08-08-2012, 02:33 AM
Had a family vacation planned to Fish Lake so we loaded up the Truck and moved to... Fish lake. Got to fish lake after the prerequisite 5 hour drive (little girls got to potty a lot) and we had camp set up by 3 p.m. on Friday. Time to hit the water. Fished hard until dusk. Caught one decent Rainbow and all the perch my little girl wanted. She never did cast, hook a fish, and land it all by herself. She is only 4 so I figured patience would prevail.
Up early the next morning (my wife and daughter thought 8:30 was early.. I guess they were on vacation...) on the lake at 9 a.m.. Caught a couple of Splake and the odd rainbow early. We were there to catch splake and jigging was the method we were going to use. I was shocked at how slow the fishing was for the targeted Splake and Lakers with jigs. The perch by the way were a consistent 10 inches with at least 10, 11 inchers caught in a day. Also we landed 2 jumbos a day in the 12 inch class on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
We trolled for Rainbows for about an hour on Saturday after jigging produced Sacha's first 100% self caught fish. It was a 15 inch Splake. I was SO proud. Landed all the perch we wanted again as well. Closer to noon we decided to troll for some Bows since that is the thing to do in the afternoon. Depth was not a real issue as pop gear and worm were the ticket on mono trolled 50-80 feet back. I think we made out with 4 rainbows around 18 inches and a bunch more nothing under 14 inches. But I was not there for the stupid rainbows. I did it just to keep the little one happy.
After lunch we did more fishing. Saturday afternoon we fished it hard with the jigs. Nothing but the odd perch. I was going after the macs for the whole afternoon. The wife and daughter were dinking with the perch. Just before dusk I got 2 Splake in the 16 inch range. I was getting disappointed at this point. Usually the fishing is a bit faster even considering the time of year.
Sunday morning found me alone on the water catching a few odd Splake and one lone Pup Laker. This whole time I was marking a bunch of fish on the finder at 50-70 feet of water, and in the 90 to 120 range there were tons of what I believed to be Lakers. Just not much action. I could jig right under the finder and being no novice to Fish Lake, I was switching colors and tactics pretty regularly to find the magic bait, but to no avail.
Decided to get some ice-cream at the general store, and avoid the daily rain storm. Met up with a fellow BFT'er Extrema, and he tipped me off to the Night fishing. As it was Sunday I think he had previous engagements with the wife and family and I know he wanted to go fishing on Monday morning, but I could not bring myself to intrude on him Sunday evening. I was hoping to hook up with him on Monday morning, but my wife gave me the O.K. to do some night fishing by myself.
That being said I started early, about 8 p.m.I brought the heater and a lantern and all the other necessities for night fishing. I caught several perch and 2 small suckers for bait just before dark. Little did I know I should have stocked up on the bait... Just before Pitch black it happened. The Perch stopped biting almost ominously.. Splake after Splake and Pup Mack after Pup Mack ensued. I actually had a hard time at first getting through the rainbows on a strait jig. I ended up Putting a dropper weight with a foot and a half of leader on to punch through the mass of surface feeding Bows. All the splake were from 16 to 18 inches with 3 or four pushing 20 inches. Somewhere in between all those fish I hooked 2 solid Lakers. Never saw them but both simply hit my jig and stripped line to 120 feet of water. Once fish was on for less then 20 seconds the other was on for 5 minutes or so.
Just a fish story if no picture (I usually land all my Lakers, but not that night) but the Splake were all magnificent. Fine and fat. Hard fighting and beautiful. Not to mention I had the hole lake to myself. Not another boater out there all night. The beavers kept slapping there tails in protest at my transgression into there territory all night, and more to the intrusion on there TIME of night. Deer, Elk and a Moose all joined me by the lake that night. One nicish Bull elk with rather larger then normal velvet stubs was particular noisy. Owls hooting and the elegant whistle of the loon all were my partners that night. I can't really remember deciding to leave or the short boat ride home or the shorter drive to camp.... But I remember leaving for only one reason... I was out of bait.
