FISH CATCHING TRAVEL

“SAVE OUR WATERS”

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The Wade Right Fishing Belt

Brought to you by

The Best Wading System on the  Planet.

Tomorrow there is only one plan, the Boss wants a fresh fish fry for the big game, so tomorrow I will actually be keeping a few.  What flavor I have no clue, it will depend on what is biting, or how I choose to fish.  But this time of year has one thing going for it, if you want some fish they are usually biting enough to get it done.  Probably should not have said that, but no matter what it will be a good day on the water.

Weather 

67/71.  Mostly cloudy with a 60% chance of afternoon rain.  Wind ENE 5 – 10 mph.

Lake Level

Today  94.19 msl.  Thursday  94.17 msl.  (Down over 4 feet since last year but we got a drop from the last rain.)

Activity Periods

Major 2:31 pm to 4:31 pm.   Minor  8:59 am to 9:59 am.

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The new Knockin Tail Lures are coming soon.  

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It is foggy here in Victoria this Tuesday morning, and like yesterday morning when I fished, it is raining.  The plan yesterday was simple, troll up supper, quit early, hit happy hour at our favorite establishment, then enjoy the game.  And it worked out perfectly.

To make a long story short I trolled up about 15 or so, cleaned 3 for supper, and called it a morning.  The real interesting thing was the timing of the bite.  I putted around an hour or two, getting a half hearted bite here and there until about 10:00 (See Minor time above.) then the bite was on.  Bass, whites, and crappie.  Since it is just me and the Boss I only needed 3 so I kept one of each on purpose.  Time for a story.

When I was living and guiding at the boat dock on Norfork we used to have fish fries in the summer.  We would have everything from bass, walleye, striper, crappie, whites, catfish, and on a couple of occasions we added a ringer to the mix.  Spearfishing was allowed on Norfork and Jerry would shoot a couple of carp.  Clean them carefully and add them to the mix.  Funny, folks ate fish until they foundered and not one person ever asked or said this is carp.  Not one.

If fish is properly cared for, and even on the lake when I am keeping them they go on ice immediately. We almost always eat them that day, prefer to never freeze fish though again, if done properly is ok.  Then cleaned/fileted properly and back on ice in the fridge until cooked.  So with 3 different fish obviously there was a difference in texture and shape, but when it came down to it, no fishy taste, it is all good.  And last night was delicious.

The only thing I did forget as it was raining and they were not all that big, I decided to take a dead fish picture which I do on occasion.  That picture was going to be them on a platter but there was one problem.  We started “testing’ the first piece or two and then the full fledged feeding began.  And of course cleaning up I went “rats”, forgot the picture.  Trust me they were goood!

As a side note on catching white bass in the early spring, sunny days are usually better than cloudy.  Not to say don’t chase them on cloudy days but there is a little difference.  On our area lakes the bite is going to be on big time in the next month, this is just the precursor.  But I am sure our fish are a little confused with the wild water temps swings.  Up lake the temp was as high as 64.9, up almost 4 degrees in the last week.  And as I type this it is 73 degrees outside and projected hit 77.  This has been one wacky winter.

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A big congrats to LSU.  What a game and it was so nice to see Ed’s face.  No bigger dram could come true for him than winning it all, much less in New Orleans!  There were lots of LSU fans, you know who you are, who hated the hire.  But he has grown and adapted to the changing game.  And the players love him, what more could you want?  So hate all you want LSU is the national champion.  It does not get any better than that for a football fan.  So now when you are talking bad about him at some time in the future just remember – He took you to the promise land.

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Oops, there will be an abrupt end to this drivel.  It is 11:00 and the sky is clearing some so time to put this down and load the boat.  So hopefully there will be a good report in a few hours.  So keep stopping in and thanks for reading my stuff.

Good Luck and Tight Lines