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Fishing Report: local Bass lake

2K views 12 replies 5 participants last post by  Jeff Sod 
#1 ·
Well, my wife went out shopping yesterday afternoon and I was sitting there watching TV for about an hour before a light bulb went off and I said "I could be fishing on this beautiful day instead of sitting inside." 20 minutes later, I was on a local lake in my float tube. :)

I was on the water at about 2:45 or so and caught a few pickerel to start out. I finally got one small bass after about an hour, but there was nothing biting in the usual spots. I was paddling my way around a small island where there's usually never any fish when I saw one roll on the surface not far off shore, so I decided to put a few casts near the island. It's normally very shallow but with all the rain the water was probably 2' deep or so right up to near the shore. Not too much later I dropped my fly near shore and saw it pop up out of the water. I figured it was a sunfish nipping at it, but after my first strip and pause, something smashed it. A minute later I had a 1.5 lb bass in hand. I kept working my way down the shore and got another one about the same size a few casts later. A little later, another smaller bass was in hand. I kept working my way around the island and got another couple bass in the 1.5 lb range (my digital scale weighed them all at 1.5-1.7 lbs), plus a nice 12" yellow perch.

I missed a few more fish before it got totally dark and I decided to call it a night. It was an educational trip for me because I've never caught a single fish off the shore of that island, and this time, they were all clustered there. Probably my last bass outing of the year and not a bad way to end things! :)
 
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#3 ·
I was using big streamer patterns.

I also apologize for not posting the name of the lake I was fishing, but people rarely fish this lake, but it's one of the best anywhere in my area so I'm not big on telling anybody else about it. :)
 
#6 ·
I couldn't resist the urge to the hit local pond for a bit of late season float tubing myself on Saturday. I have not had a largemouth on the line in a couple weeks or more and was hoping to find at least one willing candidate. It was nice clear calm day and though I should by all rights have been chasing oak leaves around my yard with the blower I decided they could wait. I arrived just before three and only fished for an hour. I had a pool thermometer hanging off the tube and it was reading 56 degrees. Not bad for middle of November. Anyway I wasn't sure what to expect as far as fishing goes but figured the weather has been mild so something has to be biting. In short order I was fast to a nice pickeral. I then hooked a nice largemouth the very next cast. Both of these fish hit the fly hard! For the next 45 min's I had a steady pick of fish. Caught 4 or 5 largemouths, 2 pickeral and three sunfish. Probably my last LMB outing this year too and nice way to wrap it up
 
#9 ·
Nice! I think the last time I got a largemouth was on Columbus Day, although I did have a couple hits from a 6"er last weekend. Haven't seen any pickerel around either, which is kind of surprising since they don't mind the colder water.

Q
 
#10 ·
Well, I had some free time yesterday so I decided to hit the water again. :)

The bass seemed to be done for the season. I got 4 pickerel, and even those were sluggish. I'm not complaining though because they're already enough of a PITA to unhook, especially when they get the fly down in the gill area, so being sluggish makes it a bit easier to extract the hook.

That's it, I'm done for the year with the float tube.
 
#11 ·
Yeah Pickerel can be fun to catch but messy to unhook. I think because they strike at warp speed they often get the hook in deep. The old upside down trip helps but I find you can never get them to open their darn mouths to get the hook out. They probably are the best shot at getting action in warmwater ponds this time of year though. I just picked up a copy of an old book called the Weedy World Of The Pickerels by Bob Gooch. Who would have thunk you could have written a whole book on Pickerel. A very old school book written in the 60's but fun to read was cheap. Another book I picked up that was even cheaper and well done was America's Favorite Fishing which done by Outdoor life in the sixties and well researched. It is all about Sunfish, Bluegills, Crappies and Hornpout fishing. Some very good b&w plates with excellent details on distinguishing different sunfishes by the gillplate shapes. This book was listed at $1.00 by many booksellers online and was well worth it to me.
 
#12 ·
Jeff Sod said:
I just picked up a copy of an old book called the Weedy World Of The Pickerels by Bob Gooch. Who would have thunk you could have written a whole book on Pickerel. A very old school book written in the 60's but fun to read was cheap.
I used to read that book all the time at my local library when I was a kid. It was in the adult section, but the librarian knew that I was a fishing nut and didn't mind me hanging out in that section to read the fishing related books. Heck, she even occasionally let me check a few out to take home for a while.

Memories....
 
#13 ·
Do you remember reading the part in the book about how the author had heard that some people went out on the ice just after the ponds froze with an axe and walked around the shallows in search of pickerel and would wack the ice above a spotted pickerel to stun it then chop a hole and retrieve? Not very sporting but I guess if food is your only motive then it's effective.
 
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