What a strange day this was! A mid afternoon booking at 2:00 was cancelled due to forecasted thunder storms. I checked the radar, got back to Andre with the all clear and he decided to meet me at 1:00 instead. The person he was supposed to come with was reluctant to go out after he saw the weather and heard, 90% chance of thunder storms. You have to love our weather men! Rarely right! Anyway, I had some time to kill so I decided to head out earlier and continue the search for additional new areas & fish. It was on fire with the walleye biting really good this morning. Unfortunately, so were the lunge! Got another big one again. I covered lots of water and figured out what these fish were doing and where they were holding, then left. I would be back with Andre this afternoon. I headed to the ramp to meet him just before 1:00 and we rolled out. It had been quite a few years since I had fished with him and he was happy to be in this rig. With much more room than a bass boat, he loved it! We began our troll and the first fish to hit was a smallie around 3 pounds. He hadn’t been fishing in a while and was just glad to be hooked up with the fish. A little while later, the walleye started hitting and he was now boating some nice eyes. As he hadn’t eaten dore in a while, he was looking forward to eating some. I obliged him and put a few in the livewell throughout the afternoon. We covered all the areas I had located these fish the last couple of days and picked at them pretty good. There were even a couple of double headers that I hadn’t seen in a while! The fishing was great and I don’t think Andre had imagined it could ever be like this. Although he never really boated any giants, he did manage several overs up to almost 5 pounds. Along with these, he also caught plenty of quality keepers. Some of which went home with him for his dinner tonight. We stayed out a little later than I was use to and pulled the plug just before 6:30. Not before we were able to boat three more good fish though, in the last 5 minutes! I think we might have been able to do even better, if we didn’t have the north wind blowing 2 footers on us most of the afternoon. We definitely ended a great day on a high as Andre caught more fish than he ever could have imagined. All this from a cancelled day due to potential thunder storms and rain. Go figure, it was sunshine the whole day long!!

Corey and his wife were with me for a morning trip and he requested smallies. No problem, I knew just where he could catch a bunch! We met at 7:00 and were fishing 15 minutes later. After a quick orientation on the area and a small explanation on how to work the baits, they were ready. I had Corey try some blades but the fish just didn’t seem to want to chase anything. I quickly switched him to soft plastics and hoped the bite would change. Minutes later, his wife hooked into a nice one but it threw the hook on a jump. Corey on the other hand started hooking up and kept at it with many smallies being landed. In fact, they both hooked into fish and even managed a double at one point. With the water on a slow rise I anticipate an improvement in the bite really soon! They worked this area thoroughly before we moved to another one further away. As bad luck would have it, his wife hooked into the largest bass of the day and it came unpinned on another jump. Although a little disappointed, she soon got over it! They hooked into a number of fish here and even had another double headed! I had them work this area over completely before moving to what would be our last stop. It was here that Corey brought up the numbers with many more fish coming aboard. Plenty of other strikes were also missed, but that’s fishing! Shortly after noon, we called it and headed back. It was definitely nice to be able to run in smooth water for a change. The last few days had seen 3 footers or better each time out. By 12:30 we were back and soon after parted ways. They really enjoyed catching these brown bass as they usually fish for only largemouth back home in Florida. Although they may be bigger, you can’t beat a smallie!!

After I dropped off my clients from this morning, I picked up an old friend with his grandson. Keith & Colton would be tagging along with me while I went searching for fish. With plenty of other clients coming up, I just wanted to locate more. I trolled new areas that I hadn’t touched this season looking for something different. The lake was completely flat calm with lots of floating grass making trolling quite difficult at times. I had to clean the rods too often and decided to relocate. I also had to raise the top with the heat & humidity! We spent what seemed like forever without a bite and I could see that Colton was getting a little bored. Keith explained to him that this happens sometimes when you’re looking for fish. At  9 years old, you just want to catch something! Well eventually I moved to deeper water and one of the rods bent. Although the reel didn’t fire, the rod bent pretty good. Colton had finally got his wish and was into a pretty large northern. After a couple of pics, we released the pike and resumed the troll. I was marking what seemed like walleye but for some reason couldn’t get a hook up. Later in the afternoon we finally got a little breeze and another reel fired off. This one was a nice smallmouth and Colton was quickly back on the rod. He had a little more difficulty reeling this fish in with how hard it was fighting. I netted the three pounder and took a few more pics before releasing it  again. Now he was happy and looking for more! We got the lines back in and went a little while longer without any action and then the wind started. It was kicking up much better that earlier creating a good chop on the water. It also felt good with the heat! When the next reel fired, it went off hard. It didn’t seem like a normal hit and I was pretty sure what it was. I handed the rod to Colton and instructed him  what to do. We brought the other lines in and awaited the confirmation. It was all he could do just to hold the rod and keep the line tight with the weight on the line. Even before we saw the fish, I knew he had his very first lunge. It was just too strong and never left the bottom. The fight went on for a while with the light line he was on, as this was supposed to be a walleye troll. Although exhausted, he quickly overcame it and went into adrenaline mode. When the fish finally jumped, he really dug deep into what strength he had left for the remainder of the battle. Keith wanted me to help but I refused and just kept on the small motor keeping him close. Colton was to battle this beast on his own! He fought it like a champ and when I finally got a chance, I put the Boga Grip on his catch. A sigh of relief was had by all as I removed the lure and prepped for a few quick pics. I kept the musky under water the whole time so that it wasn’t stressed any more than it already was. When I finally brought it aboard, It was for about 45 seconds for several quick shots and right back in for the release. It took only seconds before she kicked and swam off unharmed. No worse for wear, she made a kid’s dream a reality! I think a little later, this will sink in and Colton will realize just exactly what had happened. I know of only one other kid that has caught fish like this at his age and his dad does this all the time with his clients too. Once all the smoke had settled and things got a little calmer, I decided to call it a day. Everything else after this would just be downhill. No sense continuing after a high like this! I’m sure they had a lot to talk about on their drive back home. With all that excitement, they would be reliving every single minute of the fight. They may not have brought any walleye home for dinner, but I think this was much better. Sort of like icing on the cake!!

