Spent the day with my good buddy Andy this past Tuesday. Ventured back to the lake that coughed up the 4lb 11oz largie from last week, and both of us had high hopes for some good action.
Launched the boat at 8:30am to calm conditions and a mix of sun and clouds. Headed to a shoreline that has produced some fish in the past and began tossing shallow cranks and Senko's. Worked this sand/weed/rock area for 30 minutes without a hit or a spotted fish. I took this as a bad omen. As I've said before - this lake really frustrates me. I know it holds big fish, but finding them can often be a struggle. I hoped this wouldn't be one of those days....
Decided to cruise out from shore and check out some humps. Found two that went from 40 feet and crested out at 18. Marked some good fish and tossed out a buoy. After working tubes, craws and jigs for some time - again without a bite - I figured it was time to head to the shallows and work over some docks and laydowns.
Found some pad beds that looked promising but no one was home....although we did see a chunk of a largie casually swimming out in the open, with her nose turned up at the offerings with presented her with. After that, we hit a shoreline that had a few laydowns with slop pushed up to them. As I was re-tying my jig, I mentioned to Andy to take a few pitches at one promising tree. With my back turned, I hear the "swish" of a rod slicing through the air on a hookset, but half-way through an all-mighty "crack." I look up to see Andy holding half of his flipping rod while fighting a fish on the other end! With a bit of a struggle, we get the girl in the net. Beauty of a fish at 4lbs even.....as for Andy's six-month old Shimano stick - not so pretty.
This pic says it all....
Luckily, I had a spare Kistler to loan out for the rest of the day...
Hit a variety of docks shorly after and managed to put two other fish in the boat...both between two and three pounds. My docks that produced fish from last time held nothing. With the clock reading past noon, and only three fish in the boat, we made the decision to pull the boat out and launch on a section of the Rideau for the afternoon. Before doing that, we fish a stretch of pads near the launch that produced a decent largie for me on a frog. With that, I rubbed the skunk smell off my body..
We were on a section of the Rideau by 1:30pm and headed straight to the undercut cane. The first fish was in the boat almost immediately. Although this section has a great population of fish, getting a fish over 4lbs doesn't happen with much regularity. Saying that, it is a super fun stretch to fish. We continue along the cane/slop and put a bunch more fish in the boat...we also miss quite a few. At this point the wind begins to howl, and boat control is beginning to be a chore. I suggest we run up the river and work over some pads/slop. Sadly, not a whole lot of action there.
I motor the boat over to a shoreline that has some great looking laydowns/slop, and we begin pitching jigs to them. A couple more small fish, and then I set the hook into this chunk. Say her come out from the slop/tree and suck the jig in before it reached bottom...
She tipped the scale at 3lb 15oz's and had one of the biggest bellies I've laid eyes on. My guess is a frog in there, but who knows..
With the wind howling now and some ominous storm clouds appearing overhead, we decided to pull the plug on our adventure. All in all it was a fun day, but we just couldn't put a decent pattern together. One of those "one fish per spot" types of deals, with areas that looked productive holding few. But, that's what I love about this sport - figuring the fish out.
Well, one more week of hitting the water before I head in for surgery to have my appendix removed. August will be fairly void of fishing, but look out come September...
Until next time...
Good Fishing,
Justin
