Christening New Tackle

Rich, Chabil & the Unknown Fisherman were my guests today, hoping to catch a few good smallies. I too was looking forward to seeing what would happen after the big blow yesterday. The north wind we were seeing this morning was much better than what we had yesterday!

I headed out in a decent chop and very overcast skies, to get to where I wanted to begin. I had decided that they would be covering water and all throwing blades to get the job done! With the wind blowing pretty good on this area, I was sure that it wouldn’t take long before the first fish would bite!

They were all informed that we were looking for only big bass where we were and the spot didn’t disappoint! The Unknown Fisherman was first to lock up and it was a really good fish. I don’t think he was ready for the strike when it nailed him 20 feet from the boat, but it was sure welcomed! He had also christened his new baitcaster making it even sweeter! This was a great way to get the day started and I shot a few pics of just the fish as he didn’t want to be photo’d.

We continued along after the release and Rich was soon into another really great bass of his own. He also nailed a couple of others soon afterwards as I remained in the anchor mode position. We were covering the water slowly, trying to monopolize on every fish that we could and it seemed to be working. Chabil was the only one without a bass yet but not for lack of trying. They all had a few others bump their lures without getting pinned and I decided to switch up the baits to try and refine the area.

I made a demo cast for Chabil with a soft plastic and immediately set into a quality bass. He should have no problem after that! Rich was on a drop shot now and also hooked up on practically his first cast. The unknown fisherman was tossing a jig and was quickly into a fish of his own and to everyone’s surprise, it wasn’t a bass. Instead he was providing me with dinner as the walleye came aboard. Nobody wanted it so I gladly livewelled his catch for later tonight.

The change up to refine the area really seemed to be working as more fish were coming in the boat now and even Chabil was catching. Rich was just hammering the bass on the drop shot rig and the unknown kept catching walleye on the jig. He even managed to put another keeper in the boat for me!

We had remained in the same area for several hours and many a fish was landed. Eventually it just slowed down though and I decided that we should make a move. We were off to another area and hopefully more fish!

With the water temps finally starting to drop, I decided to try a couple of fall spots where the fish tend to school up. To my surprise, Chabil was the only one to catch a bass from there and I didn’t stay long. Close by he almost added another, but it never really got pinned and was gone almost instantly.

I moved in much shallower and Rich managed to get a couple of bites, but only landing one of his fish. We continued the move and set up on a point extension only to have several smaller fish landed from here. Time to change areas again!

The unknown fisherman had managed to backlash his baitcaster earlier in the day and although it took a while, I was finally able to free the mess. He was back in business once again! With everything working fine, he went back to casting the blade and in no time, was into another beast! I anchored up the boat with the electric and they fan casted the area, hoping for a few more. Looks like this was a lone wolf, as they never had another touch after that!

We had covered plenty of shallow water in hopes of more bites, but I soon realized that it just wasn’t going to happen. I set up a couple more rods with a drop shot and headed to a deeper section to try and get more fish.

This place was on a current break and they managed to get into a few more bass. Although nothing big, at least it was action! With time just about done, I headed to one more spot to see if they could finish with a bang. It was here that the unknown guy christened his new drop shot rod with a really good bass. Unfortunately that was all she wrote and we were done for the day!

This proved to be a great day for these three with several firsts occurring. Both the unknown guy and Chabil had managed to christen their new rods with some quality bass. Everyone had landed many good fish and learned plenty in the process! I was even taking a couple of keeper walleye home for dinner. Who could ask for anything more!