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Posts: 1310
Location: Washington, PA | We have a few small lakes in my area that are FULL of shad, trout, bullheads, and just about everything else a muskie could want, literally a buffet. My question is this. The particular lake only has one very small weedbed, is an electric motor only lake, so trolling is out of the question. Other than fishing that one spot, what would you do?
Cast the schools of shad? Cast near the damn where the bullheads are all over the place? Just thinking of where to start. I think one of the big problems with catching muskies in this lake is that they stock so many rainbow trout, the fish just have food everywhere! |
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Posts: 132
Location: Elkhart, IN | Hi,
I would look for other structure. The fish will relate to more than just weeds.
Definitely spend some time out casting the middle. You don't have to mark shad to catch fish. You don't have to fish very deep either. They will come up to smack your lure.
Good luck!
Brian |
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Posts: 440
| We kind of have the same situation here. It seems at times you just have to get big, dumb and ugly with them. Try and stand out in crowd. Eratic seems to be another key. We have a shad base, 10 ft visibility in the water and our best color is orange tiger. Make sense of that. |
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Posts: 938
Location: NeverNever Lake | I don't know, but I can be there in 15 mins once you figure it out...................
Stocked trout always makes it tough. I wouldn't be afraid to throw a black Bulldawg around the dam area or move up into the shallows with a Trapp once the season opens up again. It would be kinda nice if it got a little pressure on it for once just so patterns could be discovered.....................RaZe
Edited by RAZE1 4/1/2004 4:00 PM
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Posts: 1310
Location: Washington, PA | RAZE, we need to work that baby this year. It's been lurking in the back of my mind too long.
I wish we could fish it right now, those fish have to be shallow.......UGH.
Edited by tomyv 4/1/2004 4:11 PM
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Posts: 20231
Location: oswego, il | Does the lake have wood? How deep do the weeds go? Your lake sounds like it has bare bottom if that's the case. I would troll it with the electric and I would bang bottom. I have found that if there is not alot for the fish to hold to as far as wood, rocks and weeds, they will hold to the bottom. Somthing to think about. |
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Posts: 459
Location: New Baden IL | You could try drift trolling. Not really trolling, but kind of like it. I learned it in WI where trolling is not allowed. If the bottom is "somewhat" snag free, you can keep a bait down to almost any depth if you use 2 rods with the medium size bulldawg.
What I do is take set your boat up to use the wind/current to go over the structure you want to fish.
You can increase your speed with the trolling motor. It's possible to get 3.5-4.5 mph with the trolling motor and wind at your back.
Then make a long cast opposite the direction you are drifting.
Put your clicker on your reel, and hit freespool.
As the first bait is sinking, pick up your second rod, and cast it out in the same direction.
Pick up the first rod, and bring the bulldawg back to the boat with a bunch of rips, and jerks. Try to make it stand out. You can get a feel for the depth pretty easily with some practice. Sometimes you need to reel it up quickly to cut the depth back before you start the jerks and rips.
Watch for a follow, and cast it back out, put the clicker back on and set it down with the reel freespooled.
Pick up the second rod and do the same with it.
If you forget to freespool the reel, a snag or fish will drag it overboard (not that that happend to me)
If you forget to put the clicker on, you lose your first alert for strikes and snags.
I always just lay my second rod on the deck, till you get bit. Then the chaos comes. That's the fun part.
Hope this helps,
Rodney LaCaze
Edited by 2Rodknocker 4/1/2004 11:59 PM
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