dink Posted February 11, 2007 Share Posted February 11, 2007 It's been awhile since I've posted something in this category, but today deserves the effort. St. Louis area (Baldwin Lake - Baldwin, IL) 20 degrees air temp @ 8:00 am, high temp 33. Bluebird skies, WNW 5 - 10 mph My fishing buddy and I decided to give the old "bath tub" a try today. The bath tub being Baldwin Lake. This is a 1,000 acre power plant lake shaped like a rectangle and surrounded by riprap. It has one man-made jetty (point) that separates the north and south ends of the lake and two areas that discharge the hot water and create current. We started the day with him catching a 4 lb. hybrid striper near one of the discharges on a lipless crank. He caught a couple more LM in the area before we headed to the jetty. I caught nothing in this first area. At the jetty, I started throwing a C.Rig with a 'pede and he continued cranking the lipless. We were getting ready to move again when I swung. After a brief struggle, a beautiful 3+ smallie was in the boat. Nice. We circled back and worked the point with C. Rigs for another 90 minutes. I put five more fish in the boat which included a 4+ LM and another even bigger smallie. He only caught one fish here and was beside himself. You see, this is the guy who taught me how to throw a C. Rig years ago. The student bests the master! This was a good day in itself.... but it is not over yet. We proceeded to the other discharge area when the jetty slowed down (he realized he wasn't going to beat me there...he he he). No sooner did the trolling motor hit the water, he commenced to administering a whoopin' to me with that lipless crank. It started with a 5 lb. drum and continued with bass after bass. Hope seemingly gone, I finally connected with one... then two.. then three. We were on some very aggressive fish gorging on shad below. All these fish (20 - 25) were 1 - 4 lbs and chunky. The race was on for total numbers, but I was still behind. BANG! Something crushed my lipless crank and doubled me up. What a fight in heavy current this sow put up. 5+ lbs. Oh happy day! We finished the day where we started and got one more good hybrid and a couple other decent LM. I am still smiling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clipper Posted February 11, 2007 Share Posted February 11, 2007 That fishing sounds good enough to brave 20 degree temperatures. Glad you had a good day. What was the water temp? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dink Posted February 11, 2007 Author Share Posted February 11, 2007 All fish came out of 48 - 58 degree water (surface). The smallies came out of 48. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User T-rig Posted February 11, 2007 Super User Share Posted February 11, 2007 ANY PICS? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MattStrykul Posted February 11, 2007 Share Posted February 11, 2007 SWEET sounds like you had one amazing day my friend! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User Grey Wolf Posted February 11, 2007 Super User Share Posted February 11, 2007 That was worth the 20 degree weather ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fishing Doug Posted February 11, 2007 Share Posted February 11, 2007 Dink, congrats on your excellent fishing day. Can you give a few more details on the lipless cranks (brand, color, speed of retreive, etc). Hoping to try out the new boat on Baldwin or Coffeen very soon. thanks in advance, FD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super User roadwarrior Posted February 11, 2007 Super User Share Posted February 11, 2007 Excellent! Anyone fishing in 20-33 degrree weather deserves a gold star. I'm glad you caught a bunch of great fish, too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dink Posted February 12, 2007 Author Share Posted February 12, 2007 Thanks for the kudos, guys! The specific baits we were throwing were 1/2 oz chrome/black back Super Spot (me) and 1/2 oz black/white Red Eye Shad by Strike King (my partner). We started off running them pretty quickly straight in, but soon realized they wanted it slowed down with brief pauses. this is what we used for the Largies. The two brown bass hit a C. Rig on a rocky point. A three foot leader behind a 3/4 weight tipped with a Zoom centipede in watermelonseed. No "super secre patterns" here . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dink Posted February 19, 2007 Author Share Posted February 19, 2007 Same lake... same conditions (little warmer with high of 36)... same results. Small correction on the original post. The lake is a 2000 acre rectangle not 1000. Nonetheless, my buddy and I caught 5 keeper LM bass (over 18") all between 4 and 5 lbs, 4 hybrid stripers (4 - 5 lbs.) and around 20 sub-legal bass. No smallies today, but still a darn good one. Traps, Spots and Shad Raps were the ticket. Find the shad, find the fish.... no elaborate pattern here. Sorry, no pics again. If any of you St. Louis area guys want in on this, PM me for details. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fishing Doug Posted February 19, 2007 Share Posted February 19, 2007 Congrats on the success...again! oh, and PM sent-I need to know where to look for them on Friday. ;D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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