Juno 6/29/2012

I was able to squeeze in a few hours of fishing today before I head off on another few days of vacation.  I arrived at the lake around 4am and was able to fish until 10:30.  The lake continues to fill up with weeds making a lot of techniques impossible.  I caught around 20 bass with the biggest only going 15 inches.  The majority were caught on a spinnerbait, with a few falling to the paddle tail worm and jig.

Lack of Posts

It's been a while since the last post.  I just returned from a trip to Disney and am ready to leave for a few days camping.  I hope to be fishing again by the fourth.

Fish/Finch Lakes 6/10/12

This was my first trip to these lakes this year.  I didn't go in with high hopes because there was a 20+ boat tourney the previous day as well as the lakes being treated for weeds 11 days ago.  I started the day throwing a Gambler Paddle tail worm and picked up a few fish.  I eventually switched over to a jerkbait.  I saw numerous fish chase it all the way to the boat and couldn't get any takers.  I decided that the jerking action was throwing the fish off and went to a slow steady retrieve.  That was the ticket that allowed me to pick up 22 bass.  A sixteen incher was the largest.  It seems that every trip this year has been capped by a sixteen inch fish.  I need to find a few larger fish.

Juno Lake Night Fishing 6/6/12

I got a chance to do some night fishing on Juno last week.  I fished from midnight until 7am.  Most of the night was a complete bust.  As soon as the sun began to come up the fish turned on and I was able to salvage the trip with 11 largemouth and 5 rock bass.  Nothing of size was caught.

Paradise Lake 5/28

Not much to report here.  A friend and I were only able to catch two bass, one dogfish, and one pike.  The lake was packed with pan fishermen and only one other guy that appeared to be hunting bass.  I have never had much luck catching bass on this lake, but figured it wouldn't have all of the holiday crazies running around on it.  On a positive note, I was able to see my first bald eagle.  That is something I've been looking forward to for a long time.  I didn't get a picture, but we were able to get pretty close before it flew away.

Juno Lake 5/25/12

I fished Juno after work tonight from 6-11pm.  I wanted to get out and fish before the weekend holiday traffic hit.  I caught about a dozen bass with the biggest going 16 inches.  I'm really having a hard time dialing the fish in on these lakes this year.  I seem to have to junk fish and throw a variety of baits just to hit 10-12 fish a trip.

Juno Lake 5/20/12

I arrived at the lake around 5:30am and was shocked that the lot was already beginning to fill up.  The first thing that I noticed was that the weeds have gotten even worse and many were to the surface as the water is even lower than last trip.  It will surely be a tough year to fish this lake as the weeds are going to present some major problems.  I fished until about noon and only left because it was beginning to get too hot.  I didn't catch a lot of fish, but the ones I caught were all in the keeper range.  I think I ended up with 12 on a variety of baits.  Most came on a Rapala jerk bait.

Magician Lake 5/19/12

I went to Magician this morning and the fish were biting.  I caught a fish on my first cast and it continued all morning until the sun came up.  Once the sun came up it seemed like the fish completely shut off and I couldn't figure out what they wanted.  The morning fish all came on a shaky head worm pulled slowly across the bottom.  Water clarity is around 8 feet and all of my bites came in 4-6 feet of water.

Maggies 5/13/12

I got out to the river for about 4 hours this afternoon.  The water was really dirty and visibility was minimal.  Water temps were running right around 65 degrees and the fish didn't seem too active.  I caught a few large mouth, a couple small mouth and one walleye.  They all came on a rattle trap.  My goal was just to cover as much water as possible and find active fish.  One small mouth I caught had some funky discoloration.  I also realize I need to work on my fish holding skills because the picture of the walleye looks down right ridiculous. 

Dewey Lake 5/12/12

I started the day at Magician, but an hour in a storm blew through.  The skies got dark, thunder started rolling, and I saw a bit of lightning.  I decided to call it quits and headed to the ramp.  By the time I had all of my gear loaded and got a mile down the road it began to clear up.  I still felt like fishing so I drove down the road to Dewey Lake.  I have never fished this lake and have not heard much about it good or bad.  It's quite a bit different than Magician.  It's mostly shallow and has a lot more weeds.  I ended up catching 22 bass and one crappie.  The only problem was that only one bass would have kept.  I'm sure that large bass are in the lake, but I would say most are small.  They all came on a baby 1 minus.

Juno 5/10/12

I got out for a few hours after work today.  The air temperature was 65 with abundant sunshine and not a cloud in the sky.  I fished for a few hours and caught one or two bass on a variety of different lures each, but never could put a pattern together.  The water was 64 degrees and extremely clear.  The weeds are already getting bad.  With our mild winter it appears that they are going to be really bad.

Boat Repairs

Well, my boat has been in the shop for over a week now and I sure do miss it.  I took it in to have the tilt/trim motor rebuilt because it was leaking fluid from the main ram.  I assume it's just the seals, but didn't think it was a task I was cut out for.  It was a beautiful weekend with the nice weather and full moon.  I bet the bass are really bedding and it's killing me to not be on the water.

Juno 4/29/12

Another trip to Juno and yet another cold start to the day.  We arrived at the lake around 7am to temps in the high 30's and a light wind.  We drove to an area that is generally weedy and has a nice drop from 5 feet to 12 feet.  I picked up a few in this spot on a jig.  We bounced around from area to area without much luck before we decided to try the channels.  We caught a couple more in the channels using soft plastics.  By the end of the day we had 12 bass of which only 4 would have kept. 

I was able to catch a few bass on some hand poured jig trailers I started making.  That gives me some confidence to pour some more and mix up some new colors.  I will make a separate post in the future about how that's going.

Juno 4/28/12

Finally!  Michigan bass season is here and I was hell bent on not missing opening day despite a forecast of windy, cold, and rainy weather.  I arrived at the lake a 7am to a light drizzle, 45 degree temps, and 13mph wind.  I decided to throw the rattle trap into wind blown points.  I caught 2 doing that and then switched to a Mann's 1 Minus.  That bait produced another 2 fish.  I spent the morning drifting different parts of the lake throwing about 8 different baits.  Around 11:30 I decided I had had enough seeing as how my fingers and toes were completely numb.  I ended up with 5 fish, 3 of which were keepers.  I'm pretty happy considering the conditions and 52 degree water temp.  It did rain nearly the entire time and even hailed off and on.

Wawasee 4/21/12

I have no idea why I decided Wawasee would be a good choice today.  It was chilly, overcast, and super windy.  The wind made most areas nearly impossible to fish.  I was able to find a few protected spots and picked up some small fish.  I also tried the channels, but those fish had a case of lockjaw.