Author Topic: I made it out....  (Read 3088 times)

Offline ctom

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I made it out....
« on: 06/14/13 11:02 UTC »
....this morning for a couple hours and did fairly well. Crappies and sunfish both kept me busy and every now and again a smallie would chomp down on my crappie plastic and give me a thrill. Of course the catfish, carp and sheephead gave me a thrill too.

I fished a 600 acre local lake and every hen crappie I caught this morning still was carrying spawn despite the water being almost 70 degrees. Late snows, recurring high water events and roller coaster water temps have those fish messed up big time. I imagine they either move in one night and get the job done or it may be late enough now that they'll just hold the spawn. Even the sunfish hens had swollen bellies which were as hard as rocks. I couldn't find a crappie on typical spawning water today. They all came from deeper water. Maybe hit shaallow over the deep stuff but they definitely were not using shallow water. Strange and stranger.

Its was a nice morning on the water but now the wind has bucked up a bit again and clouds have moved in. Rain they say by tonight. Thank You Lord for those precious three hours this morning!
There are good ships
and wood ships
ships that sail the sea
but the best ships are friendships
and may they
always be ......An Irish Toast

Offline ctom

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Re: I made it out....
« Reply #1 on: 06/20/13 09:59 UTC »
I got another hall pass for a couple hours this morning and managed to get some quality fish between storms. I only had a couple hours but I would have left anyway due to the clouds of gnats on the lake today. I'm still hacking those suckers up out of my lungs.

My target was crappies and I did well on them and sunfish and bass also were willing participants. The fish of the day was a 31" carp that hit a bluegill/chartreuse-tailed small fry 1.75". On a 7 1/2 foot ultralight I had my hands full.

I brought home a meal of 12" crappies for our dinner tonight and released perhaps forty more of them. I had some sunfish up to 9" and bass seemed to be hanging around just to annoy me.

The weather has already kicked some major-league boomers up this morning, one of which hit the lake just as I was leaving the parking area. Another just swung past the house as I wrapped up the filleting session. The sun is shing like no tomorrow but the air is black in the SW....the direction the stroms have been coming from. In spite of all the wet we've put up with this year already we need a good soaker again for the gardens and yards. Apparently today and the next couple days have been delgated to deliver the wet. Bringer on, I'm land-locked for a few days now.
There are good ships
and wood ships
ships that sail the sea
but the best ships are friendships
and may they
always be ......An Irish Toast

Offline MO QWACK

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Re: I made it out....
« Reply #2 on: 06/20/13 19:17 UTC »
Awesome, those carp can get you going! I always think I have a big flat head but never fails role rubber mouth rolls. Do y'all mainly catch white or black crappie? Most of ours are white unless you are on the main lake then its about 50/50.

Offline ctom

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Re: I made it out....
« Reply #3 on: 06/20/13 20:53 UTC »
Mo....

The lake I was on this morning and the Mississippi River have both white and black crappies with the black being dominant. I don't know about elsewhere, but in this part of the world a 14" white crappie will weigh about the same as a 11" black. During the spawn I'll see the colors hang around together but after the spawn the whites tend to be open water fish while the blacks tend to relate to structure more. After the spawn, I tend to hang around structure too.
There are good ships
and wood ships
ships that sail the sea
but the best ships are friendships
and may they
always be ......An Irish Toast

Offline Jester

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Re: I made it out....
« Reply #4 on: 06/21/13 06:45 UTC »
Sounds like you had a great time Tom. The rivers here in SE Georgia have been up and down for the last 2 months. I'm loving the high water due to the fact that they have been all but dried up for the last 8 to 10 years. I do have a question though. You guys have fresh water sheephead??? I have never caught Crappy, Sunfish, Carp in the same water as Sheephead. I know they say  that y'all do it different in the north But I had no idea it was that different lol  ;D

Dennis

Offline ctom

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Re: I made it out....
« Reply #5 on: 06/21/13 07:17 UTC »
Oh yes and apparently our freshwater drum is like our crappies up here and have rules of their own. I tell ya what.   If you'd like to acquire some of these drum that get along with sunfish, crappies and others real well, maybe we can arrange for a transplant from here to there. lol We have way more of these drum than we need.
There are good ships
and wood ships
ships that sail the sea
but the best ships are friendships
and may they
always be ......An Irish Toast