July 26, 2016
Fishing Time: 7:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.
Rating: 6
Weather Conditions: Overcast skies
Bait: Drop Shot with Poor Boy’s Baits Green Pumpkin Erie Darter and Poor Boy’s Baits Pilenzler Melon Erie Darter and Quick Drop 1/4 ounce weight
Rod: Megabass Orochi XX Drop Shot Rod
Reel: Shimano Sustain
Line: 7-pound Sunline Super Sniper FC
Total Bass Caught: 6
Final Weigh in Weight: 7.86 pounds
After a disappointing last outing, I knew that I had to get back out on the water and hook into some quality fish. Since I haven’t fished the south end in a while, I decided to start there and see if I could hook into any bass by the lillies and wood piles over there. I began by working my crankbait along the weedline and in-between fallen logs, but wasn’t able to get a fish to bite. After that I noticed that a lot of the weedlines dropped off to deeper water, so I decided to pick up my drop shot and give those a try. On my fifth cast, I felt my line go slack. I quickly reeled up the slack and set the hook. Immediately, I felt the fish thrash its head and I knew that this was a big fish. After a great battle with the smallmouth, I was able to bring it into the boat and put it on the scale. It came out to be a nice 2.86 pound bass. I worked those drop offs for a little longer, but wasn’t able to get any other bites, so I decided to motor over to the second point on the left and give those docks and drop offs a try. The first few drop offs proved to be very unsuccessful, but eventually I came upon a dock with an inflatable tied to it. I cast over past the inflatable and slowly hopped my worm back to the boat. All of a sudden, I felt something hammer my worm so I set the hook and was able to bring in a solid 1.5 pound smallmouth. The docks then shallowed up and got weedy so I was forced to move out and fish deeper water. On the next dock, I cast to the drop off next to the weedline and instantly felt something tap my worm. I set the hook and brought in a dink 0.5 pound smallmouth. I felt that there could be a school of bass there, so I cast back and yet again was able to bring in a 0.5 pound smallmouth. Now I knew for sure there was a school of bass there, so I cast back a third time and after a little twitching of my worm was able to get the third bass in the school to bite. This one was also a dink 0.5 pounder. I worked that drop off for a few more minutes, but that seemed to be the end of the feeding frenzy, so I moved on to fish the v-dock. Surprisingly, I didn’t have any success there, but I later heard that my friend had fished that dock a little earlier in the day, which would explain my lack of success at my favorite dock. After that disappointment, I moved on to the next dock which resided on top of a shallow drop off. I cast to the top of it and slowly worked my worm down the drop off. Once the worm was about half way down the slope I felt something grab my worm, so I quickly set the hook. I battled with the bass for a while and had to fight to keep it from jumping and shaking the hook, but eventually I was able to bring it into the boat. I put it on the scale and it came out to be a solid 2.18 pound smallmouth. I then got really dark and I was forced to head in and call it a day.
Observations: The water temperature ranged from 74-75 degrees, which is about where I would expect it to be considering the warm weather we have been having. Most of the bass are in pretty deep water and I caught mine in 20+ feet of water with the exception of my last bass which came in about 12-15 feet of water. The good news is that the bass all seem to be healthy and have been fighting very well for there size. Along with this, they have all had large bellies on them, which shows that there is a plentiful food supply in the lake. It was nice to get into some 2+ pound bass today and have some quality fights, but I will definitely have to try and locate some largemouth in the future.