Thread: Report on Cat Fri 5-15

Late report on the Cat. Got there and on the water at 9:15 and right off the bat, trolling diff. colors and sizes of jigs,,nailed a 13 incher, then turned around and hit the area again and nailed another, and then it poured. Rained 3 more times that morning before clearing finally about noonish. Off and on all day till 3:30pm, picked up a fish scattered till I had caught 22 crappies, 2 largemouth one at 2lbs, and 4 about a pound stripers. Tried bandits for over a hour with no results, changing colors half doz times. Changed colors on jigs and using diff style jigs at least 15 times. Only color I could get them to hit on was 1/8 oz RR's with flo green tubes injected with crappie nibbles. I couldn't get them to hit anything else but that jig. Speed of long lining was critical also. If I was moving slow,,no hits,,moving too fast,,no hits. You have to guess that one. Also. out of 22 crappies,,only one was a male and he was the smallest I kept as I kept only 7 total as they were all females loaded with eggs. Water temp was 68 and later that day with the sun finally out..up to 72 in a few spots. Eggs weren't totally ready for the spawn either. Its the reason I released the other females, and the 6 besides the male I kept were pretty hard hooked and probably wouldn't have made it. I personally think with the pressure on the Cat..we need to let them spawn and catch them later. Only other than a small dink I released, the male being 10 3/4", these were nice sized females to 13 inches I had caught long lining.

Originally Posted by filletfetish

Surprised cranks didn't yield a few. Some days, you have to be very specific....sounds like one of those days.

So was I as speed was a critical factor . I tried speeds from 0.4 to 2.0 and the when trolling jigs or RR;s the slower most of the time the better. But Friday, speed the fish hit the RR's was 1.4 to 1.6. Normally l prefer a speed of 0.8 to about 1.0 for jigs. That speed is a good cranking speed as well and couldn't get a hit on a crankbait. Depth was also a critical factor that I didn't post. You will have to figure that one out. Lake had been stabilized for 2-3 days after a dreop of 17 or so feet from the pull. Water from the launch was stained and thru the slot,,out in the main body of the lake was fairly clear closer to the dam you got. Great water,,but most in the upper 60's. Quite a few fishermen fishing the points farther out in the lake with minnows,,but not catching much after the rain to where most had left by noon as the clouds cleared and it finally warmed up.

Outlook for next week beginning Monday thru June 11 by acu weather forcast is rain off and on thru the 11th about every day, with below normal temps. Hope its wrong. Heck,,I am still seeing tom turkeys around my location still wanting to breed and going thru the motions, still wanting to breed.