing what smallmouth do when airborne. Dang drunks. Why isn't floating down a river enough for them? Whey do they have to turn the river into a noisy bar full of too loud people telling stories not worth telling...again and again? That's a chunky bass for a river.

 

The tubers are usually college students, so I give a little bit of leniency for their youth and lack of wisdom. But it is heckin annoying for sure. 

 

He was a chunk for sure. I didn't get a weight on him because I'd already had him out of the water for too long just to get my phone out of my backpack and take a photo. 

 

I went out again to the same stretch of river at 5:30 this morning. Fished for about two hours before coming home. Only caught two smaller bass and a rock bass. 

 

 

 

 

[The Baron]

Our bass opener finally arrived yesterday.  It felt great to get out.  I’d watched a few YouTube videos about speed worms and it intrigued me, so I had a couple packs of Reaction Innovations Machete worms to try.  TR with a 3/16oz. tungsten weight and a 5/0 EWG this produced 1/2 doz. fish very quickly, with a 3.1# and a 3.9# in the mix.  So I handed that rod to my son and one ate it on the fall on his first cast.  I picked up a TR Bandito Bug and caught a couple more bass and a decent pike - odd for one to grab a bottom bait and can’t believe I landed him on straight braid.  Our first hour was fire, then the next two were dead but it was still a great opener. 😎

We did have an unusual occurrence.  We’d only been fishing 1/2 hour and hit a good spot, landing 4 good bass almost back to back.  I then realized a boat that had been stationary at about 100 yards from us was now less than casting distance away (he came from further out in the bay, to almost right along side us).  I considered speaking my mind, but he had a couple kids with him.  So I just said hi, how are you and cast right up the side of his boat where I’d been casting anyway.  He didn’t get the message, but after catching nothing after 5 minutes he looped around right to where we’d been, the whole time within 60ft. of us, as we slowly moved on down the bank. 🙄 

 

[throttleplate]

12 hours ago, IcatchDinks said:

River wading today, I found some poor bloke's topwater lure broken off on a branch. Tied it on and caught my largest smallmouth of the year so far my third cast. He's only 15" (I haven't done a ton of river fishing this year.) But boy, did he put up one helluva fight! An absolutely massive explosion on the eat, and then the most acrobatic fight I think I've ever had. Three giant leaps, running this way and that, and then he tried putting another hook into me when I tried to lip him at the bank. (Despite my waders, I was standing right next to the bank when I caught him.) I actually hate the action of that freebee lure, so I'mma put it in a case somewhere and forget about it. 

 

Also, don't mind my derpy Riley Greene Hat. It saved the back of my neck from a nasty sunburn. 

 

I caught several other smaller fish too. I probably would have caught more, but every time I keyed in on some fish, a group of drunken tubers would come around the bend splashing, kicking off against the bottom, yelling, and scaring all my fish away. Of all the kinds of people on the river, tubers are the worst in my opinion. They're always drunk, always loud, always rude. It was a good day, despite the ruckus. Found two lures including the one I caught the 15 inch acrobat on. One of them is a deep diving crank that needs some TLC and maybe a new paint job. 

 

 

Same fish, but with me in the picture:

 

 

 

 

Nothing wrong with your hat.

12 hours ago, MN Fisher said:

Yes - so long as you and your wife both have licenses - you can have 40 total between stringer and freezer.

 

Thanks, we could have kept 40 fish but i was unsure of the wording of the regs. I have in the past 2 days ate 15 blugills thats 30 filets, not huge filets but makes for a great dinner with salad and such.

[IcatchDinks]

2 hours ago, throttleplate said:

Nothing wrong with your hat.

 Haha. Thanks! My wife says she can't take me seriously when I'm wearing it. 😄 But I take the sun seriously and yesterday was a day that I did not want to mess around with the sun. 

[BrianMDTX]

For an absolutely gorgeous day, it was a bit disappointing. I went back to the “quantity not quality” pond to give it another shot. Here’s what I was greeted with when I got out on the water. 

Other than a cloudless sky, it was perfect. I started with a popper but topwater action seemed dead. So I switched to a 1/4 oz. blue/black swim jig with a green pumpkin Rage Craw trailer. Three casts in and it got hammered. About 10 seconds into the fight my jig was gone. I had just retied it on, so I was baffled, until I remembered seeing that big gar the last time.  I tied on another 1/4 oz. green/brown swim jig with a Rage Bug trailer but wasn’t getting anything. So I switched rigs that already had a 3/8 oz. blue/black swim jig with a black sapphire Zoom Z-Craw Jr. trailer.  A short time later it got hit and I had my first bass. On a jig. 

