Brian & Marin were my guests today on Lake Memphremagog, for smallmouth bass. We started fishing round 8:30 AM under sunny skies, but soon found ourselves in the clouds. There was almost no wind at all and the water temps were 55 to 57 degrees depending on where you were. Our air temps reached almost 70 degrees by the end of the day when we finished around 2:00 PM. Both Brian & Marin managed to catch plenty of perch & smallmouth bass with the largest bass going to Brian at almost 4 pounds. The lure of choice today was definitely the jig as over 75 percent of the 30 fish or so fell victim to the fin-s jig. Rock shoals offshore were definitely the place to be as our last stop yielded about half of the catch. Overall, a great day with plenty of fish caught by all!

After yesterday’s ordeal with the electric motor, I had to finally switch out that motor for the spare in my truck. I was fishing with Kevin & Denis today on Memphremagog for the morning and didn’t want any more problems while on the water. The fishing began with a few smallies caught on a jerk-bait by Denis and a few more on jigs by Kevin but they were rather small in my opinion. I moved around quite a bit trying to locate some of the larger females with no success. All in all, about 10 or so bass were caught & we decided to try another lake to see if we couldn’t find some larger smallies somewhere else. By 12:30 PM we were fishing a trophy lake and it didn’t take long before the first fish came aboard. Unfortunately, it was a lake trout and a little on the small side, so we released it back to the lake. We did a little running & gunning, trying to get into some of the larger bass, but it was really slow. Denis managed to get into a smaller bass of about 3 pounds on a jerk-bait and eventually one around 5 pounds on a super fluke. The rest of the afternoon was pretty much the same with a fish here & there, all on super flukes. Kevin landed one over 4 pounds and several others a little smaller too! The weather finally broke late in the afternoon when the sun came out and the clouds went away. This began a warming trend that got the fish a little more active and the water temps went up to 54 degrees. No wind was present, but the black flies were and this was a real pain to fish in. All in all, a tough day with about 15 or so smallies caught up to 5 pounds!!

After a couple of days off, due to the miserable weather, I was back on the water for a few hours this morning. I spent the first 30 minutes in the parking lot of the lake, repairing my electric motor. It seemed like all the wet weather had caused it to run poorly and needed a little opening up. After I finally got on the water, I found the water temps had dropped once more and held right at 50 degrees. Fishing was tough, but the few fish I caught in just three hours were all in the 5-pound range. Cloudy skies looked like rain and the winds were blowing pretty well, from the N/NW at 10 t0 20 knots. The day was cut short when the electric motor began to make a funny sound from the head. Seems like the relay was shorting out and making a buzz that I didn’t like, so I decided to call it quits for the day and try to repair it back at the room. Tough day all around!! No pics once again!

I fished Lake Memphremagog with Tim & my wife, Christiane today and was surprised to see the sun for most of the morning. The winds were out of the S/SW at 5 to 10 knots putting a little chop on the water, but the color was like mud. It was really difficult to locate water clear enough to be able to fish, but offshore humps were definitely the place to be. Once again, jerk-baits and jigs accounted for the 20 or so smallies up to 3.5 pounds that were caught & released today. The water temps were around 54 degrees in most places, but the mud lines were really thick from all the heavy rains we’ve been having lately making for difficult fishing conditions. The afternoon wasn’t much different today as the rain began to fall around 1:30 and we headed off the water by 2:30 PM when the conditions worsened. The winds had increased to 10 to 20 knots with 2 footers greeting us for the run back. The overall fishing was pretty good considering all that Mother Nature dealt us today!!

I fished with my wife, Christiane on a trophy lake for about 4 hours today. With all the rain and storms we’ve had lately, I knew I had my work cut out for me. Last night’s heavy rain muddied up the water, brought the level up almost another foot and dropped the temps down once again. The same area that had 55 degrees yesterday was now barely 52 degrees! The fish had also evacuated the area and only produced one smaller fish of about 3 pounds. I moved around plenty and concentrated on areas that I thought would be holding bigger bass and still came up empty. They were definitely in the deeper water as I brought up a couple in each place I fished. There were even a couple that might have been over 6 pounds as I visually saw them chase down the lures and retreat back to the drop offs. By days end, only 2 fish of 3 pounds were released, but several other bigger ones were seen. We even had follows from a couple of lakers once again! With all the rain that continued to fall during the day, the water temps seemed to fall even more. The next couple of days have the same weather forecast and I will have to stay deep if I want to get into any of the larger smallies as well as the high numbers that I am so custom to during this pre spawn period. No pics again!