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Hit the water about 9:30 am, overcast, suprisingly calm. Started working docks and saw beds right from the get go. With no wind, and good water clarity, the fish were pretty spooky. It appears that most of the fish have just started commiting to beds. There are still some fish crusing the shallows not yet on beds, and some areas that will typically have beds that dont yet have them. It started raining on us at around 10:30, but mostly just light showers. I only touched two rods today because of the conditions. One rigged with a watermelon black flake Yamamoto tube w/ 1/8 oz tube weight and Gama 3/0 ewg worm hook, rigged weedless. The other a drop shot w/ 3/16 oz weight, and a #11 color 3.5" pannic minnow. Both baits produced fish, but the pannic minnow produced the bigger fish. If your not familiar with pannic minnows, you should be. They are a great locally made bait. Check out density-tackle.com for all the details. We were on the water for about 3 hours, and landed about 10 fish, most in the 1-2.5 lb range, with the biggest being the one in the picture, which I didn't weigh, but would guess 3.5-4 lb. We saw alot of fish, but most were being very spooky. All fish were in 4-6' of water, typically right next to a dock piling. Not sure of the water temp as the temp on my sonar is not working.

arniejl

5/26/2011 7:01:00 AM

That is a fatty. No work yesterday? I am off until next Tuesday:) Hitting up Swofford today or probably tomorrow with the wifey.

I own panic minnows and love the action of them but am a little confused on how to fish them. I fished them last Sunday a little with a weighted swimbait hook but fished them like a tube and letting it sink all the way down on a slack line that bouncing it along a bit. May I ask how you fished them?

Thanks

HammerinHonkers

5/26/2011 9:26:00 AM

Fish them nose hooked on a dropshot, they are deadly

rickydbasser

5/26/2011 10:30:00 AM

Can attest to the panic minnow. Over the previous 4 years I had beaten American Lake to death with a drop shotted small Fin-S in rainbow trout. After so many smallies caught and released, it just wasn't catching near as many fish. Thats when I bought some Panic Minnows at Sportco. Immediately began catching more smallies again. Ofcourse I was also catching a whole lot more rock bass too. We've probabley been on the lake at the same time, cause I fish the heck out of American. I've personnally been getting the shallow bass dead sticking a 4" Bass Pro Shop Sticko in watermellonseed. Anyway, good report.....

f1sh1nf00l

5/26/2011 8:36:00 PM

arnie,
unfortunately im working nights, so i woke up "early" to get some fishin in. Drop shot is how I usually fish panic minnows, but I also have some little wobble head jigs(thats what I call em, they are the ones with the plastic disc in front of the head that makes them wobble on retrieve), those work nicely with the panic minnows running them over rock piles where theres not to much weeds. Let me know how Swafford went for you. I might head to Riffe sometime for a little pre fish.

arniejl

5/27/2011 7:22:00 AM

Yeah, headed out this morning for Swofford at 5:40 a.m. Got to Scott Turner road, just past Eatonville and it was just pouring and 41 degrees. We turned around and now I sit contemplating Lake Spanaway or American or maybe even clear Lake. Hmmm.

You know I hate dropshotting, lol. When I asked the question I had hoped that wasn't the answer, but consensus says... bummer.

HammerinHonkers

5/28/2011 1:42:00 PM

The plastic disced jighead is called a scrounger head. Another good trick is to bite off 2 inches off of a swim senko and put it on a scrounger head, works great.

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