Can you tell Joseph REALLY liked today’s fishing trip?
Jasmine was the picture of concentration today. She stayed focused on feeling the hit and watching her rod tip and caught a bunch of fish.
Mike was a “late-bloomer”, but, once he figured out how to get his slab set just right, there was no holding him back!
This morning we awoke to heavy grey skies, and a cool drizzle driven by a SE wind. I knew it’d be a day for lots of fish and few fishermen!
I met Mike, Jasmine, and Joseph at 7:15a, did a little safety briefing and an introduction to the techniques we’d use today and we were off to hunt fish.
We were met with immediate success at our first stop at Area 108/143. In this area we found small, separated schools of 12-20 fish each holding tightly to the bottom in 20-22 feet of water. Due to the still low light level, these fish were not very aggressive, so we went to work with the downriggers to move baits past a lot of inactive fish to get our baits looked at by the few just-getting-active fish among them. This worked very well for us as we used Pet Spoons in white and silver to tempt a total of 28 fish including one “double” for each person (that’s 2 fish caught on one rod at the same time).
If we’d ended the trip right then and there I think this family would have gone home ecstatic about what they had caught, as they we really enjoying the entire experience, but, there was much more to come!!
By 9:30 this shallow action had died, forcing us to look deeper and to look elsewhere.
We found light action between Areas 344/566 in 27 feet of water, and jigged for 3 fish before heading elsewhere. For jigging today, we used the TNT 180 in white, 3/4 oz.
Next, we gave Area 719 a try and picked up 17 more fish here by jigging.
Our last, and most productive, area was Area 074. We sat in one spot and boated exactly 42 fish in our last 80 minutes on the water. Mike really got the hang of the importance of adjusting your slab to an appropriate depth and working it very carefully. He must have said a dozen times (concerning his previous attempts at fishing), “Man, I have been doing this all wrong!!”. Well, he did it right at this last spot and added more than his fair share to our total.
When everything was said and done, we had boated exactly 90 fish, every single one of which was a white bass today.
TALLY = 90 Fish
TODAY’S CONDITIONS:
Start Time: 7:15a
End Time: 12:15p
Air Temp: 53F at trip’s start.
Water Surface Temp: 57-58F
Wind: SE8-10.
Skies: Soupy grey and heavily overcast to the point of drizzle.