Thread: Melvern 11/12/08

Finally a day when the stars and planets were in alignment and the wind was not gusting from the mid teens into the mid twenties I was able to check out Melvern. Having read the glowing reports on Melvern I was anxious to check it out.

It was with high anticipation of perhaps being able to observe the likes of Ima, Rod Doc and maybe Al as they plied their fishing expertise on the water if not up close maybe from a distance being able to see and add some new waypoints to my meager inventory of waypoints on Melvern. Well if they were there I didn't spot them but still had a reasonably good day on the water.

The backseater was a little slow in getting into the catching part of the the fishing game. I was able to keep this 22 inch walleye from bothering the backseater’s hooks and he did do a good job of netting it for me. First picture.

We started out working points on our way towards the dam with very little success. At the dam we started catching crappie with a few legals but none of the legals were of the expected Melvern quality but more like the Hillsdale legal’s in length. The short fish were full bellied thick and healthy looking fish. We went back up lake to work some brush pile waypoints in hopes of finding the Melvern type slabs.

While working the brushpiles and with no intentions of attempting to emulate a good guide I done a very good job of catching and keeping the dinks away from the backseater's hooks so he could catch the Melvern quality fish. Second picture.

We ended the day up with 14 legals apiece and both considered it a long but very good day on Melvern.

Great day! Was the walleye incidental, or were you targeting them also? Could you give a guy a pointer as to what the walleye are doing right now at Melvern? Anyway, looks like you had fun, and that crappie looks really nice too.

Originally Posted by BuckCreekMike

Great day! Was the walleye incidental, or were you targeting them also? Could you give a guy a pointer as to what the walleye are doing right now at Melvern? Anyway, looks like you had fun, and that crappie looks really nice too.

Just incidental but I am very aware they can be caught somewhat frequently while crappie fishing. I had no intentions yesterday of dressing any fish after a long day on the water but will eagerly change my mind and dress a tasty legal walleye anytime.

I'm the wrong person for info on how to catch the eyes other than just going crappie fishing and hope.

As for the eyes I tend to think Hillsdale is probably the better lake having caught a few nice ones myself and seen several caught there and heard of many nice ones being caught there while crappie fishing.

lee
whats with all the clothes i thought you were fishin mevern not iceland
btw you might want to be careful about the backgrounds in your pics
with my new computer imaging software i now have the waypoints of where the pics were taken :D
and the bobber that opens up a whole new line of questioning
al

Very nice day on the water. Going to give it a go with the Chatt Meister himself on Sunday. Can't wait....

Nice catch guys...Can't wait to get out again....I think I may have forgotten what the thump feels like.

Nice pics!What type a jig and size of head where you using.Also, any specific depth that the fishing was best?

Originally Posted by haugboss

lee
whats with all the clothes i thought you were fishin mevern not iceland
btw you might want to be careful about the backgrounds in your pics
with my new computer imaging software i now have the waypoints of where the pics were taken :D
and the bobber that opens up a whole new line of questioning
al

With my cold bloodedness I tend to over dress to be comfortable on the water. If I happen to get uncomfortably warm I can always shed a layer or two.

As for my waypoints I rather doubt that any of them are unique to me and aren't already a part of the Melvern frequent and regular fisher folk's current inventory of waypoints.

The bobber in the livewell is just a enhancment to Lund's expensively superior high quality livewell containment/drainage system on my boat. I'm rather reluctant to reach my arm into the livewell water up to my elbow with 35 deg water in order to pull the plug to drain the livewell. By divulging this info here I have probably now lost all chances of acquireing a patent and any potential fortune from this remarkably unique and bright idea. :D

Originally Posted by PurpleCrappie

Nice pics!What type a jig and size of head where you using.Also, any specific depth that the fishing was best?

I was using a 3/8 and 1/4 oz ball head jigs and the bait colors were generally a chartruse combo of bright colors.
On the dam I was trying to duplicate what I had been doing on the face of the dam at Hillsdale where that was scraping the bottom for crappie. At Melvern I just had to be close to the bottom in 20 ft of water.

For the brush I was looking for it in the 18 to 24 ft ranges close to larger drop offs. For us we were catching them around the brush and not deep in the brush on the bottom. We would catch one or two nicer fish around then moved on but now as I think of it we probably should have stayed and probed deeper and more methodically into the brush for the slabs once we had caught some around the brush.