I got out for a few hours Sunday before I headed off to church and did ok. The fishing was a bit slower than we had anticipated due to the the cold front and winds that increased during the time we were out. But we still caught them consistently. We fished rocky areas from 6 FOW out to about 9 FOW. My best Smallie came in 6.5 FOW on a Canadian Mist Xtreme tube and went 5lbs. A few minutes later I ran into a friend of mine who had just gotten two back to back that were 4 and 4.5lbs (I think he said). The quality wasn't bad, even though the fishing was kind of slow. Lots of 2.5lb keepers.
The fish didn't seem to want anything off the bottom. We tried dropshotting some Gulp and 2.5 tubes to no avail. I did get one on a white Lucky Craft Pointer 100, but that was the only one. She was nice fish tho. Generally, they wanted a tube dragged slow, so that's what we gave them and ended up with a pretty nice limit (all caught and immediately released of course).
The key was the rocks. Whenever we got away from the rocks, we got away from the fish. When we went back to the rocks, we got 'em biting again. We had one double header and several near double headers in between the slow periods. My partner ended up catching a couple of decent ones on the new Xteme craw color, but the action seemed more consistent on the Canadian Mist.
The wind started howling around 9 and I'm convinced we'd have caught more if we had thrown out a drift sock and slowed down. The bite kind of died off when the wind started pushing the boat along faster. That's why we probably got more bites up shallow...because the wind was less of a factor and we were presenting the baits more slowly.
All in all, it was a nice first outing on St. Clair for us. We both caught plenty and a few really nice ones. I'm looking forward to the DK this weekend. Hopefully the bite will pick up and the weather will cooperate so that we don't have to spend the day in the canals like last year. Right now, you can go into the canals and whack 'em, but you may not get the weight to compete. We'll see. Can't wait for Saturday!
Rev, April 28 is today.....Monday. ??? If you went out before church on Sunday then you were there April 27. Anyway, I didn't see you. I was near Masonic until about 0900 and then by the 400 Club. Then back to Masonic to end the day at 1100 til 1300.
BD ;D
Early in the season, Canadian Mist always seems to be my go to bait.
Later in the year, the other colors seems to catch up, but not early.
Er.. the 27th. I was looking at today's date. ;D Aaaannnyyywaayy... I was down South of where you were at.
I forget what day it is sometimes too................. 8)
BD ;D
I got a chance to get out after church and in the 5 hours we were out, just got 40. It was slower than I expected to be sure.
We launched from Selfridge and did the Harley to Fairhaven run. I didn't do all of it though.
We didn't get anything over 4.5 lbs. though. About a dozen were in that range. A good amount of 3 lb.'rs and so on.
St. Clair Crayfish was hit on all sizes. In fact my partner, Charlie Shaw, beat up on me with the 5" version. I did well with the 4" and Drop Shot Tube as well.
I'll update my website postings (www.combat-bassfishing.com) for Marked Map and Combat Fishing newletter subscribers tonight.
Charlie with a Selfridge smallie:
Man, I never do well over in the Selfridge area. We need to get out there so you can show me the ropes! ;D
Me too. It's been a long time since we boated "40 in a few hours".
I'll hold the other end of the rope......
We went out of harley last thursday hit the channel @ metro and the seawalls picked up some nice largies. then went up into anchor bay and clobbered the largies right @ the edge of a mudline that was forming on spinnerbaits and tubes. Then moved out into the front of selfridge and got into some big toads of smallies. avg was tween 3.5 and 5. again on spinnerbaits, erie tubes and st clair craw both 2 1/2 in and 4 in. using ball jig stuffed inside of the 2 1/2" tubes.