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| Last night I and my partner were fishing in a league. As we moved toward an area with marked rock out cropping we saw a big splash, then about a minute later saw a musky completely clear water right by the hazard buoy. We fished toward the area and by the time we got to the hazard, there were dozens of bait fish breaking the surface, over and over again. Area had large boulders and weeds. Sometimes we could see the baitfish, mostly small bluegills, in large groups. While I have seen that behavior in the past, with bait fish chased to the surface, never for this long. We fished an area of maybe 3 acres hard for over an hour. Topwater, spinner baits, bucktails buzzed over the weed tops. The whole time, bait fish were coming to surface every 10-15 seconds.
Knowing that it was not necessarily musky chasing, we still thought it worth trying.
But, we never had so much as a follow. We did see the musky roll again near the hazard buoy. We finally left and fished another area.
Clearly there was a ton of baitfish, so maybe that was why no interest in our lures. Or maybe we should have been doing something different, although I am not sure what.
Water was 5 to 7 feet deep, large boulders and thick weeds within a couple feet of surface. A few, small open areas which is where we saw the baitfish.
Any thoughts? |
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Posts: 401
Location: Selkirk, Manitoba | Case of need to match the "hatch" as best you can. We don't have any significant bluegills here, but if say that were perch, I would not be thinking that they were being chased to surface, they would be more likely to hug bottom and tighten up school if that were the case (same with ciscoes, shiners, etc). My guess is that that gills were feeding on something else, potentially shiners or some other minnow species spawning (or the larvae hatching) and the gills taking advantage of that. The feeding behaviour of the gills and their darting, etc would get other predators in feed mode. In these scenario more likely to get a bite than a follow. Predators in these situation do seem to get very selective for size/shape/colour. I would not discount the possibility that the musky were not even feeding on the gills, but on shiners if that was what was spawning.
Edited by Angling Oracle 6/12/2025 10:05 AM
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| I did throw a couple smaller baits, one a rubber blue gill and the other a perch glide bait from Rapala. Closest I could come to the bait fish. |
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Posts: 1525
Location: Brighton CO. | There's a little city pond a few miles from home some years they stock it with Trout in the spring, this year they stocked it twice. Other years I've caught them on a Mepp's #1 witch I've cut off two of hooks to make it a single and pinch the barb down on the remaining hook. When they first stock it and I will catch fish on the first cast and it's in it's throat. The last time they stocked it was Friday (both times they stocked it didn't show up in the stocking report) I caught a Trout on a Mepp's #2 dressed treble I was hoping to catch a Bass Mepp's #1 and on a Trout magnet jig in both cases I would fish thru packs of twenty Trout and maybe one or so would be a little more aggresive and you would get a hit or even a peck. I would catch 3-8 fish per morning and other people would come and go without nothing. I don't use worms or Powerbait. I don't like to eat Trout so everything goes back. |
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Posts: 1525
Location: Brighton CO. | The point I make with my rambling above is there can be fish everywhere but they may not be feeding. Here in Colorado we had Muskie outings and they (fish and game ) had stocked Trout and we would never boat a thing when the Muskies were beating up on the stocked Trout. |
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Posts: 2371
Location: Chisholm, MN | Muskies... |
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| Kirby Budrow - 6/12/2025 1:27 PM
Muskies...
Ha! On the way home we joked about joining a golf league next summer instead of a musky league. Much less frustrating. |
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Posts: 2371
Location: Chisholm, MN | North of 8 - 6/12/2025 1:29 PM
Kirby Budrow - 6/12/2025 1:27 PM
Muskies...
Ha! On the way home we joked about joining a golf league next summer instead of a musky league. Much less frustrating.
I'm a terrible golfer but I threaten walleye fishing all the time |
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Posts: 1304
Location: E. Tenn | Got a J-13 Rapala? Crank it just fast enough to run under the surface.. That's worked for me several times when baitfish are dimpling the surface over tall weeds. |
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Posts: 164
Location: West Central WI | This may be worth something, or nothing. It brought back memories of fishing off piers on the Gulf Coast and on a coral island in the Indian Ocean while I was in the navy. It was common for bait fish to be so concentrated that the bottom looked like a large moving black blob with tens of thousands of “minnows” swimming so tight together it blocked out the white sand below. When a predator fish attacked that blob, there would be a large “V” shape as the minnows moved out of the way and it happened fast. I would catch some of those minnows and put a treble l hook through the tail area and toss it ahead of that “V” as it formed. With all the other fish frantically swimming out of the way, the one slow fish – mine, would get eaten almost every time. In your situation, why not toss the closest bait or minnow (bluegill?) you have resembling the fish that are jumping and let it sit still or small twitches in the middle of where the fish are being chased. With all the other fish swimming, it would be an easy target. Casting and retrieving through all those moving bait fish would make your bait look like all the others so your chances of not being bit are the same as those of all the bait fish trying to escape. Give that muskie an easy target. Outside the box thinking for muskies but may be worth a try if your first idea isn’t working. |
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| Thanks. The area had heavy weed growth, with boulders here and there and just a few open spots. We did try a walk the dawg style bait and worked it like an injured bait fish, but it was an 8" Weagle, so much larger than the bait fish we were seeing. I did wonder if we would have had something really small to work like that if it would have worked better. |
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Posts: 2371
Location: Chisholm, MN | Likely the fish you saw already ate. You probably watched it eat. It might have been the only one there or any other fish there just ate as well. You probably missed the window. Been there. |
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| Kirby Budrow - 6/13/2025 7:25 AM
Likely the fish you saw already ate. You probably watched it eat. It might have been the only one there or any other fish there just ate as well. You probably missed the window. Been there.
Yep, that is what we decided. Knew it couldn't be that we were not smart enough ;>) |
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Posts: 13
Location: Wright County MN | I would agree you probably saw that fish eat. not to say there couldn't be multiple on that school of bait but normally I would cast through it a handful of times and keep working the spot. Its hard to decide between working an area you know there's for sure one or keep covering water. I normally am of the mindset to keep running. |
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Frustrating Scenario