Insane Feeding Frenzy

September 14th 2018

 

Patrick was with me today in hopes of getting into some great smallmouth fishing. He said that he wouldn’t mind catching walleye either and would be happy with either. No problem, I aim to please!

We headed to an open water flat and drop shotted it for about a half hour, but without any success. I idled over the area and despite seeing a few fish present, they didn’t want to bite. I eventually went to an area I hadn’t fished in several weeks looking for some smallies but this place only coughed up one decent bass. It did however put the first walleye in the boat for him to bring home tonight.

I didn’t waste long moving to another area and this time the bass cooperated! We had started on a drop and Patrick managed a couple of nice ones but then it got crazy. I could see further off in the distance fish busting the surface and raced over with the electric motor on high. No sooner had we arrived and they stopped. Patrick made one cast and was instantly rewarded with a nice smallie on the end of his line. They may have stopped feeding on the surface but they were still here! For almost 2 hours we had active fish and he boated all kinds of huge bass. Although there were plenty of misses and lost fish, there were also many landed! We couldn’t have asked for a better way to get the day started!

Eventually all good things must come to an end though and the feeding fish were done! We had seen them busting bait and were in the right place at the right time to take advantage of the frenzy. It was just insane!

I moved to another rocky area when the action stopped and covered more shallow water. Although there weren’t nearly as many fish here, we still managed to get into some real quality ones again. There were small pods of fish that aggressively chased our baits and some of them even ate. I tried several places close by and we picked at the bass on each and every one. Eventually we just ran out of areas and I decided to make a long run to another place that I hadn’t fished all season.

When I arrived, it didn’t take long for me to realize that it was dead. In fact, it didn’t look anything like what I remembered and 5 minutes in, we were out!

I stopped on a weed line for our next spot and despite working it for a while, we only managed a couple of bass and one small sturgeon that was accidentally snagged in the snout!

The next spot however put several fish in the boat. A combination of bass & walleye were landed here and Patrick even managed to get the three he wanted to bring home for dinner. We released the others to be caught again another day!

With time getting on, I decided one last move was in order and headed to another smallie spot further away. It was here that Patrick put his last photo fish in the boat. It was another quality smallie and definitely worthy of another pic. I also managed to pick up a few others and between the two of us, we had plenty of chances in the end.

Today was everything he had hoped for with the insane action in the morning and fish throughout the day. It’s always nice when the fish cooperate too! Patrick had landed some huge bass today and saw what a feeding frenzy was all about. All I know is that he had plenty of practice setting hooks and playing big bass! I only hope the weather gets a little cooler in the coming weeks so that this can become a normal thing instead of a hit and miss. The fall period is almost upon us but you wouldn’t know it with the weather lately. It seems that summer just doesn’t want to leave. Hopefully this will mean a longer fall and that I’ll be able to fish right into December again this year! Crossing my fingers and toes!!