OH WHAT A WEEK!

Jim is down for a few weeks after having foot surgery but my neighbor Charlie was kind enough to go fishing with me yesterday. It was a cool and windy morning as a front passed through and the fishing was off from what it had been earlier in the week. We started at a spot I had never fished before but left that spot after about two hours without a fish. The second spot was slow yet we started catching a few 11 inch plus fish right away. The afternoon bite picked up after the wind eased. We ended the day with 22 good fish. The biggest fish was 15 inches. Charlie caught that brute on a minnow tipped pushing rod. There was also a very nice white crappie in the mix. I changed my long line setup yesterday. After years of pulling double jigs (1/16's) I decided to pull singles and add a split shot to adjust the depth. A few years ago, I read a post from Dutch on CDC. In that post, he said he pulled singles and caught just as many fish as he did pulling doubles. I thought about that and the fact that I catch about 90% of the fish on the bottom jig. Fishing single jigs make untangling snags easier and rolling up at the end of the day easier. As I get older I have to remind myself smarter not harder. Yesterday my setup was single 1/16 oz jigs on all but a couple of rods. I used split shot sizes 1/16 oz or 1/24 oz on some of the rods. I also pulled a 1/32 oz jig with a 1/24 oz sinker which picked up a few fish. The best curly tail colors were Tennessee shad and blue/black/chartreuse. We trolled 1 mph when we could (wind) and found the most fish in about 10 feet of water at a depth of 6-8 feet. The water temperature was in the 58-60 degree range. This was the third trip to the Hill in the past seven days. On the previous two trips I fished with another friend. We caught a two man limit out of his boat one day and 40 out of my boat a few days later. Now is the time. If you snooze you lose!