Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Darrell & Dads Family Guide Service
Started out in the first cove south of the launch on the east side. Worked the edge of the pads with a spinnerbait and a crankbait and flipped the pads with a Z-Hog and worm. Huge school of fry in front of the pads so I tossed the fluke for a bit. The water is so clear here I watched a 2-2.5lb smallie come out of the pads, swim under the fry, then make a pass up through them and go back in the pads. Cool but a little dis-heartening knowing they have more food than they know what to do with right now. I saw another cruiser so I tossed about 3 different lures in his vicinity and he would swim away, the only lure he showed interest in he swam up towards it but when I twitched it he stopped and slowly turned off. What this told me was the food is so easy right now they don't want to and won't work for it.
I continued south until another boat passed me going north, I bumped out cause I didn't want to fish used water and shortly thereafter decided to leave them the area and I ran up north to a shallow flat before the bridge. I tried jigs, spinnerbaits and crankbaits up here but literally no interest except the dink perch! Time for a tactic change...
I motored out deeper so I could start the re-rig process as it was getting windy. I switched to a smaller 1/4oz jig, a weighted and an un-weighted fluke, a tiny swimbait, a 3" grub and a drop shot and laid out an alternate color for each bait. My thought process was the drop shot would work as it's the easiest meal of the group and resembles a minnow, however, being stubborn I used the other stuff first haha. A few dink perch and a couple dink smallie misses and I finally busted out the drop shot. Had nibbles every cast but the better fish came on a Panic Minnow in 12-15' of water. First keeper of the day was a largemouth off wood, 2.3lbs. Second and third keepers were smallies and both came off wood as well. I had to use a 1/2oz weight due to the wind picking up and I kept the leader at about 4' to keep the bait out of the grass I was fishing. Released a couple dinker smallies in between the two decent 2+'s. Waaay slower than what I was expecting! I launched at 9am-ish and left at 4:30pm.
Has me rethinking a trip to Whatcom tomorrow....
Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Darrell & Dads Family Guide Service