What's working now Open Water '07

[Oldtyme]

Don't know about MN but here in IN we'll be lucky if the lakes don't freeze up again.............

[Cyberfish]

Me and "Max" (juggs) did well today out in his boat, with crappies willing to almost jump in the boat, we were reeling em in almost every cast! Plastics were fantastic today I got most of my fish on the dragnmag, and on 2 and 3 inch power minnows. I was fishing in nine ft, about 5 to 7 feet down.

Max with a slab

MT and crappie

lots of nice fish...

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[Cyberfish]

Another nice day had me and max out on clearwater lake, it was not so clear though really dirty. there were tons of bluegills up shallow but they were really finicky. I put the smallest float on with the smallest lure I could find in my box, a 100th oz the jig with glo head and black and white hair. Jack tried a yellow flu-flu. He nailed one right away and started bragging , but that was the only bite he got! I proceeded to nail around thirty gills, some nice sized while max and all the other fishers around the bay just stared in disbelief. Then juggs switched to hair, but still couldn't get anything. I let him use my pole to get a few, and I switched his jig, he has a white one on, and they seemed to want black today. We switched back and he started pounding em too. toward the end of the evening we got a few nice crappies and bass mixed in, I even caught a golden shiner!

juggs and gill..

MT slabasaurus

more fish..

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[Matt Johnson]

I took my dad out for a good part of the day yesterday. We found most of our pannies in about 4-6 feet of water along the wind-blown side of the warmest bays. Mainlake surface temps were 47-49 and the back bays were darn near 52 (which is where a majority of the fish were congregating).

We worked Thill floats along the drift with a 1/32oz jig and Exide Micro Shad. Color wasn't all that important. Berkley Power Tubes and Power Minnows took a few fish too, but the smaller profiled Micro Shad seemed to work a little better. Also caught a few fish on twister tails.

The crappies were more out in the open, while the gills held closer to the weeds (very few greens, mostly brown and down). Water clarity was actually decent, and I think the wind helped with the bite because of visibility. Once the sun came out the bite slowed a bit in the shallows. Water warmed another degree or so, but the acitivity level dropped. Either way it was a great day to be on the water.

Looks like we have a couple more nice days, but the weekend is calling for some rain...

[Corey Bechtold]

Nice report Matt! Glad you finally got some time to get out in the boat.

My report is a little late but here goes...

I spent a lot of time fishing this weekend and learned a lot. One of the keys to success during the early open water season is paying attention to detail. On Friday I searched a local lake with no fish coming to the boat. The locator didn't show any and there weren't any fish that I could see shallow. It was a tough couple hours on the water but it was still a learning experience. One factor I noticed was the water temps never got over 41 degrees which may have had something to do with the fish being so inactive.

Saturday I was a little more hopeful. The sun was out longer and the water temps had a chance to rise. The lake had shallower bays that had a chance to warm faster turning on the fish. And that is exactly what happened. When we started fishing the water temps were around 43 degrees. Early in the afternoon the temps peaked out at 47 degrees turning on the fish like a switch. Cole started by catching a nice Crappie. Then another. I said if he caught another that I would have to switch to a Power Minnow. Guess what? He did it! 3 in a row and I was getting schooled by a 5 year old! Cole was having a ball so I switched baits and finally started catching fish. We fished Thill floats 2-3' down in 6' of water. Twitching the bobber to give the baits life seemed to trigger more strikes. At times setting the float a little deeper and slowly trolling the bait took some fish too. When the bite was going best it simply didn't matter what you did. They were just going nuts! This is the opportunity I look for where I can try out new baits or techniques. I tried those Bobby Garland Shad baits that I picked up at the Sport Show. I fished their Crystal Shad minnow bait and they worked dynamite! They have the same profile as the Power Minnows but there are some really interesting colors to choose from. Cole stayed with the Smelt Power Minnow fished on a 1/32oz White jighead. Cole had the bait outfitted on a 6'6" Fenwick HMG ML rod, Mitchell 308XGe reel, and 6lb Stren Magnathin line. The rod was perfect for Cole because he could take up a lot of line to get positive hooksets. I fished all kinds of rods that were rigged with different baits in a variety of colors. One rig that worked great was a 6'6" ML Lightning rod, Abu Garcia 301 reel with 2lb Crystal Fireline. The line casts awesome and gets solid hooksets. I am definately going to pick up some more Fireline Crystal for more applications. Here are a few pictures from the day...

