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Fishing with Bob and Justin 5/2 thru 5/4, 2019
Sorry, it's been a week since I last blogged about a trip, but with the weather we've had this past week, it wasn't conducive to a good time. ;)
I had to reschedule some people who fell on those dates, unfortunately.
So, that brings us to Bob and Justin who came down from Wisconsin to fish with me this past Thursday, Friday, and today. Our first two days were tough for us. Bob wanted to jig....so, on day one, I took them up to West Reef where the Helix showed us good marks, but they only caught 3 walleye and one sheepshead there (I'm sure we stayed there much too long, but it's hard to leave fish to chase other fish...especially, if you think the weather and post spawn just has them in a funky mood).
With an hour and half left I said, "Lets go trolling and try to put more fish in the box"...so, we moved east of Lucy's and set up on the line with a southerly trolling pass, so that the NE wind would put the waves on the corner of the Ranger's stern at 1.7-1.8mph with Chrome Bandits in tow at 50-90 back off the Off Shore boards.
My crew landed one and saw three more pullbacks...only to find the fish escape when the board was halfway to the boat. So, we ended day 1 with only 4 fish.
Day two wasn't any better....due to rain/wind we launched a little later than normal. We got on the water by 7:45, I think. We repeated the pattern of going jigging first, and marking a lot of fish on the Humminbird, only to wonder why they weren't biting their offerings... even though they changed up their baits more than once.
This time, we gave ourselves enough time to do a little more trolling, but as my luck would have it, the bite shut off for many around 10:30 up on the line. This was repeated more than once on the radio and confirmed by a couple of captains I called. So, when the wind kicked up, I asked them if they wanted to go jigging in one more spot before we headed in, and they said, "Yes".
I took them down to the Marblehead Lighthouse and set up a drift from 30 foot to 21 foot of water. There were outrageous marks all through the water column in that 28 foot, but the water was chocolate milk, so we didn't catch anything there.
We ended day two with a whopping 2 fish to show for it...but, my guys were still happy about the day's fishing, and were looking forward to day 3 with a positive outlook. (My very favorite kind of customers!)
This morning, I picked Bob and Justin up from their hotel at 5:30 and took them to McDonald's for a breakfast "to go", then, headed to Catawba to wait on Capt Kevin to show up and launch us. He graciously agreed to since my guys didn't have waterproof footwear to get through the water on the pier, or the water we thought was on the pier.
Side note....the water level at Catawba is doable. The docks are floating docks the water has receded down from the cement part of the docks, so your feet won't get wet.
Anyhoo...we headed northwest out of the ramp this morning and hit the cans west of the Bass Islands. The Bandit program was similar to the day one program by Lucy's, which was 50-100 back. Huff Daddy Chrome, Nailed It, Buck Fever, and Khaki were good today. The biggest was probably 25 or 26 inches, but the majority were all cookie cutter 2 to 3 pound eaters. My crew was very happy with their results today, and that makes me happy. :)
I picked up a trip to fill tomorrow, so I'll be out again in the am with another crew from Wisconsin. Fingers crossed it goes as well as it did today.
Stay tuned..
Capt Juls
