Thread: Winterize… What is that?

With mom and dad moved in to their new house over in Mason (a short drive away) we decided to hit Saginaw Bay and take advantage of some great weather before a predicted storm.

Dad, Brian, and I left the house at 5:30am and made the two hour drive to Bay City. I did not like the reports coming from the Linwood area so I decided to launch from Patterson (on the mouth of the river) and head to a spot that Kevin and I had pre-fished this spring before a tournament. I had a feeling the fish would be in this flat next to the channel and would be eagerly awaiting food before the storm came in.

We headed out of the channel and made the 4 mile trip in 35 degree weather. We checked a few spots on the Lowrance before we settled on an area that showed promise just south west of the spark plug. The hooks on the screen indicated that the fish were in the 10 to 15 foot depth and suspended over 20 feet of water. Using my Precision Trolling app I was able to determine that the best setback to run our Rapala DDHJ 12’s was in the 60 to 90 feet range behind our Off Shore Tackle boards. Brian decided to try smaller size 9 Berkley Flicker minnows back 35 to 65 feet.

Before Brian could get his side of the boat set, board number 3 on my side started rocketing backwards. I tripped the board and handed the rod to my dad. We made quick work and boated a nice 5 pounder on a jointed deep husky jerk minnow. As soon as the fish was in the live well, Brian’s 1st Off Shore board set at 35 back went screaming backwards. He was rewarded with a solid 6 pounder on a custom flicker minnow.

I made a slight turn to the west to avoid putting myself in a direct path with a duck boat when my second Off Shore board went completely under water. My custom walleye candy husky jerk hooks did their job and a 9 lbs fish was added to the basket.

The morning was not fast and furious by any means but we were putting fish in the boat. No set pattern, depth, or color outshined another. After 3 hours of fishing and six fish in the boat, I noticed my trolling motor was showing being on max 10 power and we were only trolling at 1.1mph instead of the 1.4 I had set on my autopilot. I had experienced this issue a week earlier when fishing out of Lake Erie and now the issue was showing itself again. I had an idea of the issue but no way to rectify it.

With the impending storm headed our way and a 2 hour drive back, we made the decision to pull the plug. We had a great 3 hours on the water and were rewarded with some awesome fish. Sure, we would have loved to put more in the boat but sometimes you have to take the good with the bad. In the end it was found to be a bad battery in my 24v system causing the problem and a new set of batteries will be installed shortly. I don’t want to miss out on this great fall fishery!