Next morning I awoke to break camp around 9. Got out of the camp ground at noon or so. I was adamant about trying to night fish Joe's Valley, and my wife was none to excited, but she is a very good wife and succumb to my persuasions... Joe's Valley at around 3 p.m. on a Monday is quite a sight to see. It kind of looked like a weekend crowd, jut not a many boaters and many more serious looking anglers in more serious looking boats. I saw some fish get caught, and even a 30 inch plus Splake/Laker? The other fisherman were not talkative nor interested in chit-chat about there fish. They did put the fish in the boat and from the looks they gave me were not interested in my ilk.... Oh well. I probably would not be interested in my ilk either. Fished the weed lines pretty hard up until night. Lots of suckers and such.
But with my new found knowledge of Fish Lakes night time treasure trove I was pretty confident. Same as Fish Lake the night came and the suckers became absent. Nothing nibbled. I was sure to start stacking fish.. Well I did not. An hour into it yielded 2 smallish Tigers, a dink Brown, and a skinny Splake. I have had tremendous luck with spoons, and remembered a few of the glow in the dark variety were in my tackle bag somewhere. After 10 minutes of searching I found what I was looking for (you would think glow in the dark would be easy to find in the dark? Yeah right the tackle bag must not let any light in to charge the paint...) I pulled out several Glow Kastmasters and Cripple Herrings. The blue and glow Crippled Herrings were immediately assaulted. After several missed fish I tipped them with some sucker meat and was delighted to get hook up after hook up. I got one Splake at 25 inches. I was pretty stoked until I reached for the phone to take a picture and realized I forgot to charge the battery.... Great.
Unfortunately for me I ended up hooking and landing the largest Tiger of my life that night It was just short of 27 inches. And to add a little more insult a beauty of a brown fell in around 24 inches... For freshwater fishing on cold water fish that was probably the best night of my life for size and species. Just memorable. I did however get some great pictures of my daughters first fish. I got off Joe's Valley around 3 a.m.. I was the only person out there all night long. The drive home was so tolerable with memories of one of the best fishing/camping trips I have probably ever had. The best moment was the
on my little girls face with her first "big" fish. All but 2 Lakers were successfully released, except for several perch and suckers kept for bait.
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Up early the next morning (my wife and daughter thought 8:30 was early.. I guess they were on vacation...) on the lake at 9 a.m.. Caught a couple of Splake and the odd rainbow early. We were there to catch splake and jigging was the method we were going to use. I was shocked at how slow the fishing was for the targeted Splake and Lakers with jigs. The perch by the way were a consistent 10 inches with at least 10, 11 inchers caught in a day. Also we landed 2 jumbos a day in the 12 inch class on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
We trolled for Rainbows for about an hour on Saturday after jigging produced Sacha's first 100% self caught fish. It was a 15 inch Splake. I was SO proud. Landed all the perch we wanted again as well. Closer to noon we decided to troll for some Bows since that is the thing to do in the afternoon. Depth was not a real issue as pop gear and worm were the ticket on mono trolled 50-80 feet back. I think we made out with 4 rainbows around 18 inches and a bunch more nothing under 14 inches. But I was not there for the stupid rainbows. I did it just to keep the little one happy.
After lunch we did more fishing. Saturday afternoon we fished it hard with the jigs. Nothing but the odd perch. I was going after the macs for the whole afternoon. The wife and daughter were dinking with the perch. Just before dusk I got 2 Splake in the 16 inch range. I was getting disappointed at this point. Usually the fishing is a bit faster even considering the time of year.
Sunday morning found me alone on the water catching a few odd Splake and one lone Pup Laker. This whole time I was marking a bunch of fish on the finder at 50-70 feet of water, and in the 90 to 120 range there were tons of what I believed to be Lakers. Just not much action. I could jig right under the finder and being no novice to Fish Lake, I was switching colors and tactics pretty regularly to find the magic bait, but to no avail.
