October 17, 2015
Fishing Time: 4:45 p.m. – 6:30 p.m.
Rating: 8
Weather Conditions: Sunny with clear skies
Bait: Drop Shot with Poor Boy’s Baits Green Pumpkin Drop Shot Darter and Quick Drop 1/4 ounce weight; Strike King Green Gizzard Shad KVD 1.5 flatside
Rod: Megabass Orochi XX Drop Shot Rod; Abu Garcia Veritas Rod
Reel: Shimano Sustain; Quantum Smoke
Line: 7-pound Sunline Super Sniper FC; 12-pound Yo-Zuri Hybrid
Total Bass Caught: 8
Final Weigh in Weight: 6.44 pounds
Since school has started, I have been extremely busy and haven’t had much time to get out onto the water. However, I found myself with a few open hours today and decided to go and give Lake Sammamish a try.I figured that the bass would be moving back towards the shallows, so I decided to start on the first point on the right because there is a large gravel flat over there. I started off by throwing my drop shot around the first dock, but after failing to get a bite I figured that the bass probably wanted a fast moving bait. I picked up my KVD 1.5 flatside and cast it over to the back side of the second dock. As soon as I began my retrieve, I felt my rod get heavy, so I set the hook and was able to land a dink 0.5 pound largemouth. This bass was very short, but it had a huge gut on it, which told me that there was plenty of food over there and that there could possibly be a school of bass. I cast back to the exact same spot and halfway back to the boat I felt something absolutely hammer my lure. I set the hook and was able to land a 0.75 pound largemouth. I then became convinced that there was a school over there, so I cast back to the spot again. This time the bass ate it before I could even get my hand on the reel. I set the hook and instantly felt that this bass was a little bigger. It put up a great fight, even jumping a few times, before I got it into the boat. I put it on the scale and it turned out to be a decent 1.19 pound largemouth. I cast back a few more times to test my luck, but unfortunately the well dried up and I wasn’t able to get any more bites. However, I wasn’t too disappointed because I was still able to get three bass on three consecutive casts. I continued working my way down the right hand side and two docks later, I cast my drop shot to the left corner of the dock and was able to land another dink 0.5 pound largemouth. I continued down a few more docks without much success, so I decided to motor down to the second point on the right and the two-tiered dock. I worked the docks for a while, but couldn’t get any bites, so I decided to cast out to the drop off and test deeper water. On my second cast, I felt my line get heavy, so I set the hook and was able to land a decent 1 pound smallmouth. I then moved down the point, all the while alternating between fishing the drop off and the docks. I eventually came to a deeper dock and cast to the left side of it. I felt something hammer my drop shot, so I set the hook and was able to land a 0.75 pound largemouth. I then found a steep drop off along the shore, so I cast over to it and bounced my worm down the slope. As soon as my worm hit the bottom of the slope, I felt my line get heavy, so I set the hook and hooked into a huge bass. I fought it for quite a while and felt it violently shaking its head. I was just about to get a glimpse of it, when it finally shook loose. I estimate it to be a 2-3 three pounder, so I was pretty devastated after this loss. Once I got over this, I spotted a dock that was located at the base of this same drop off, so I cast over to it and was able to land a dink 0.5 pound smallmouth. At this point, it was getting really dark, so I decided to finish the day with my favorite v-shaped dock. I worked the right side of it, but didn’t have any luck, so I cast over to the second pillar of the dock. I felt a strong tug on my line, so I set the hook and was able to get a nice 1.25 pound smallmouth in the boat. I decided to end the day on this high note and headed in.
Observations: The water temperature ranged from 60-62 degrees, so the water temperature has most certainly dropped. However, this is still a little warmer than what I would have expected for this time of the year. The bass are definitely in a transitional period because they were in all sorts of depths today. I caught mine in 8-35 feet of water, which is an extremely large range. I did notice that the largemouth were very shallow and the smallmouth were still pretty deep. I am extremely pleased with the number of bass that I was able to catch in such a short amount of time, but I’m left wondering where all the big bass have gone.