I was back on the water again today with Tim and oh, how he got em! We began our day around 11:00 AM and had to break the ice at the boat ramp in order to go fishing. The air had warmed to the freezing mark when we began, but the winds were still blowing strong. Today however, they were coming in from the NE again, contrary to the weather report and we had very similar conditions to yesterday. The water had lost another degree or so and was down to 46 at the best of times causing the fish to become really lethargic. We had lots of them just picking up the jigs and not getting hooked when we set into them. One of the areas fortunately produced only big fish averaging 4 pounds or more. There were also several over 5 pounds and a couple in the high fives. Tim had a blast hooking, losing and hooking the same fish again on several of his casts. Some of these fish were just so aggressive when the moon was rising that it was like you couldn’t do anything wrong. If you missed a fish, just stop the retrieve and wait a couple of seconds until he had it again. We stuck it out right till the last few minutes before the sun went down and then headed back to the ramp to take out. I was amazed to see my Hamby Keel Protector ripped to shreds when I pulled the boat out of the water. It must have torn from breaking the ice on the way out, but they are made of Kevlar and shouldn’t tear like that, so I thought! I have another friend that breaks ice twice that thick every fall for the past 3 years and doesn’t have a scratch to show! Oh well, the perfect end to an almost perfect day!!

I had to cancel yesterday’s attempt at hitting the water due to tremendous, high winds and was back out today with Tim & Mike for more jumbino smallies. We hit the water a little later than I had hoped for with the cold overnight temps and were into fish almost immediately. Winds were suppose to be from the SW at 15 to 20 knots but looked and felt more like the NW by the waves we were in. Water temps went 47 degrees in most areas and the air temps were about 37 degrees at best. Thanks to the bluebird skies and sunshine, it was cold but toleratable. Mike had the hot hand today, catching smallies up to 5.5 pounds, all on tube jigs. I spent the better part of the time just trying to keep good boat control in these conditions so that both of them would be able to fish effectively. Tim did manage to get a number of quality fish as well, up to 5 pounds and I even caught a few too! In the 4 or 5 short hours we were out, there were probably 30 smallmouth bass landed and plenty of others lost. It wasn’t a great day, but it was definitely a pretty good one with big, fat fish for the photo shoot at the end of the day! All in all a good one nonetheless!

Darrin & I were back on the water again today for what we hoped was to be another Multi Species kind of day. This time however we were to spend a little more time trying to catch a Muskie and with any luck, we would succeed! Unlike the weekend weather, today felt more like Florida with the 50 plus degree temperatures we were having. There was no ice to break with the boat today as we made our way out to the lake from the boat launch and this was a plus! We began fishing about 11:00 AM and got into some nice bass rather quickly, but not the numbers we had thought we would. With the water temps remaining about the same as Sunday at just over 49 degrees, not much had changed. We did however have a pretty strong wind from the W and I thought this would have helped us somewhat more than it really did. By moving around we were able to find one area with a better concentration of fish and managed to get into about 25 or so smallies up to almost 5 pounds before we called it quits and began trolling for Muskie elsewhere. The conditions were absolutely perfect looking and we were taking advantage of the afternoon major at 1:30 PM when we began our troll. We tried several areas and marked some fish in as deep as 34 feet, but were never able to get the rods to fire. These fish were glued to the bottom and didn’t have any interest in moving to take a lure. At one point I trolled about 8 times over the same fish just trying to piss him off and it just backfired. We could have stopped this lure washing disaster and gone back for more smallmouth, but both of us thought we would eventually score, so we kept on. We kept on so long that we trolled right into the dark, still marking fish and with the same success. The temperatures were so warm that even once the sun went down, it still felt comfortable. It was too bad that we hadn’t had a single pull as this seemed like the perfect trolling conditions for a score. I know it was just right for us, but apparently not for the elusive ski!! All in all a pretty enjoyable day, nonetheless!!

Darrin & Blaine joined me today on a local lake for a mixed bag kind of day. They met me at my house around 7:30 AM and by the time we had done everything and gotten to the water to fish, it was almost 9:30 AM. Once again, there was no need in jumping out too early, as the night temps were way too cold to start out earlier than we had done. It had gotten so cold overnight that we had to break ice with the boat as we idled out to the lake to fish. This is typical for this time of the year and it hadn’t surprised me at all! The day was another sunny one and without any wind most of the time, felt like it was over 50 degrees in some areas when we fished. I had been wearing a survival suit lately and was beginning to second-guess myself on this day! I actually had to peel it down to my waist a few times to cool off. It was a little while before anyone hooked up, but Blaine managed to get the first one into the boat and it was a real beauty of 4.5 pounds and almost 20 inches long. These fish are so fat at this time of the year that they resemble a pre spawn smallie from the earlier months in the season. Once more, tubes were going to be what was needed to entice these fish into biting again today and it was to be a real slow bite. I think there were more missed strikes today than actual landed fish and I had many of them as well. We definitely saw the big bruisers, but with clear water, high sunshine and no wind, they were reluctant to bite our offerings. I had to vacate the mid range water and go deep in order to get bit, but the fish were a little on the smaller side when I did. Most of the larger bass were in 4 to 8 feet of water and cruising through the weeds and rocks but absolutely inactive most overall. It’s not that we didn’t catch them, it’s that we didn’t crush them! Darrin & Blaine were both into fish but 2 to 3.5 pounds most of the time. They caught a few over 4 pounds but nothing over 5 today and that was surprising. Darrin even managed to get a nice walleye over 4 pounds and a really jumbino perch that were to become dinner later. We picked at the bass all day long and caught many medium sized fish in 12 to 15 feet of water with tubes along with the occasional larger one but opted for a change. Around 3:00 PM we decided to close shop on the smallies and began to troll and see if we could get into a Muskie. Unfortunately after an hour and a half or so without a touch, we called it quits and headed home. All in all it was a decent day but below the calibre that I am so accustomed to at this time of the season. Regardless, there were still 40 or 50 smallies caught and that’s still a pretty good day for anyone!!!

I was back on the water again this morning, once more at the crack of 11! It was really too cold last night to be racing out in pursuit of fish that would bite just as well when you could actually have feeling in your hands. Alain & his girlfriend Cindy, as well as my wife, Christiane joined me today for some incredible smallmouth bass action. The water temps had gone down once more with all the cold nights we had been experiencing and were now a little over 49 degrees at best. This didn’t seem to matter as Christiane locked up on just her second cast. It turned out to be a really nice fish of 4.5 pounds or better as I netted it and put him in the livewell. We would be taking pics later and wanted to keep a few of the larger ones for the shoot. Although it may have been sunny, the winds were from the NE at 10 to 20 knots and that just felt cold. It might have reached 38 or 40 degrees again today but the wind chill had the temps more like 28 or 30 degrees max. We managed to get into lots of really quality sized; smallies today with probably close to a dozen in the 20-inch size. There were 5 bass that would have gone 5 pounds or better and an uncountable amount of 19 inch fish over 4 pounds as well. Even with the crappy conditions, the fishing was great! Everyone caught lots of big fish and we ended up with over 50 bass total by days end. This is pretty good considering we only spent about 5 hours on the water today!