A Big South East

Herm was in today with his grandson Hunter, looking for some bass & walleye action. A little traffic had them arriving later than anticipated and we hit the water around 8:30. Trolling was the first attempt at landing a few quick biters but the east winds and overnight lows had them lock jawed. I was definitely marking plenty of fish but they weren’t moving to eat. It was apparent, we would have to slow down and cast for them instead! I pulled the plug here and shifted to another section where I was pretty sure they would land some smallies. Well, Herm blasted one on his first cast throwing a spinnerbait and Hunter was also tight to another on a tube. Too bad only one came to net but we were sure there’d be more as it had taken about ten seconds to get bit. Ironically, it wasn’t that easy and they had to work plenty to get just a couple more bites. Despite the fact that we were able to see many swimming around, very few had any interest in eating and we were relocating once again. This time however, I headed to deeper water where I hoped they would cooperate. As with before, Herm locked up almost immediately and thoughts of many more entered our minds. There were just too many fish marking in 20 to 30 feet of water not to get bit! We made multiple drifts in different areas all the while hooking into bass between 2 & 4 pounds. Hunter was also getting use to the drop shot technique and pulled a couple of his own in as well. It wasn’t the easiest boat control with a strong SE wind and I really had to work at keeping the boat drifting correctly. Wind against current is never easy and we had a cross wind against the current today. Without adjusting the angle constantly, the lines were all over the place and nobody would get bit. We fished this area for quite some time, making multiple drifts at various depths in order to find the larger bass. The bite was actually a strange one for some reason and many more fish were missed than landed. It seemed like they weren’t eating well and not staying pinned for long. When it became evident that we had overstayed our welcome, I moved once again. As with each area today, someone hooked up right away when we arrived and it was usually a good fish too. Once we remained for a while the fishing got much tougher, forcing us to shift again. This was becoming a bit of a pain as we weren’t able to monopolize on the fish in each area. We did manage to catch pretty much every where we stopped, but they shut down quickly after we arrived and the numbers definitely weren’t there. I hit several more places and we managed one walleye and a handful more smallies before returning back to take out. I knew we were going to get crushed at the ramp and wasn’t surprised to see big waves crashing on the shore when we got back. Although we had rough water and tough conditions while fishing, we weren’t completely on the receiving end of the worst winds. The boat ramp was however and I moved quickly to ensure the least amount of pounding the boat would receive. Although it wasn’t what I had hoped for today, they still had plenty of chances and landed some really nice fish in the end. Hopefully when Herm comes back in a few weeks the fish will be in shallower and a whole lot more stable conditions will be seen. I know he’s crossing his fingers and hoping for better results!!