Fishing with Danny and Randy...5/25/2026

[Capt Juls]

Left the house at 4:45am, hit the gas station for some ice, and headed to Mazurik's to get things ready before my customers showed up at 6am. The wind was very light out of the north, the air temp was in the low 60s, and the sky was cloudy.

When I got to Mazurik's, it was dark, and there were a few others already there and launching their boats. After the usual boat prep, I jumped in to dig out some crankbaits that are in the front storage compartment....those are the ones I don't use that often. This time, I was going to try the Reef Runner Mag 44s on one side and Bandits on the other side. They've worked in May before, so I thought I would give them a try.

Danny and Randy showed up on time, and we launched just before it got really busy at the ramp. I hadn't seen Danny in a year, and this year he was walking with a cane, so I told him to meet me at the courtesy dock instead of trying to climb the EZEESteps on the trailer to get into the boat. It would be much easier for him. Randy parked the truck and came down, jumped in the boat, and off we went.

I knew I wasn't going back to where I was yesterday, and decided to head towards Starve Island area, and the east side of the Bass Islands. On our way there, the Garmin kept marking a lot of fish in 20-22' of water, so I turned the Vexus around and went back to a starting point, and set up.

The Ulterra and baby Merc worked in unison to keep us on a course to the north at a speed of 2.5mph (FishHawk speed).

The water temp on the surface was 58.5 degrees, and at 15' down it was 60.2 degrees.

The lake was only a little rough from all the boat wakes...not the wind. The north wind was less than 5mph at 6am. A fog threatened to come in, but never really did, so that was a relief. I hate fishing in the fog.

Danny wasn't able to stand up, so Randy helped set lines after I showed him how to attach the Off Shore boards and set dipsies.

Two dipsies ran off each stern corner. I use a 6' rod and an 8.6' rod on each side. The shorter one is the "inside," and the longer is the "outside".

The inside run on the zero setting, and the outside run on the three settings.
The zero settings were set at 25 and 27 back. The three settings were at 35 and 37 back. Yeck and BadMo Arrow spoons were used. I didn't even bother with the worm-burners this morning.

We had 8 in the cooler in no time at all, and then we had a major mishap happen...it was no one's fault, but it was disastrous.

Here's what happened....

Since Danny can't stand very well, when a fish was on a dipsey, he would heave himself off the driver's seat and sit on the starboard compartment, so he could reel in a fish. Well, this time, he sat on the Ulterra remote that I had set down, and the remote freaked out.

The trolling motor lost it's paring to the remote, so I couldn't do anything with it, and it had gone berserk....speed was at power 10...it was turned to the right...and not responding to commands to turn the prop off. By the time I was able to put the kicker motor in neutral and get up to the motor itself to turn it off, the boat had done 1 1/2 circles and had board lines under the boat, and eventually had three lines wrapped around the kicker's prop. I was at least able to use the net to get the Off Shore board that was hanging off the end of the kicker back in the boat.

The line wasn't budging, though, so we would have to go back to the dock to free it. I wasn't about to go swimming at this time of year to fix it. Maybe when the water is 80 degrees, but not when it's 58! lol

Three lines had tangled in the kicker prop, and one even found itself around the trolling motor shaft. Two Bandits were still floating out back, and when I got the boat on plane, one of them came flying into the boat. A "Buck Fever" Bandit was lost, and it is floating out there somewhere.

We made it back to the dock around 7:30, and it was busy, so we pulled up to the courtesy dock and were able to free the kicker prop of line. However, since I have the day off, I have three reels that will need to be respooled tomorrow. Too much line was removed to keep them in calibration.

We went back out, but this time we only set the dipsies, because the crankbaits did nothing in that first hour, and the spoons were catching. We only fished four lines, but were able to get our limits before we ran out of time. Whew! Nothing big...just good eaters today.

Some days aren't perfect, but they can be interesting.

Randy has his own boat, and it will be launched for the season tomorrow. He's got a nice 1988 Tiara.

Danny will be back next week for a two-day trip with a friend who is coming in from Utah.

I'm off tomorrow, but will be back out for a two-day trip with Mick Jandl and two of his friends. They are coming down from Wisconsin.

Stay tuned....

Capt Juls