About 1015 this morning, I thought my morning really was getting off with a bang. I was working a submerged log in the vicinity of marker No. 9, when something big crushed my Thin N. The battle only lasted about 60 seconds, but it was wild. From the moment the fish slammed my crankbait, he was on a dead run, heading for open water in the opposite direction I was moving. Then, just as fast as it happened, my line went limp.
I probably should explain here that, for a very long time now, I've always cut off one barb on all my treble hooks to make my lures more weedless, and the hooks on this Thin N were no exception. When I reeled in the crankbait from this event, one of the two barbs on the front hook was completely gone, and both barbs on the rear hook were nearly straightened. I have every reason to believe the fish likely was a nice striper, based on the single scale about the size of a quarter that was hanging from one of the barbs on the rear hook.
Unfortunately, the rest of the day was tame, compared to the episode I just described. The 1-10 in the picture above was my best fish of the day to come aboard. I also had one that was 12 inches. Two more were just dinks.
My only two productive lures today were the Thin N and chatterbait in the photo to the left. They each accounted for two fish. However, I lost two more fish en route to the boat on the chatterbait, and I had two others bump the chatterbait without getting hooked up. Today was the first time in more than a year that I've caught any fish on a chatterbait. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I can entice a few more into jumping on it before all is said and done.
I had the parking lot all to myself when I started this morning, but Chris Fretard joined me an hour or so later. We stopped and chatted a couple of times. The last I knew, Chris had boated two fish: one on a spinnerbait and one on a worm. He still was fishing above the bridge when I called it quits, so I'm not sure what his total was today. Perhaps I'll get an email from him later. If so, I'll attach an update to this report.
The water temp when I left the ramp this morning was 53.2. Once again, I forgot to check it when I came in, so that's my bad.
There was plenty of water all day, but the level was dropping, and as long as these north and northeast winds continue, it'll keep dropping. If I can believe the weather forecasts, it'll probably be Friday before the winds switch around to a favorable direction. With a little luck, I plan to try getting back out Saturday.
According to the email update I received from Chris Fretard, he ended up with six fish today: five bass and one yellow perch. The first dink was caught on a spinnerbait, on his third cast of the day. The rest of his fish came off a Texas-rigged worm twitched between the transition zone of 2 and 5 feet. His best bass of the day weighed 2-9; his second best weighed 2 even. The rest were dinks, including the smallest of them all--a 7-inch perch. As Chris constantly reminds his partner, "Big fish are easy to hook. It takes real skill to catch small fish."
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