Hillsdale....following the shad

[slabby joe]

When the screen looks like this.... your livewell can look like this..........On monday the fish came pretty fast as long as you stayed in the shad school but it amazes me how quickly the school would seemingly disappear....then you just start hunting for them again and again and again....fun way to fish but frustrating when the fishing is so hot and then nothing in an instant. The wind was blowing into the area I was fishing both days so the trolling batteries got a good workout and white caps kept the boat bouncing but worth it when you could find the shad....I started in the same location on tuesday but couldn't locate big schools of shad so moved to another arm of the lake and found big schools like the above pic. and bigger crappie. The crappie seem to be mostly over 10in. and quite a few in the 11in. range and not as many little dinks as usual...I hope this means better quality fish for this year. I hope this pattern continues for awhile longer since limits for me are usually few and far between. I found out that you follow the school even into the standing timber in and out of the creek channel and they are constantly on the move.

[LBM]

Thanks WTG Doug

Perhaps you may what to learn how to blur out certain areas when posting pictures.

Waypoint Viewer

[Scouts Out]

Nice, thanks!

[dkv]

Thanks WTG Doug

Perhaps you may what to learn how to blur out certain areas when posting pictures.

Waypoint Viewer

WTH Lee, it was open water. Cheez!

[LBM]

WTH Lee, it was open water. Cheez!

Note the depth there was showing 32 ft of water and that depth was in the channel with lots of visible standing timber still lining that channel and apparently that map picture was taken on a windy day with a very high sun angle where the standing timber was not casting enough shadow showing all the standing timber in that area of the lake.

[dkv]

Sorry, missed all that, was not thinking!

[John Wells]

No loss, that spot isn't a secret, we call it shad point.

[fishlessDan]

Note the depth there was showing 32 ft of water and that depth was in the channel with lots of visible standing timber still lining that channel and apparently that map picture was taken on a windy day with a very high sun angle where the standing timber was not casting enough shadow showing all the standing timber in that area of the lake.

Maybe these new locators require better eyes than mine, but I cant see any standing timber????

[LBM]

Maybe these new locators require better eyes than mine, but I cant see any standing timber????

With the DS on that locator one wouldn’t see any standing timber unless they were over submerged standing timber or with the transducer being very close to the timber. With what was showing on the locator I would assume it was out in the middle of the channel.

My comments about standing timber came from my familiarity with that area and as Slabchaser said that location is a well know and well used area.

True there is no standing timber visible on the locator or on the satellite photo from the way point viewer I linked to. I commented on the standing timber after DKV thought that was just open water from what he could see on the satellite photo.

[TowboatTroller]

How was you catching them ?