The heat wave finally broke for us...

The heat wave finally broke for us yesterday! After 7 days of 90 - 100 degree days and 70+ degree nights, we finally got a break. Some severe thunderstorms broke it yesterday, with last night's temp bottoming out in the upper 40's! Incredible temp swings.

Anyway, Walt & I hit the Quabbin at about 7:30 am this morning. The air was 51 degrees - the water at a balmy 75 degrees. Breezes were calm to start, with a gradual build up between 5 - 10 mph by mid morning. Nothing drastic.

When we first stopped to start up the side pulling motor (which, btw, was a GREAT investment!), here is what the lake looked like to us:



About as pretty a picture as you'd care to see with a fishing rod in your hands! However, it was a severe cold front that we had to deal with.....we weren't sure if we'd skunk out or what? No need to worry however, pulling our jigs over the 19' - 22' depths proved more than even some tight mouthed crappie could bear. Here's a couple of screen shots that our sonar displayed to us:





Off & on we'd come across groups of fish, in with bait, throughout the main basin. Walt started things off with a representative sample of the crappie we were catching:



Nothing giant, but a lot of fun on 2# test UL rigs (which we use exclusively). Now here's the real kicker for ya. I had just received another order of "stuff" from Grizzly Jig (love this company!). Amongst the numerable lures were 3 gawdy cranks - Arkie 350's. In colors I wouldn't personally select myself. But after seeing some of you guys killing 'em on these, I just had to try them. Here's the first action:



And a close up of the crazy looking bait:



Apparently the cold front caused the crappie a bit of dementia! They absolutely loved this crank! Crappie fishing never ceases to amaze me.

Follow that up with an absolutely nutty yellow perch who thought this crank was something it might like to mate with:



This particular crank was the definite hot ticket for today. Who knew? Also of note was the larger sized CB Slider Minnows (2 1/8" length, not including jig!). Also in the most gawsh-awful looking color schemes you can dream up to present. They just wanted/needed the gawdy today for whatever reason? Tried more standard/natural color schemes too - nothing doing. Back to the crazy colors!

Here's another nice one that Walt took:



And one that I took as well:



Also used the "G" sauce on the plastics, but I can't honestly tell you it made a significant difference - for today (I'll never lie to you!). OK.....the suspense is over....how many did we get today? Last trip was 84. We pulled off at about 1:30 pm (6 hrs. of fishing) and caught & realesed 53 this trip. All mostly crappie, with 9 gills, one rainbow trout and one, the afore mentioned yellow perch. Not our best day, but it was a refreshingly beautiful day to be out on the water. Thank the Lord this heat wave is over....for the time being anyway!

Hope some of you fine folks had an opportunity to wet a line today. Maybe a while before we can do it again - with doctor's appointments and weather to contend with. God Bless America!