Burn’n Em Up

Gino & I fished on Lake St-Louis today and tried trolling a bit for Walleye & Pike. This wasn’t very productive and eventually we opted for the smallies once again. This was definitely the right choice as both of us were soon to find out. This was going to be a half-day of fishing and we began around midday. High sunshine, warm temps of 80 plus degrees and a wind from the W at 10 to 15 knots were what we were greeted with on our run up the lake. The water temps went above 70 degrees, finally and began an upward trend that should begin to activate some of these lethargic fish. We got into several smallies in the 4-pound range with the largest going 19.5 inches in length. Tubes and soft plastic jerk-baits accounted for these fish before we moved off to try another area later in the afternoon. The winds had begun to kick up a little stronger and were now blowing at 15 to 20 knots with stronger gusts from the W making the boat ride a little splashy. I thought I would try an area closer to the ramp that I hadn’t yet fished this year, just in case the winds became stronger. Well, they did and trying to control the boat became a real chore when the edge of the shoal looked more like a rip tide than the lake we were on. A few more smallies were caught with some other larger followers before we were forced to get out of there. Too bad too, because I thin we could have really gotten into them given he opportunity. In the first three casts, two smallies were hooked and another shortly afterwards on a spider jig in deeper water. All in all a decent afternoon regardless of the strong winds we were forced to endure.