Very easy fishing on Pine Lake yesterday, opening weekend, after the lake was heavily stocked. Fished with Quadfather and Craigo. Fished from about 7 am to 3 pm. The action for me was constant, trolling a best west spinner behind a small flasher, no weights, fifty pulls back. Took a while for Quad to dial it in (match my setup ;+] ), but he got to steady action as well. Took a break in the middle to work the shores for bass. I released one small large mouth caught with a floating perch pattern Rapala plug. I caught and released maybe 30 trout.

Quad had to leave about 11:15, leaving me with an empty seat in my boat. So I decided to offer that seat to a stranger amongst the huddled masses fishing shoulder to shoulder on the big dock. He was on the end of the dock, closest to the boat launch, easy to float up to and ask. Turned out to be another WALakes member, Craigo, and he was eager to get off the crowded dock. He was only there for 20 minutes he said, and had his patience tested by other guys casting over his shoulder.

So we head out, and I resume my steady hookups. After Craigo adjusts his setup to sortof match mine, with a wedding ring behind some pop gear, he starts getting some decent action. The best action was right in the middle of the lake, fishing the surface in about 30-40 feet of water.

Finally I decide my butt had been in the seat long enough and told Craigo that I wanted to wrap wrap it up. He badly wanted one of the 800 bigger fish that were recently planted, but so far had eluded all of us. But, it was time for me to go. We were trolling our way back to shore, when Craigo's dreams came true. The big fish hooked up very far behind us, but I saw it jump and could tell it was much bigger than the others. Had a little scare when the fish went over my line, and got our lines tangled. We had to carefully work together handling our poles to unwind the line while not losing his dream fish. He got it to the boat, and I struggled to net it, so he took the net and deftly drug the fish into it. Victory! Twas a great way to end the day!

Definitely one of the best fishing days I have had. Did not think to get the water temperature. Partly sunny, not much wind. Not many boats out at first, but the collection grew as the day wore on. Quite a few belly boats, pontoons, and kayaks. The dock was packed the entire time.

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