Fishing with Chuck and His Boys...7/24/15

Okay, okay, first let me say, I'm sorry I haven't blogged a lot this week. I have been getting texts and emails asking me if everything is okay, because they haven't seen a blog entry from me in a few days. Everything is fine! I'm just running short on time each day.

Between getting the boat cleaned up for the next day's trip, making the brownies, doing the daily chores, and taking care of the 5 animals who let me live with them, I have very little time left before my 7-8pm bedtime. So, sometimes I'm going to miss blogging about a daily trip. I apologize for that...sincerely.

I do have time to blog today though, because I really don't seem to care that there is a light layer of dog hair on the carpeting and kitchen floor. The vacuuming can wait one more day!

I picked my crew up at 4:45 at the place they were staying. I would be fishing with Chuck and his two sons Donny and Derrick (10 and 8 years old, I think).
They wanted to get something to eat, so we headed over to Big Bopper's to have breakfast with some of the other Capt's. The morning chatter was pleasant, and the boys ate a hearty breakfast before we headed to the ramp.

We stopped to pick up some ice, and headed to Catawba State Park to launch at 6:15 AM. Off we went to the west side of the islands. I am not at liberty to say which area, because it isn't my info to give. All I can say is that it was west of the islands. I was worried that there would be too much algae over there, but it was pretty decent looking water there in the morning.

We made one pass with the Bandits running 75, 81, 91, and 120 back, and picked up one walleye right away. Then......nothing. We made a move up to between B Can and Cone Reef, and marked fish, but only had one pull back. We didn't get another fish for the next three hours. The boys were kept busy bringing lines in to check them, and to get used to using the line counter reels.

I had them scheduled for a 4 hour trip, with the option to keep fishing for another two, if the boys wanted to. I was sure they would want to go in, but they wanted to stay out and keep fishing. Hearing that made me happy. :)

We made one move south of where we were, set down to look for fish on the Onix, and got hailed by Capt Eric on the "Pirate Clipper". He said that he and "Pooh Bear" were catching fish now, and that I should move back down to where I started in the morning.

I decided to change three of the crankbaits back to crawler harnesses, with #2 Tadpoles, and set the first one out 41 back with the Purple Crusher Warrior blade (copper belly)
I thought to myself, "This might actually be good, if the crawlers go". As soon as I thought that, that first board went back, and I called Donny up to reel it in.

Both boys did a great job reeling in fish, and managed to get all of them in the boat. We only had one throw back walleye, because it didn't make the legal limit of 15 inches, and only one white perch all day. The rest of the fish were anywhere from 16-24 inches. Very "good eaters" in my book.

We ended up with 6 more keepers in that last hour and a half, to make it a total of 7 for Team Oesch. They had a good time and were grateful for the good weather Mother Nature provided for us. They are planning a nice family fish fry with their catch today. That too makes me happy!

Tomorrow, I am headed back to Canada with a gentleman, his nephew, and niece to fish the west side of Pelee. I'm hoping the grass is out of there by now. It's been a few days since I have been up there, so I'm not sure how it is up there right now. Fingers crossed...

Stay tuned....

Capt Juls