Fish on!

Here it comes...

Cole with his fish.

Now getting back to business. Sunday I thought would be better since the weather was stable. I convinced Bailey and Brooke to come with Cole and me. We thought about hitting a different lake. The gamble didn't pay off as the only fish we saw in shallow were fish we didn't want to catch (Pike and Bass). The water temperatures were favorible (45-49 in the bays) but the Crappies weren't in at that time. It was fairly early in the day but the lake was extremely clear so my guess was that the fish might show up late in the day. Having 3 kids in the boat I wasn't able to be patient and wait for the fish to turn on so I thought about heading back to the lake Cole and I fished on Saturday. When we got to the lake things looked a lot different than the previous day. The lake was very dirty and there were lots of floating moss and weeds which made it very difficult to fish. Bailey did pick up a nice Crappie right away on a White Berkley Power Tube. We had decided to move to a different area since we had a hard time keeping the moss off our hooks. The kids thought it was a lot of fun to chase the turtles that were hanging out in the shallows so the fishing got put aside for a while. During our turtle hunting I was starting to see a lot of Bluegulls that were right under the surface. They weren't huge but the numbers were insane! While I tried to maneuver the boat near the turtles I tried to get some fish to bite. I caught quite a few Gills on the Power Tube but wished I would have had my fly rod with me. Between the turtles and fishing we saw another interesting site. There was a Carp that was being pushed by 3 Pike on one side while another larger Pike came up and hit the Carp from the other side. The Carp left the area and the 3 small Pike chased the larger one. My guess was that the Pike were still finishing up their spawn and they didn't want the Carp in their territory. If anyone understands what was really happening with those fish let me know. Like I said before, there is always something new to learn each time on the water. The day ended up fair at best. We picked up a few more Crappies, Sunfish, Bass and Pike. Lots of activity in the shallows but more activity in my boat. My kids had a blast chasing turtles, learning more about fish in their environment and how crazy spring can be.

I had a great weekend and really enjoyed my kids. I can't wait to get them out in the boat again! Here are a few more pics from the weekend...

Cole with an evening Bluegill.

Brooke nets Bailey's Crappie (I love her smile in this picture!).

Bailey's Crappie.

Turtle, Turtle!

Hopefully everyone is enjoying the beautiful weather and gets a chance to get out fishing.

Good fishing,

Corey Bechtold

[snoozebutton]

Nice report Corey and love the smiles in those pictures!!!

[Coach1310]

Great post Corey. Good to see some kids still like to get outside in this video game era. Cole poses like a professional angler the way he holds the fish, pushes it out and always has the rod/reel in the pic too! He must have had a great teacher!!! Good luck and go get some more this weekend

[clamtrap]

The kids learn from the best.There dad Great post jason

[Corey Bechtold]

Thanks for the responses! I'm just glad that the kids still like to hang out with their Dad.

I can't wait to get out again soon st see "What's Working".

Good luck this weekend,

Corey Bechtold

[united jigsticker]

Corey,

Call me in the morning.

Jeff

[Slyster]

Hey Corey.. call me too!

[united jigsticker]

Sorry, I better talk in code.

There is a big bite on ^$##!@ over by the $0*%^ @!#.

I'll meet you there at !(!

Jeff

[Ole the Guide]

Hey,

That's the exact location where my son and I were yesterday! We caught some nice ones. Biggest 14" and 14.5"....

The spring bite is on!!!

Ole

[Andrew Erickson]

today and yesterday we got about 20 crappies on countdowns

[TurnUpTheFishing]

Made it out to a metro lake this AM and the bite was going good. The bluegills were active in water about 2' and crappies where hanging out a little further out in about 4-5'. There was also alot of bass actively cruising the shallows and lots of suckers where shallow spawning. The fish were very spooky. they would scatter if I casted to close to them and I put on my camo rainsuit to help break up my profile.

I started with a 1" tube and got a few fish but switched to a berkly power nymph and did really well. The fish I got were in a sandy area that had scattered rocks in the sun and out of the wind.

Lots of gills in the 7-8.5" range, a few crappies and small bass also showed up.

