Report; 7/11/18

We don't get to "choose" much when we fish anymore. Seems like the weather & doctor's appointments and life in general interfere with our "retirement" plans these days, more than ever! Anyway, another severe cold front came through last night, but Walt & I decided, "what the heck", let's go!

Launched around 7:20 am this morning with the air temp in the lower 60's and the water around 77 degrees. It was a cold run out but that's usually the case for us. Here's a shot of Walt piloting us out with his stick steer:

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A tad on the chilly side, but warmer than in previous trips. We started out as usual, side pulling jigs and crankbaits. Walt let out 2 plastics dressed on 1/8 oz. ball heads; I elected to go with one 1/8 oz. jig and one of the "gawdy" Arkie 350 crankbaits in blue/chartreuse. That crank caught fish, but not as well as the pink/chartreuse model. Anyway, it did pull up this unexpected surprise:

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Hard to believe a largemouth this size is cruising the 22' depths, but I guess it knows where the food is. BTW, that was on 2# test line on my 9' B n' M rod. Great rods!

Here's some shots of the main basin depths we were looking at. The groups of fish and bait were not as prolific as previous trips, but they were there - just more scattered about:

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On one of our side pulling passes we glanced over and saw a small group of whitetails feeding. Actually there were 3 deer there, but this is the best shot I could get - without my 30/06:

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Here are some pictures of what Walt & I were able to catch & release:

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And of course, a trip would not be complete without a few yellow perch. They see to have a hankerin' for crankbaits as of late!:

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All total we caught & released 78 fish today; most being crappie, with two yellows, 1 bass and 8 bluegill. Not a bad day to be on the water. Hope some of you folks got out as well. Looks like another possible trip on Friday....we'll see if these old bones can take it! :)