I fished with Andre & Dane once again today, but had to settle on another lake when we saw the 25 to 30-knot winds on Memphremagog. Thank god we have options around here! Instead of fishing for bass we decided to try our luck at trout & salmon again. The air temps were in the low 40’s and the winds were from the N/NE at an incredible speed. The water dropped once again to about 42 degrees in the warmest areas. We had a light drizzle that never let up all day! It took a while before the first fish came to the net and another one followed shortly after. Before we knew it, there were two salmon in the livewell! By the end of the day, there were three lake trout added to the livewell as well. It was a tough bite, but under the conditions we were dealt, I think we did well. I can’t wait for warmer weather!!!

I fished with Andre & his son Dane today. We began on Lake Salem and Andre got into some smallmouth on his first few casts. They were rather small, but it was a good sign, nevertheless. The air temps were in the low 40’s and the water temps dropped 5 degrees to 47 degrees, overnight. With overcast skies and some showers in the forecast, I knew that they weren’t going to get any better either. The winds started light & variable, but soon shifted to the North East and increased to 10 to 15 mph. The fish were there from yesterday, but we had a hard time convincing some of the larger ones into hitting as they followed the baits without taking. Andre and Dane caught a few more before we relocated to an open water rock pile. Only one more was to be caught with a few more lookers out there as well. I decided that we would relocate to another lake once again as we took of this lake. The winds were no better there, but we managed to get into 1 smallmouth of about 4.5 pounds and three lake trout. The lakers went 4, 4.5 & 6.5 pounds and were caught on Fin-S baits & jigs. We also trolled with fly rods, again with no luck. To make matters worse, the temperatures dropped from 51 degrees down to 43 and the wind picked up to 25 mph from the North East. We also experiences rain for the last hour of the day as we hung in until about 5:30 P.M. Tough day once more! I can’t wait for some better weather!!

I fished alone today & checked out a couple of new bodies of water. Memphremagog was the first stop & I found the water looking more like coffee than a lake. The temps were ranging from 42 degrees in the shallows to 44 degrees out in open water. The shallow bite wasn’t very good with only a few smallies being caught. The open water shoals weren’t much better but the fish were bigger. By noon, I decided to take off the lake & try another smaller body of water hoping to find warmer water. Lake Salem was the place to be as I found 52 degrees in one section of the lake. Some areas held more bass than others, but at least there were concentrations! The sky was a mix of clouds & sunshine all day and the temps reached almost 60 degrees at the height of the afternoon. Jerk-baits, crank-baits & jigs were all that was used today and the fish came from 5 t0 10 feet of water in old weeds. Between the two places, close to 25 bass were landed making this a rather slow day for the time of year.

Only Stacy was able to fish today and we headed back to the same lake to see if we could do any better than yesterday. Fortunately, the weather was a complete opposite from what we had the day before. It was sunny and the temperatures rose to 60 degrees by the days end. Winds were light & variable and the water was beginning to finally warm up with all the sunshine. On the first cast of the day, a four-pound laker inhaled the fin-s jig presentation and went into the livewell. A few more lake trout hit the jigs, but unfortunately didn’t hook up. It’s never a good thing to get a fish on your first cast, as we were about to find out. Many more hours of fishing went by before another fish was finally caught. Stacy landed another four-pound lake trout and it also went into the livewell. For some reason, trolling flies doesn’t seem to be working very well yet. Hopefully, in the next few days or so the water will warm up enough to trigger the trout & salmon into taking the flies once again. Only two fish for our efforts today, tough bite once more!

I fished with Stacy & Crissy today for trout on a lake in northern Vermont. We headed onto the water at the crack of 10. No sense getting on the water too early at this time of year. The air temps were not much more that 45 degrees and the best water temp we could find was 43 degrees. The cloud cover & wind from the north made it feel a lot colder. We trolled fly rods and streamers for over three hours without a single hit. I decided that a change was in order and we began fishing fin-s jigs instead. It took quite a while before a fish finally took one of the jigs and not long after, Stacy landed a five-pound lake trout. This turned out to be the only fish we were to catch today. By 3:30 we had all had enough and decided to call it a day. A tough bite to say the least!