Thread: Please help me fish Hillsdale successfully

Hi all,
I've been trying to fish Hillsdale for over 6 years now with my boat and have had the worst success. For 2-3 years, my best day on the water was 2-3 fish caught. Granted I don't out there as often as most of you fellas. It may be only a couple times a month. But, that means when I finally get time to go, I'm really disappointed when I completely strike-out. I hear a lot of guys claim they can go out anytime no matter the conditions and catch fish. They're worst days on the water usually sound better than my best days. I don't need to catch 50 to be happy. 5-10 would be an incredible day on the water for me.

I've finally gotten to a point where I can occasionally pick-up 5-10, but I really want to make this a consistent thing. For instance, I had one of those super-rare weekends where I was able to break away from the wife and kids twice in one weekend. This Saturday afternoon around 2:00pm, I went out to the flats, anchored off (no trolling motor) right over a good bunch of fish (I have sonar) and had instant success. I pulled 11 fish (7 keepers 10"-12") out of that spot in about 1.5 hours. Caught crappie & stripped bass on minnows with jig-head about 10' down. Would have loved to have seen some walleye. So, I marked the spot on my GPS and figured I'd take my daughter out Sunday morning (around 9:00am) to a proven location where I knew she'd have fun catching fish. Well guess what? We struck-out completely even though my sonar was showing a massive school of fish directly below us! She still had fun driving the boat around, but if I don't change something quick, I'm gonna completely loose her interest in fishing altogether.

I'm finally learning enough to where I can use my sonar to find the fish, which took years, but now when I find them, they only sometimes bite. I know a lot you say Hillsdale is tricky and I should branch out and try other lakes, but concurring Hillsdale is turning very personal for me and is quickly rising to the top of my bucket list.

So, long story short, please help me figure out why my luck changed so much within 18 hours. The weather was very crummy Sunday morning, but I talked to a friend of mine who was out there a couple hours earlier and had a great time catching fish. Was that couple of hours all that made the difference? Is it impossible to catch fish when a storm front is moving in?

Just went to hillsdale tonight, you should try to go for white bass, it is fun to catch.
http://www.crappie.com/crappie/kansa...ml#post1911772