Another day with a big howl! It may have been less than the last couple of days, but it still blew at 20 or more knots. Tough to finesse with light presentations to say the least! We started out with a troll for some eyes and managed a couple, along with some pike of course. I switched it up a bit and hit another area after fighting the wind and tried for something larger. Bingo! Locked up with a healthy lunge and Ted’s personal best. Shortly after the release we decided to try for some bass and I took a beating on the electric motor trying to keep boat control in the open water. Ted missed several due to the wind but managed to land more than he lost. We jumped around a lot today and hit several non productive areas before returning to trolling late in the afternoon. He was hoping to take a few more walleye home and I knew just the spot. Whoever said walleye don’t fight needs to hook into a couple like we had today. these line screamers fought more like smallies than eyes. I really thought he was hooked into bass each time the reel howled. Fortunately for Ted, they weren’t and he was having fish for dinner. We ended it  after three more Walters and a good mix of fish for the day. Definitely not the easiest outing but a really productive one nonetheless!

I had to cancel yesterday’s couple due to giant winds, but managed to fit them into today. I had a group for the morning and they would be taking the afternoon. Although the waves were considerably smaller than yesterday for the start, they would grow by the afternoon once again. I headed out with Remy, his dad and brother to see what kind of damage yesterday’s big blow had unleashed on the lake. It didn’t take long to figure out that the fish were going to play hard to get! We trolled a couple of key areas and managed only a few pike and even they were terrible hits. I had lost more water temp and it was now down to 69 degrees. I fished shallow, mid and even deeper but was only picking a bite here & there. They managed to land a couple of walleye in one spot and I was marking plenty more. I even resorted to drop shotting and that too went untouched. In a last ditch effort I relocated to slightly deeper water and tried to vertically drop shot. It was here that they had several bites and a few bass and walleye came aboard. Given more time, I’m sure fishing would have improved and the numbers would have also climbed, but we ran out of time. The morning shift was officially over and I had to change the lineup for the afternoon. We headed back, through heavy boat traffic and bigger waves for the meet.

The afternoon saw Juliana and her husband Ely in the boat. We had postponed their trip from yesterday due to the weather and rescheduled it for today. Although the wind was bad, it was still better than the ocean we saw when we met at the docks the day before. Between the boat traffic, sailboats and wind, I knew I had to go somewhere far in order to fish. I thought largemouth would be a good choice and ran to the other side of the lake in hopes of escaping some of the wind. Well we may have had less waves but the wind was still pretty bad. Very little protection from the blow was seen as they fan casted various weeds. It was difficult to target specific places and lots of good water was missed. There was one area however where several decent largemouth were caught and or lost. We spent considerable time in here hoping not to have to go back on the open lake. Unfortunately it was inevitable! We left the somewhat sheltered weeds and crossed back over to the ocean. Hard to believe, but it had gotten worse since we started and I was forced to try another troll. The water had muddied up pretty bad and the rollers were terrible but we tried regardless. We hooked up pretty quickly with a decent keeper sized eye and I really thought we were going to get into them. Too bad mother nature had other ideas because it was damn near impossible to stay on my waypoints in this wind. I couldn’t make turns properly and trolling into the wind was next to impossible unless I wanted to swamp the boat. Several times we had some water come over the bow while trying. I was in 3 to 4 footers and decided to give drifting with a drop shot a try instead. Once set up they dropped down and I instructed them on what to do. A couple of bites were missed before Ely managed to get another walleye. It was also difficult because of suspended grass in the water column and they were forced to check their lines quite often. I eventually had to pull the plug here and try elsewhere! The last spot of the day was where we had ended the morning trip but now the waves were about double in size. A vertical drop shot with the kicker in reverse to maintain the presentation wasn’t as easy as it was earlier in the day. I had occasional rogue waves coming over the back while trying to maintain control. Once again Ely managed to get another walleye from here before we had to call it. They had plans this evening and had to be somewhere by a certain time. The fishing proved to be a challenge today as both groups experienced some of the toughest fishing so far this year. With conditions so inconsistent, it’s hard to adjust constantly. Water temps are up & down and never stable. Above all of this though, it has to be the intense winds that are the worst as most people have a hard time detecting bites. Tomorrow should see less traffic and hopefully reduced winds as well. Crossing my fingers!!