A Variety of Techniques

Sabrina treated her boyfriend Andre to a day on the water, for a birthday gift and this was the day. We headed out at the usual time and directly to another area to troll. I wanted to get them into good fish as quickly as I could!

With the lines in, only minutes passed before the first pike appeared. Andre brought to net a small northern, but it was only the start. Surely they would get bigger!

The next pike was also on the small side, but at least the fish were biting where we were. I knew it was only a matter of time before they would be into some walleye and covered the water in anticipation.

Sabrina was up again when the down rod screamed and I could tell by the way it was fighting, this was the one! It was staying down and did so, all the way to the boat! I netted her fish and also knew that it was going to be too long to keep. After a few pics, she was released unharmed to fight another day!

Many more pike were caught by both, including a nice double, before Andre was into his first walleye. It was while Sabrina was doing battle with another fish, but unfortunately the hooks pulled out before I could net it. Too bad too, because it was big!

We continued the troll and picked at the fish for a few hours, before it finally it happened! Andre was officially into a nice walleye that fought him all the way to the boat. Once in the net, the hooks just fell out. I guess I netted it just in time!

When the action died where we were I decided to make a long run to see if they could get into some bass. I wasn’t sure if I was going to go shallow or deep, but opted for the shallow waters fist.

I had both of them throwing soft plastics and they had many bites in the time we spent here. Although new to them, the presentation was working and eventually they got into the rhythm. They both missed and lost plenty of fish, but they still managed to bring many decent bass into the boat. Andre even landed a small sturgeon from this area as well.

With only a couple of hours remaining in the day, I decided to try for a few more walleye before we were done. Drop shotting was up next and although we didn’t catch anything on our first spot, I definitely marked plenty of fish. The high sun and flat calm conditions seemed to have these fish in a really negative mood and it was showing. The perch were hitting our offerings but the baits were too big for them to even get in their mouths. Time to make another move!

I had brought the sturgeon rods in hopes of anchoring up somewhere, but never really found a good looking spot to fish. In fact, very few of them were even jumping, anywhere on the lake! I had to eventually settle for a deep reef and hope to get into a few more bass or walleye.

Andre was tight to a big bass almost as fast as we stopped, but it threw the hook when taking to the air. Too bad as it was definitely the best one of the day! He quickly followed it up with another bass loss when the second one pulled free during the battle. His luck continued too as the next couple of fish did exactly the same! Sabrina managed to catch a couple of smallies on one of the many drifts we made and we brought another good keeper walleye and a couple of unders in the boat as well. At least they had two in the livewell now, making for a great meal tonight!

The time had passed by so fast today with all the running around we did but they had caught fish. They had also learned a few new techniques that hopefully would come in handy when fishing on their own. Without realizing it, both had slammed as well with the three species they caught! All in all, it was a pretty good day!