Learned a New Way to Fish a Popper

It wasn't a "hot" topwater bite today, but at least I managed to slow down my retrieve enough to finally catch some fish with one. It wasn't just a matter of slowing down, though. The fish wouldn't have anything to do with a popper fished the conventional way, so I had to improvise. I finally found that if I could keep the bait in one spot and just wiggle it ever so slightly, with some pauses thrown in between some of the wiggles, a few fish ultimately would attack my offering.

The best fish I could muster with the wiggling popper was a 2-10 that really crushed my bait.  I knew from the git-go, it was a decent fish, cause he was slipping some drag, and I could feel him shaking his head for all he was worth, too. When I finally got the fish inside the boat, he was bleeding profusely. A quick inspection revealed that he initially had gotten the hook in his gill plates, and as a result of all his efforts to shake free, the hook had torn out of his gill plates and snagged the lip.

I doubted the fish would survive his ordeal, but when I eased him back into the water, he wasted no time getting away from the boat. I sat and watched the area for a few minutes to see if he would go belly up, but that never happened, at least not in the immediate surroundings.

Also hooked a dink with the popper; he only swirled under the bait but got too close to the pointy things.

Further went on to boat a 3-5 and two more dinks today on a spinnerbait.

Talked to Skip, who was out today as well, and learned that he caught a total of seven fish (see representative photos below) on a fluke. Said his biggest would have gone about 2 pounds.

Plan to try getting another day on the water next week, prior to the next open tournament on Sunday, May 21. Will likely continue trying to refine my wiggling-popper technique.