All fish were Released....everyone please remember to release those big pannies!

Heres a few of the bigger ones.....

[Corey Bechtold]

Nice report!!!

I didn't get the chance to go fishing this weekend. Too much family stuff going on and then the weather turned to poo. Hopefully I can get out sometime during the week to see what's happening.

Good luck,

Corey Bechtold

[Cyberfish]

Got some nice panfish in my tube sunday afternoon, all on plastics in the shallows.

here are some good panfish I got...

[decoy]

Try a fly rod... Slow sinking wet flys are killer in the spring.

[united jigsticker]

Pelican Lake huh?

Slabs on Pelican lake aye?

Big bulls out on Pelican Lake on Sunday were there?

[tommyk]

Spent the weekend with the wife at my folks place up in Hayward, WI. I was expecting low water temps and a deeper weedline bite considering the last ice left the lake only a week before I got up there. Well, water was 53-55 degrees and the fish were in shallow left over weeds just outside and inside of a waterway flowing from another lake. The water level was low leaving only about 12 to 18" of water above the tops of the weeds in 3 to 5 feet of water. I began by casting an assortment of ice fishing plastics on a small white Diamond Jig tied to 2 pound line. It was a good way to pick off the agressive fish but even as light as an ice fishing jig is, I found that I had to retrive it a little too fast to keep from getting caught up in the weeds. To keep my presentation in the strike zone that the fish were looking for I fixed a small Thill Stealth float just about a foot above a Size 6 Gold/Pink Ratso. It wasn't typical bobber fishing like with live bait, but rather twitching the jig and float lightly for about two feet and pausing only long enough to let the jig fall straight down and repeating that until I was back to the boat. Most of the fish would hit on that pause, but a few would take it on the move and one even decided that he wanted to try to eat the float instead. Most fish measured right at 10" with a few 11" mixed in and one nice 12.5" slab.

The hot jig of the weekend ...

A few of the nicer ones from the weekend ...

A nice double (The crappies aren't bad lookin either ) ...

[Corey Bechtold]

Great report tommyk! Thanks for sharing your "What's working now" information. Paying attention to the little things really helps put fish in the boat.

I fished for a couple hours after work with a fellow employee. We hit a small backwater bay looking for the warmer water and some Crappies. We found both and they were pretty concentrated around the brush piles. I fished plastics and my friend fished minnows. Both worked but I was able to keep my bait in the water more as I didn't have to dip into the minnow bucket. I fished almost exactly like tommyk did. I used small horizontal jigheads (white) and Lindy Techni-Glow tails. I switched to a size 6 Ratso later because the fish destroyed my last tail. Fishing a small Thill float around the timber got the most attention. Twitching the bait or slowly cranking the bait in was the trigger for the Crappies. No real photo worthy fish tonight. Mostly 7"-11" fish. There were also a few accidental Bass that harassed us tonight. Some notes on the lake: Water clarity was less than 1'. Key depths were less than 2' down in 3' of water. Surface temps were 59 degrees.

I hope to get out again tomorrow with another buddy in search of some larger fish.

Good fishing,

Corey Bechtold

[FWA]

I hit up S Lindstrom Lake last Saturday morning with my brother and my son. After seeing me catch the 1st crappie of the day for our boat, my son proceeded to school my brother and I. Here was a dandy 4 pounder that slammed his Culprit paddletail. After a few photos, it was released... No real slabs for the day, but everyone had fun. We got off the lake just as the rain started to fall at around 11 AM. Pretty fun for our first outing this year!

[Cyberfish]

Wow, nice pic FWA! congrats to your son catching that big ol Largemouth!the smile says it all!

[palisade1kid]

I've been using small hair jigs to get these fish.

Right up against the shore when it get warmer outside & a bit deeper say 5-8 FOW when it gets cooler.

The 1st few came 3 days after the ice went out & then we drilled 30 on Sat.

None of them were huge.They all were in that 10-111 inch range.

Their colors are really pretty.

The bass have moved in so while we are searching for slabs & bulls we are running into these bucketmouths.

As you can see they are running 2-2.5 lbs.which is not big but boy do they put a load on my UL.gear.

[ozzie]

nice to see you on the forum crappiekeith. hope to read about the bite and see more of those slabs.....again Welcome to FM