Today was a training trip to teach some new trollers how to use boards. We probably didn't pick the best day as it started out with a pretty stiff wind, but it laid down after a few hours somewhat. We started out by cedar point and that area was packed and i mean packed with bait. We did pull 4 nice fish from that area and then we went searching. We found bait just packed in 30' and closer to shore all the way from the castle to cedar point. Most of the fish marks we found where on the bottom. I'm assuming since the prior night was clear and a big bright moon that the fish ate all night and where sitting on the bottom full of shad. We set up chrome blue bandits and ran them 100 back with a 2 oz putting them right on the bottom with all of those big marks and we where able to pull a few nice big 9 and 10 lb fish. i slowed way down to 1.5 and it seemed to get us some bites and put some fish in the boat. I think we got them trained up on setting boards as we reeled in and moved so many times they got lots of practice. The amount of bait near shore in that area is amazing and the bellies of the fish we filleted had 10 to 12 shad in them. This is great for the fish and getting them big and healthy for the spring spawn but makes them a bit tougher to catch. We will see what the weather brings us, maybe we can get a few bonus winter trips in.
sunday 11/29/20 trip-113020-023-jpg