 

 

I cast right into that wood and he smashed it. Not that big but a good fight. After that the bite really died. I wasn’t getting anything, or seeing anything, until I saw a bass really go after something twice. It was right on the bank of a small island and way under overhanging brush and dead wood. I tried skipping a jig in there but couldn’t get it where it needed to go. So I picked up my spinning rig and skipped a weightless watermelon red Zoom Trick back about 4’ through all kinds of limbs until it reached the bank and it got immediately crushed. Although using a MLXF rod, I got it out of there but boy, oh boy did it put a bend in the rod! Twice I got it close and it dove, but finally I grabbed the line to pull it in…and my line snapped at the hook. And that was the last bite of the day. Not sure how big it was, but it looked between 4 and 5 lbs. 

[Swamp Girl]

You were the bug, not the windshield, @BrianMDTX, but you had an exciting afternoon, for sure.

[gim]

20 hours ago, OmegaDPW said:

Mine are gone from the bank already (one hour North of the Florida line).

@throttleplate is in northern MN so my guess is the water temps there are about 70 degrees. Where I am in Central Mn the water is 73 and all the bass and panfish are done spawning now. I don’t really target panfish outside of a couple trips in the early spring. I have no interest in them once the other seasons open here.

[gim]

8 hours ago, IcatchDinks said:

Only caught two smaller bass and a rock bass. 

Rock bass. What an embarrassment to the rest of the bass family.

[IcatchDinks]

3 minutes ago, gimruis said:

Rock bass. What an embarrassment to the rest of the bass family.

I think of you every time I catch one. 

[The Baron]

Dang, that’s a heartbreaker @BrianMDTX.  Sounds like you did the near impossible getting her out of that tree though, with “fairy wand”.  lol 

[BrianMDTX]

It’s a St. Croix Bass-X 6’ 10” MLXF. It certainly had a bend in it but it got her out of the wood fast. Once out, she kept runnin’. We fought. I lost lol. 

[throttleplate]

4 hours ago, gimruis said:

@throttleplate is in northern MN so my guess is the water temps there are about 70 degrees. Where I am in Central Mn the water is 73 and all the bass and panfish are done spawning now. I don’t really target panfish outside of a couple trips in the early spring. I have no interest in them once the other seasons open here.

 

I actually live in Fargo ND, which borders Moorhead MN and i do all my panfishing in Detroit Lakes MN which according to this map i am considered to be fishing in central mn. I am really fishing in west central. I dont know how official this map is so it may vary between maps.

[MN Fisher]

5 minutes ago, throttleplate said:

I am really fishing in east central.

You mean West-Central?

 

I lived in northern MN for 6 years - Bemidji is east of Bagley, west of Lake Winnibegoshish on that map.

[gim]

I consider anything south of the Twin Cities to be southern MN and anything from Duluth or north to be northern MN.

 

Regardless…minor geography detail.

3 hours ago, IcatchDinks said:

I think of you every time I catch one. 

If I catch one, I’ll post a photo as proof for ya.

 

Hope it doesn’t happen lol

[throttleplate]

2 hours ago, MN Fisher said:

You mean West-Central?

 

I lived in northern MN for 6 years - Bemidji is east of Bagley, west of Lake Winnibegoshish on that map.

yes, i was thinking east LA for some reason, to much cheech and chong.

[MN Fisher]

5 minutes ago, throttleplate said:

to much cheech and chong.

Or was it the fact you snagged their van.

[throttleplate]

well i was driving behind a van today that reeked of weed smoke.

[Swamp Girl]

4 hours ago, IcatchDinks said:

I think of you every time I catch one. 

 

I actually want to catch one. I haven't caught one of those tough, little buggers since I was a kid.

[The Baron]

3 hours ago, BrianMDTX said:

It’s a St. Croix Bass-X 6’ 10” MLXF. It certainly had a bend in it but it got her out of the wood fast. Once out, she kept runnin’. We fought. I lost lol. 

Sounds like a heck of a tussle.

 

I forget which pro referred to spinning gear as a “fairy wand”, back when they started to show up more often at tournaments.