Decided to get some ice-cream at the general store, and avoid the daily rain storm. Met up with a fellow BFT'er Extrema, and he tipped me off to the Night fishing. As it was Sunday I think he had previous engagements with the wife and family and I know he wanted to go fishing on Monday morning, but I could not bring myself to intrude on him Sunday evening. I was hoping to hook up with him on Monday morning, but my wife gave me the O.K. to do some night fishing by myself.
That being said I started early, about 8 p.m.I brought the heater and a lantern and all the other necessities for night fishing. I caught several perch and 2 small suckers for bait just before dark. Little did I know I should have stocked up on the bait... Just before Pitch black it happened. The Perch stopped biting almost ominously.. Splake after Splake and Pup Mack after Pup Mack ensued. I actually had a hard time at first getting through the rainbows on a strait jig. I ended up Putting a dropper weight with a foot and a half of leader on to punch through the mass of surface feeding Bows. All the splake were from 16 to 18 inches with 3 or four pushing 20 inches. Somewhere in between all those fish I hooked 2 solid Lakers. Never saw them but both simply hit my jig and stripped line to 120 feet of water. Once fish was on for less then 20 seconds the other was on for 5 minutes or so.
Just a fish story if no picture (I usually land all my Lakers, but not that night) but the Splake were all magnificent. Fine and fat. Hard fighting and beautiful. Not to mention I had the hole lake to myself. Not another boater out there all night. The beavers kept slapping there tails in protest at my transgression into there territory all night, and more to the intrusion on there TIME of night. Deer, Elk and a Moose all joined me by the lake that night. One nicish Bull elk with rather larger then normal velvet stubs was particular noisy. Owls hooting and the elegant whistle of the loon all were my partners that night. I can't really remember deciding to leave or the short boat ride home or the shorter drive to camp.... But I remember leaving for only one reason... I was out of bait.
Next morning I awoke to break camp around 9. Got out of the camp ground at noon or so. I was adamant about trying to night fish Joe's Valley, and my wife was none to excited, but she is a very good wife and succumb to my persuasions... Joe's Valley at around 3 p.m. on a Monday is quite a sight to see. It kind of looked like a weekend crowd, jut not a many boaters and many more serious looking anglers in more serious looking boats. I saw some fish get caught, and even a 30 inch plus Splake/Laker? The other fisherman were not talkative nor interested in chit-chat about there fish. They did put the fish in the boat and from the looks they gave me were not interested in my ilk.... Oh well. I probably would not be interested in my ilk either. Fished the weed lines pretty hard up until night. Lots of suckers and such.
But with my new found knowledge of Fish Lakes night time treasure trove I was pretty confident. Same as Fish Lake the night came and the suckers became absent. Nothing nibbled. I was sure to start stacking fish.. Well I did not. An hour into it yielded 2 smallish Tigers, a dink Brown, and a skinny Splake. I have had tremendous luck with spoons, and remembered a few of the glow in the dark variety were in my tackle bag somewhere. After 10 minutes of searching I found what I was looking for (you would think glow in the dark would be easy to find in the dark? Yeah right the tackle bag must not let any light in to charge the paint...) I pulled out several Glow Kastmasters and Cripple Herrings. The blue and glow Crippled Herrings were immediately assaulted. After several missed fish I tipped them with some sucker meat and was delighted to get hook up after hook up. I got one Splake at 25 inches. I was pretty stoked until I reached for the phone to take a picture and realized I forgot to charge the battery.... Great.
Unfortunately for me I ended up hooking and landing the largest Tiger of my life that night It was just short of 27 inches. And to add a little more insult a beauty of a brown fell in around 24 inches... For freshwater fishing on cold water fish that was probably the best night of my life for size and species. Just memorable. I did however get some great pictures of my daughters first fish. I got off Joe's Valley around 3 a.m.. I was the only person out there all night long. The drive home was so tolerable with memories of one of the best fishing/camping trips I have probably ever had. The best moment was the
on my little girls face with her first "big" fish. All but 2 Lakers were successfully released, except for several perch and suckers kept for bait.[signature]