March Madness has begun

[Jim Uran]

Fishing is getting hot, and Ill be using this thread as my blog for the month. stay tuned heading out this afternoon!

[dan z]

Sweet I'll be chasing this thread till ice out. I'll add that the madness has began for me also.

[Jim Uran]

Last night I went fishing with a buddy of mine, Jake.. We have been trying to get out and hit the ice together for a bit. I was on a decent bite and invited him up to fish for the afternoon after church. We met at the landing and went out to chase some panfish. There was a pretty stiff wind out of the southeast that managed to catch up and freeze out the hands after a half hour of solid reeling up and taking off fish. Good thing we each had our portables and heaters, he was rocking the Clam Kenai, and I was rocking the Clam Scout TC.... Great shacks for this type of fishing. Lots of gills were iced yesterday, it seemed the hot time was 3-5, which basically was non stop action

We were fishing the edge of a huge main lake flat, right at the edge of the basin, and the fish were nailing my pink tungsten jig and a waxie, we also caught a few bonus crappies... 15-16 fow was the ticket

Here is Jake with a dandy slab crappie.

9"+ gill

[Jim Uran]

Tonights trip produced some nice gills, and obviously some small ones too! It is nice to get out and fish after work, the days are getting longer, and the fish are getting hungrier.... Check this video out from tonights actions!

Watch more videos here at HSOshow

[bbfenatic]

Great Job Jim!!!! Fires me up for what is to come in the next 3-4 weeks.

Thx for sharing.

[leech~~]

Jim, do you guide? I would like to get into some nice Crappies somewhere?

[Jim Uran]

No guiding yet! Maybe next year!!!

[Jim Uran]

Took a trip to a different lake yesterday, too much snow and Im too out of shape so it didnt pan out well lol. So I went to a familiar spot at about 8:00 drilled one hole in 23 fow and caught 9" crappies for about an hour and a half and called it a night. Here is one of them little dudes.

[Jim Uran]

Had a couple hour window after work today so I tool full advantage of it. What a beautiful day to be on the water, storm approaching, zero wind, and the fish were hopping. 15 fow, and used plastics, waxies, a Lindy Darter and caught some quality fish. What a trip it turned out to be. Have some pics and video Ill be posting later.

[amateurfishing]

15 & 23 FOW...are they suspended? thought everyone saying they are much shallower this time of year....

[Jim Uran]

Shallow is relevent to the lake you are fishing. You will still catch crappies over those midlake basins after dark, suspended. And the fish I caught tonight in 15 fow were all over the water column.

[Jim Uran]

Here is a video I shot and edited tonight!! The adventure will continue tomorrow!

Watch more videos here at HSOshow

[Radar Randy]

Looks like fun. Quality pannies from that lake. Keep the videos comin man. I'll make one myself next week if the crappie fishin is what I expect. Headin to grand rapids area. GOOD FICHIN !!!

[Huntin&Fishin]

Great video Jim!

[Jim Uran]

Well Saturday I woke up too lazy to hit the ice early, so I sat around and did nothing for a while. After a bite like the day before I had to get back out at some point Saturday. So bbfenatic (Detroit Lakes moderator) and I decided we would give it a whirl up in my neck of the woods, we hit the lake at about 1:something, and he caught a few decent gills right away, and then it slowed for a while, but eventually it picked back up and we nailed the gills pretty good

Here is a dandy that he caught, we caught quite a few hovering around the 9" mark, but this one was the biggest of the day. Heck this might be the second biggest of the day, I swear he caught one that was 9.75" maybe it's on my other camera.

We also caught a few smaller crappies until dark. Then the tanks showed up lol..

Here is a beastly 14.5"er that slowly worked his way up a couple of feet to hit a green glow demon and a crappie minnow.

We caught some dandy crappies that evening, but nothing in numbers. They weren't overly aggressive by any means but it was definitely fun getting out to fish. Cold front day today, so I went to church this morning, and cruised to bemidji afterwards to spend some money that I don't have lol. Fishing tomorrow evening most likely!

[Jim Uran]

Well tonight I never intended to fish, I got home from work, crashed out like a black lab curled up on the couch and woke up at 6:30... Wow I must have needed that lol. I farted around for a while and said, hey, I'm heading to a crappie hole. That's what's nice about having my Scout TC rigged up and ready to go. I have the heater mounted in the tub, I have my Firebrite LED's and a charged battery ready to go for light. Basically all I have to do is drill a hole flop my Scout over and I'm ready to rock n roll!

Tonight I did just that, I drilled a hole dropped the Vexilar transducer in the hole and marked a couple of fish, it basically turned into a christmas tree after about a half n hour, and fishing was pretty much non stop for two hours. Mostly small fish, 9" crappies. But an occasional 11 incher would come rolling in and get whacked. It seems as though it's about every tenth fish or so is a decent one. They all went back into the lake anyways. Most of the fish were caught on a Northland Mooska, and an Impulse 1" tapeworm.

[Jim Uran]

Thursday night, we had an awesome day of weather and a front moving in from the west tonight, last time I fished before the front the fishing was insane, and tonight was no different. I stayed in shallow water after catching some monster bluegills, I stayed in shallow to target HUGE crappies that have been moving in to the shallower water to gorge themselves with.... with something, heck I don't know. But they seem to move in shallow at twilight and if I were to move out deeper I could get into more crappies, but just not the quality size. OPS Flutter Jig, and the Lindy darter proved AGAIN to be the great one two punch!

This gill went 9.75"

This crappie went 14" and fell victim to the OPS Flutter jig....

[derek5]

Nice fish! Cant wait to head north soon when and if it ever warms up a little. Fishing has been alright around the metro, but up north is hard to beat.

[Jim Uran]

What do you folks want to see in a video?? Constructive criticism is more than welcome please!

[monstermoose78]

I would like to see how you are working your jig before the bite. I think it would be help for people who dont chase panfish as hard as you Jim. More and bigger gills! LOL. I feel you have been doing a great job so far. It would be cool to get some underwater footage as well.

[Jim Uran]

Hey great idea monstermoose! I will definitely incorporate that into my next video. I have an aqua vu micro that was formatted to record video but my dvr went screwy on me. That is something I will have to look for next year. But I can get some shots of my jig/combo in the water showing how I work it.

Here is some of last nights action. I have more that I shot, and will edit up the night shift sometime this weekend.

Watch more videos here at HSOshow

[monstermoose78]

Great video Jim!

[Jim Uran]

The night shift as promised....

Watch more videos here at HSOshow

[amateurfishing]

another great video Jim, keep the vids coming, i really enjoy them. i was out most afternoon trying to take advantage of pre storm time, found all fish in 15FOW, sunnies, gills,n perch. I was nailin 10-12 inch crappies mid march, cannot findem with a search light now, any thoughts? BTW i had a blast with all the dinks, just no dinner.

[Jim Uran]

Amateurfishing, I'd say check up a little closer, or move along the break. Not sure if you are fishing a basin, or the depth of the lake you are fishing so it's hard to tell you where to try?!?!?

Well I definitely got some fishing in over the weekend, had some friends come up and nail some fish. We did pretty well over the weekend despite the wicked weather rolling through. Lots of big bluegills and big crappies were yanked through the hole, not too many pics were taken, it was too windy and cold to get any good photos of the fish before releasing them. I haven't been out since Sunday and I am starting to get the itch again... BAD

Here is Peter, (fisherdog19) with a 9 3/4" Bluegill