Slow Down Below

Got started about 630 Saturday morning below the dam with the wife. I don't know if it was because it's mother's day weekend or the fishing has slowed, but there weren't a ton of people like I was expecting with the weather. I say "slowed" it was still a good day lol.

The fishing was quite a bit slower than my previous trips this year. But we did catch some really nice fish, one of the biggest was the first fish of the day so that was a positive way to start. We fished until noon and ended up with 1 limit (7 good ones). 1lb6oz was our big fish of the day. We did have 4-5 to throw back and a few white bass/hybrids mixed in.

Fish seemed everywhere that day, 8-24 ft down scattered, but plenty around between crappie and whites/hyrids. Ran into a buddy down there and he and another were rigging also; 4 poles front, 2 rear and they managed 23 crappie and about 8-10 whites/hybrids. They were fishing all bare hooks with minnows.

I fished mainly 12-14 ft deep. Bare hook and minnow seemed to be best bite for us as well.

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Nice. Good job and good eats. Thanks for sharing.

Nice mess right there! Congrats and thanks for sharing!

very nice

That's a solid group of fish there. I enjoy this time of year where I don't see as many fishermen targeting spawning crappie because it has "slowed down" when it is really that they haven't figured out post-spawn and summer patterns and methods that do work. The only problem is that I now deal with pleasure boat riders, jet-skis, and that crowd, although the parking lot is still less crowded, at least where I launch from.

Agreed. I enjoy rigging and do most of it this time of year before summer pattern starts. It's also the easiest thing I can put the wife and younger kids on, they enjoy it as well. I am ready for some dipping though, hard to replace the THUMP!

I was there Friday and it was slow, only a few boats in the channel, had some excitement when I hooked a 22 pound Blue on my 16ft spider rod. Lol. Took me a while but I landed him, he was two inches above the slot so he got a ride home. I'm about done with the dam.

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Originally Posted by Bigby

I was there Friday and it was slow, only a few boats in the channel, had some excitement when I hooked a 22 pound Blue on my 16ft spider rod. Lol. Took me a while but I landed him, he was two inches above the slot so he got a ride home. I'm about done with the dam.

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Agreed, I'm about done as well. I MAY go one more time this weekend, we will see. My wife hooked some kind of a monster Saturday. We never saw it but you could see the water it displaced when it took off after feeling the jig's hook it hit. She was rigging on the right hand side and it hit her right most rod and went left crossing every pole we had out. I thought it was going to be bad but it spit it out pretty quickly luckily :D

Good job!

Sounds like a solid outing, especially with the wife along — always nice to land a good one early to set the tone! We've been seeing the same with scattered fish at weird depths lately. Did you try jig + minnow at all, or just stick to bare hooks?

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Originally Posted by MidnightCodeX

Sounds like a solid outing, especially with the wife along — always nice to land a good one early to set the tone! We've been seeing the same with scattered fish at weird depths lately. Did you try jig + minnow at all, or just stick to bare hooks?

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I was running bare hook + minnow on top & 1/16th oz jig + minnow about 16 inches below it. Bare hook was the best bite for us that day for whatever reason.

My buddy was running single rigs in another boat; bare hook + minnow, and they caught more than we did.

I think I'm gonna go back one more time Saturday morning. I'm gonna run single hooks and see what happens. I'll report Saturday after we're done.

Looks like a good time was had!