Bass, perch, gills, and oh yea crappie, too

[camofish]

Monday June 11th, 2007

Location: Hudson River, NY (non-tidal waters)
Water clarity: murky, 3’-4’ visibility
Target Species: Crappie, Bass, Gills
Tackle: 6 ½’ Med. Action spinning rod/reel w/ 8# mono, 1/16 oz. round jighead w/ 2” rib grub, brim
Tackle: 5 ½’ Med. Action spinning rod/reel w/ 6# mono, 1/16 oz. minnow jighead w/ 2.5” paddle grub, perl blue silver
Fishing time: 12:30pm – 2:30pm

Started off the day with the 2.5 paddle tail. A great bite to cast and cover distance with. With a little sink as soon as it hit the water or start reeling depending on depth of water your fishing. A slow steady retrieve is all you need or jazz it up like I like to do by giving the rod tip a slight bounce as your reeling the bait in is all that is need along with the whomping of the paddle tail, to drive the fishies into biting.

I was fishing less then 6 FOW today and most of my fish were tight to weed or wood cover. My 1st fish of the day came within 10 minutes of launching. Pitching the paddle tail to the shallows just in front of the lily pads and weaving is inbetween the standing weeds and this nice bass ran out to grab as I bounce by some lily pads.


Due to being shallower and up in less than 4 FOW, lots of green algae, heavily pollen covered water and weed growth I change to my other rod with the 2” rib grub. Much easier to work in shallow and closer to the boat. My method of slighting bouncing the rod on a slow retrieve was key. I could make short casts, have more control weaving it thru the weeds and bouncing the jig up and down, still have sight of my bait and watch for the bait to be inhaled by a lurking fish from below.

My next fish in the boat today would be this nice gill.


And watching this perch just bum rush the grub right next to the boat was awesome, never seen him coming till I paused about 10 feet from the boat and as I bounced, Fish On!

Only perch for the day.

I then finally found the crappie. They were hard to get into good numbers in the same area, but I did. Where the new weeds were growing good over the 3-6 FOW, is where I found the school of crappies. They were hanging very tight to the weeds and I was catching then right as I would bounce that little 2” grub right along the sides of the weeds. I was tough work in keeping the jighead hook from grabbing the weeds. The shorter the cast, the better. I was anchoring up so I could work and thoroughly cover the weed patches and open water channels with the plastics.

Here a few of the crappies that I got with the 2” rib grub.


You can see the weed growth in the picture above.

Here is a nice little crappie caught on a 2.5 paddle tail to end the day.


It was an awesome 2 hours of catch’n on the water today, although I ended up with a nasty sunburn cause I had my t-shirt off for the whole 2 hours. With about 2 bass, 1 perch, 10 gills, 20 crappies, I only used 1 paddle tail and 2 rib grubs. The rib grub I started out with today was a last weeks 2 day catch’n machine and needed to be retired.

Fish On!

[wrwest]

Wow thta is a good fishing report...

[FishnLine]

Nice catch.

[joejv4]

sounds like a great "mixed bag" kinda day. Congrats!

[harpenter]

Good all around day you had there.

[camofish]

thanks guys, I've got a new order in to try out some more colors. Hope they get here before monday so I can try and fool them with a different color. Plus, I may venture out into the main river to find some new fresh fishies.

Plus, I've got a bottle of that fishing glue, I hear it works wonders for glueing the plastics to the jighead for an even longer lasting grub body. Cause it won't be pulled on and off the collar as much from catch'n and catch'n.