New day, new question! When on the average does the spring spawn begin?
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New day, new question! When on the average does the spring spawn begin?
I'll let you know next spring. :)
This is my first year fishing crappie at Lochloosa and we started in the summer.
Tom
Another day (yesterday) on Lochloosa.
We caught 53 and kept 18. We are only keeping 12" or larger fish. Again, the fish are scattered and it took us about 6 dozen minnows to start finding the better fish and we used 5 dozen after that. We had a LOT of stolen baits and a few gar attacks.
Pretty high winds all day too.
One odd thing that happened that people that have an ECO Crappie net might need to be aware of. My fishing buddy Don had a huge crappie that I netted for him. As I started hand-over-handing back the long net handle, the crappie literally flipped itself out of the net and back in the lake. The sinker had gone through one of the net holes, caught on the rubber netting and the fish used that leverage to pop the light line and flip out of the net. The ECO net is a shallow, bowl-shaped net with a flat bottom. The fish had no trouble flipping right out.
Lochloosa water level is dropping again.
Don has a new favorite color now... hot pink. He did better on that color than on anything else we pushed all day. I did fine on my regular patterns and actually caught more fish, but he was catching a higher percentage of keepers than I was.
Tom
T om,
I have noticed that you do some trolling. I was wondering if you have tried Bobby Garlands new Stroll'R? It was designed to give alot of action when slow trolling. I work at Bobby Garland and was just curious if you had seen it or given it a try? I know they carry it at Lochloosa Harbor.
I have not tried that yet. Except for two poles that we run as 'way backs' we always use minnows with our jigs so we stay away from curlytails and such.
On the long lines we run on the two back poles, we just use a wooly type 1/32 ounce jig I tie myself. I prefer tied jigs on the long lines rather than tubes or other plastics. The tied jigs hold up better when they hit weeds and stuff.
Tom
Ok I thought I would ask. Sounds like what your doing is working didn't know what all different techniques you use.
Another day on Lochloosa yesterday.
We got over 50 but only three were what we consider "keepers". We do not keep anything under 12 inches and yesterday we caught a bunch just short of that and some very small ones. The largest was 1 pound 9 ounces.
We are doing the same thing we always do... cover lots of water pushing jigs with minnows.
Tom
PS: Had some excitement when we got ready to go home. Truck (Ford 350 diesel) started fine when we pulled out the boat. We pulled out, shut it down and started doing the normal "get ready to leave" stuff with the tie-downs, etc. When we got back in the cab to go, the thing was dead. Nothing.
Battery was fine, bright lights, no dimming when the switch was turned.
Then my buddy decided to short across the starter relay (bless Ford's little heart for putting that relay up on the fender wall where you can get at it easily all these years and years) and the starter turned over just fine. We got the motor running that way and came on home.
If it is not one thing, it is another thing.
Another Lochloosa trip on Thursday the 6th. We had planned on going on Wednesday but my fishing partner's schedule worked out that Thursday was best. Turned out to be a beautiful day, hardly any wind, warm, and the bite was on.
We caught 77 total, but only kept 8. We only keep 12 inch + fish. We caught a bunch of 11 1/2 inchers... so much so that I can now just look at a fish and tell you if it is 10", 11" 11 1/2" etc. within a quarter of an inch or so. :) I proved it to my fishing buddy yesterday. He says I have a real knack with the small ones. :rolleyes:
We did some things differently yesterday too. Pulled crankbaits seriously for the first time. Not much success (caught 4 fish total that way), but we are newbies doing that.
We also fished bare jigs for quite a while yesterday and our catch ratio (the number of fish we put in the boat per hour) was almost exactly the same as it was when we were pushing jigs tipped with minnows. We might try just using jigs alone next trip.
We are happy with the numbers we are getting, but fish over a pound are pretty scarce right now. Our largest yesterday was 1 pound 5 ounces. All the 12 inchers are running at just about a pound each, maybe a bit more.
Tom
PS: We saw some people yesterday keeping some ridiculously small fish. It burns my ass up seeing these people keeping aquarium-sized fish. I am not kidding, people were keeping fish shorter than my palm. Insane.
I have seen that also,and it tears my ass also.I hate to call the law,but there is a time and a place for everything.That's more than likely why you are not catching many fish over a pound.There is a minimum size for a reason.I have the number of my local FWC officer in my phone(got his number same time I was getting a ticket for no life jacket on my boat)LOL.You might want to do the same.We are servants of our lakes.If we don't take care of them, guess what,no one else will.
Yeah, my partner last year would keep em and I'd protest and he'd say, "Hey, they cook up like nuggets, just get a mess".Quote:
Originally Posted by T_om
I really don't like keepin em either, they got a right to grow up, etc, etc....
Now, if he's 10", his azz is goin in the box ! !
I know over here there's no size limit, so, whatcha goin to do ??