| My dad has been going through minor cancer treatment the past few weeks, and has not been up to do much fishing. I finnally got him out the day before yesterday, and it rained all day long!!!! The reason I'm posting this, is my eyes were really opened that day, and I learned alot from the ole' man. We headed north in the morning and got to the small lake about noon. The surface temps were from 54-57 that day on that particular shallow pond. I had 2 suckers out and was casting a wingo spinner while dad threw a crane bait. I immediately got a 39"er on the wingo bait and kept using it, having a few more follows in short order. Dad then got a pair of 38's on the suckers within minutes of one another, and it already was turning out to be his best day for numbers(previous best was 1 fish). He started throwing the topraider, and the rain was just pounding us to a frazzle. I nicely told him that with the temps where they were, the action on suckers, and the hard rain, that surface baits probably were not his best choice. He immediately got a high thirties fish on my Durst TR and followed it with an undersized fish. I was going to switch to surface, but the rain came harder and I stuck with the bucktail. A wake appeared behind dads tr and a 43"er was soon released(had to cut all three back trebles so I quickly gave dad my bullfrog tr as a replacement), and dad was now telling me how good he was doing(like he needed to rub it in). I switched to a Topraider and made two casts and dad said "I think theres a fish....." and WHAM, ther water erupted and the fight was on again, this time a deep head shaker that didn't show itself for what seemed like a long time. I netted dads biggest WI fish(47") and after the release, he was almost in tears when he said "my legs haven't felt this rubbery in 25 years".
Dad broke one of the rules that I usually abide by, and that was cracking fish on top in very heavy rain. I will not write that tactic off anymore. Dad also gave me one the most memorable day of fishing I'll ever have.
thanks Dad!!! |
