Dead Calm Conditions

November 1st 2018

 

A last minute outing had Darren & I fishing locally for bass & walleye. We were doing a half day and meeting around 10:00. Flat calm conditions greeted us for the ride as we headed across the lake to fish.

I had hoped to be the only one in the area but with weather like this, wasn’t surprised to see other boats out. It wasn’t raining and the lake was a mirror causing many others to take advantage of the tiny window we had been having lately.

We began by slow trolling an area that had been producing, but weren’t fortunate enough to have any hits. After almost an hour of washing lures, I moved slightly shallower and immediately got into a few smallies. They weren’t walleye but they were good fish!

I kept searching for gold and eventually Darren locked up on a nice one in the same area. As soon s he released the over, two other boats started to get closer. They eventually were trolling so close that I just pulled the plug and left the spot all together. I can’t believe this shit is still happening!

We made a long run and settled on a deep rock pile that should have produced more. My first cast had me locked up with a nice smallie on a drop shot and I thought we were going to just hammer them. Darren’s first cast in the same area did exactly the same, but unfortunately his fish came off soon after. It seemed like they were here but that was all she wrote! We tried for about 30 minutes longer without even another bite. Time to relocate once again!

I hadn’t moved far but was searching the area, looking for bait and fish. With water temps still around 47 degrees, there wasn’t much. Eventually I came across an old waypoint that had held fish in the past and we made a few casts to it. Almost immediately I was locked up on a walleye and it turned out to be nice keeper too. Once again though, we never saw another fish and decided to move!

I ran back to the area I had left because of the other two boats and was marking some good fish. It wasn’t long before we were into another really nice smallie from this flat. If I could have remained here earlier I know that we would have done very well. Too bad we had to leave so as not to educate the other two boats!

After making a few passes, I decided to try drop shotting the same place and hooked another walleye on the third cast. These fish were here but not really biting well in the flat calm conditions we had. We covered a good amount of water afterwards but never really had another bite. I thought we would try one last troll and managed another smallie before just pulling out all together. We would attempt to hit one last open water weed flat to see if anything was there.

When I arrived I kind of knew what we were going to see but idled over the area regardless. It was pretty bare with only small amounts of vegetation remaining and not much sign of life. Flat water always does this and I wasn’t surprised to see it looking like a ghost town! We tried regardless but not for more than about 5 minutes before we were done.

Although we did manage to boat some nice fish, the flat calm conditions weren’t really helpful. One day earlier I would have been happy to see this as I could have fished sturgeon. Today, not so much! Despite everything, it still was great to be able to get out on the water without a hurricane or monsoon. Lately that’s all I have seen and some days, both at the same time! I know the weather will be back to its old tricks again tomorrow and I will have both wind and rain to enjoy. I guess I should just be grateful for having at least one day without being tortured. I know there will be plenty more not so pleasant ones ahead in the remaining weeks to come!!