High Number Hookup Day

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I had two groups today with the morning trip focussing primarily on trolling for northern pike. Paval and his family enjoyed some great action for these toothy critters! His son, Daniel had a birthday and this was his wish. He wanted to go fishing and the four of them spent 4 hours landing many fish. His mother Oksan and sister Alice also contributed to the numbers. Alice had a rough time though because each time it was her turn, two fish were always lost before she landed the third. This even happened three times! Talk about the power of three!

Once we were done with the trolling, I decided to try a little drop shotting for the remaining hour or so and apparently it was a good idea. Several more fish were landed and most of them were bass. A couple of walleye also came aboard and one of them was actually in a pike’s mouth. I netted both of them as Paval actually had hooked the walleye. The pike didn’t even have the hook in its mouth!

I held out right till the last minute and Daniel finally caught a nice bass just before we had to leave! Back to the dock to drop the family off and pick up my afternoon clients!

Paul & his son Ryan came out with me and I headed right back to where I had just ended. No need to go searching for fish as I was already on good ones!

I set them up with a drop shot and showed them what to do. As we drifted over the deep flats, fish after fish were lost by both of them. Somehow they were dropping almost all the bass they were hooking into and some of them were definitely big! Once they got the hang of it however, they managed a double and were finally on the board. Too bad they went back to losing them again, right after!

I decided to spend the afternoon working the area with different passes as there were plenty of fish around. Multiple drifts had them hooking up constantly and although most were lost, some of them did make their way to the net. Both walleye and bass were targeted and both were landed!

We had started out in a SW wind that had the fish on fire and once it changed to a NW, the bite slowed and I had to search for the active fish again. Each pass saw some fish caught but most were either missed or just lost. My drifts were also shorter due to the winds pushing me away from my waypoints, causing me to reposition the boat often. It also made me drop the electric motor in just to keep the boat angled, so they could fish effectively!

The time flew by and before we knew it, the day was done. They had chances at 40 or more fish and managed to play with most of them, but only for a brief time. I saw many jump off as they tried to reel them in. Despite losing a huge percentage off fish, they both had a great time. In fact everyone today enjoyed their 4 hour trip and left completely satisfied.

It’s not always about the size or number of fish you catch, but rather the time you experience while fishing. Today was a perfect example of that as both groups now have great memories of their time on the water. They also have a couple of new techniques that may aid them in future outings. There’s even talk about returning for another trip in the future! Possibly for a much larger species of fish too! Only time will tell but I think I will be seeing them again before the season is done!