My son and I hit DC on Wed. With more than a dozen absolutely stellar fishing trips in a row for me in recent months at different locations, I was quite overdue for a good humbling… There were quite a number of bank tanglers that were just outside the ramp fee area by the island when we arrived after lunch time, but we never observed any fish in the skinny water. There were a half a dozen boats in the area, and the trollers were picking up a few fish here and there out in the middle of the bay. But not having any luck ourselves quickly at that, we continued on with our mission.
When we went out the week before and the weather conditions were almost exactly the same, mid 40's and windy. We anchored up and caught about 50 perch vertical jigging before darkness and the cold sent us home. Man… the wind was really howling that day, but we were dressed well and didn’t notice cuz we were too busy pulling in fish after fish!
The water temps had dropped a couple degrees though to 48, and the gusty wind wasn’t nearly as strong as the week before. It would have been fine if it was consistent…. but it kept changing in strength and direction within minutes…. We’d locate what seemed to me as the same perch like markings as we saw last trip on the sonar, but by the time I got anchored over them the wind would shift… With as much rope as we had to have out to get the anchor to hold in 35’- 40+’ deep of water, the boat drifted position so much that the depth we were at varied as much as 10’. If those were fish we saw, we sure couldn’t get them to bite on anything…
As we moved around we’d see a few single fish like markings at the bottom, but the challenge of getting us situated on a spot caused us to shift tactics. We trolled all around the island looking for trout, unsuccessfully. So, I figured I’d make it a boat trip and learn the lake a bit more and watch the sonar. We went over to the West side and saw NOTHING on the sonar. Then we went over to Rainbow Bay. Generally, we’d see a fish marked at mid depth in about 30’ of water here and there, but I guess they were waiting till Thanksgiving for their feasting….
Fortunately, just as it was getting dark we found a few trout that wanted to play and averted a big fat skunk. I can’t remember the last time we had one of those for dinner. However, my bruised sense of pride served up with stuffing and basted with not having any more tricks up my sleeve, this particular day did make me even MORE grateful for the great trips in the past.
Anyway, I can’t complain, I’m still learning the ropes at DC only having fished in on open water a few times. Every time I’ve gone people mostly troll out in open water in rather random patterns. I’ve never fished the west side of the lake and I’ve never heard reports of catching there. Anyone got any intel about those areas on the North end of the lake? And, does anyone know how deep your typical “rooster tail” spinner goes when trolled at slow speeds?
Lastly, have a great Turkey Day everyone! For those that watch the local news, two can play at this game P.E.T.A. And yes, I will be enjoying a fine bird today. But, lest I offend those of the vegetarian inclination – I wish you a very happy TOFUrkey Day!
Roghet
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