July 13, 2019
Fishing Time: 8:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.
Rating: 8
Weather Conditions: Overcast
Bait: Gary Yamamoto 5″ Green Pumpkin/Watermelon Senko with 1/0 Gamakatsu Wacky Worm Hook; Drop Shot with Poor Boy’s Baits Green Pumpkin Erie Darter and Quick Drop 1/4 ounce weight; Lucky Craft Flash Pointer Chartreuse Shad 115 Jerkbait
Rod: Megabass Orochi XX Whipsnake; G-Loomis GX2 Jig and Worm Rod; Abu Garcia Veritas Winch Crankbait Rod
Reel: Shimano Sustain; Quantum Catalyst PT; Shimano Curado Casting Reel
Line: 8-pound Sunline Sniper FC Fluorocarbon; 8-pound Seaguar InvizX Fluorocarbon; 12-pound Yo-Zuri Hybrid Fishing Line
Total Bass Caught: 4
Final Weigh in Weight: 8.42 pounds
Today’s outing got off to an extremely rough start. I arrived at the lake around 8:00 a.m. and, as per usual, headed straight to the lily pads located just right of the boat launch. The lake was glass and everything set up for a great day of fishing. Unfortunately, my trolling motor had other plans and, after two minutes of use, decided to stop working. With no way of making small movements, I figured that the best way to fish would be to camp out on a point. The first point that came to mind was the rocky point past the I-90 bridge. My initial plan was to work the drop offs with my drop shot, but after that failed to produce a bite I opted for a jerkbait instead. On my very first cast, I cast over to the shady side of the point and worked my lure back with a twitch-pause-twitch-twitch-pause retrieve. About halfway into my retrieve I gave a twitch-pause and had something almost knock the pole out of my hand. I quickly set the hook and, after a quality fight, was able to land the 2 pound smallmouth. Judging from the strike, I got the feeling that the bass had come out of the depths to hit my jerkbait, so I decided to cast back to the same area to see if there were a school of smallmouth there. After just my third twitch, I felt another bass swipe at my jerkbait. Unfortunately, the bass missed and a few more casts made it apparent that the bass wasn’t going to bite a jerkbait again. I did notice though that the bite came relatively close to a dock, so in the hopes that the missed bass had retreated there, I cast over with my drop shot. Almost immediately, I felt my line get heavy, so I gave a big hook set and felt the weight of a solid bass on the other end. I battled to keep the bass from jumping and was eventually able to swing it into the boat. This one came out to be a 2.25 pound smallmouth. After that, I decided to switch spots and head over to the docks straight across from the point I had been fishing. This proved to be a good decision, as my very first cast in the new spot yielded a 1.57 pound smallmouth. The wind then started to pick up, so I motored over to fish the docks on the east side of Mercer Island instead. The first few docks I tried left me empty-handed, but a deeper dock with an isolated piling off of the end of it provided me with my fourth, and biggest, bass of the day. This one weighed in at 2.60 pounds. After that, the wind got even worse, and with no trolling motor to combat it, I decided to call it a day and head in.
Observations: The water temperature ranged from 70-71 degrees, which caused the bass to hold tight to shady cover. I caught my bass in depths ranging from 10-20 feet and was encouraged by the quality of the bass that I was able to bring in today. The bass seem to be recovered from the rough spawning period and are starting to put the weight they lost from the spawn back on. All of the bass I caught hammered my bait and I get the feeling that there will be more opportunity for reaction strikes moving forward. Overall, given that I didn’t have a functioning trolling motor, I was very pleased with the day and hope to get back on the water soon.