Last outing on Erie for 2020

Holbert and I hit the lake again yesterday morning hoping for a better outcome than last week. I figured we would be ok with the weather and if we could get out to my spot, we should be ridin' home smelling of fish slime. We got the boat launched and all looked good for the first couple hours.

I can't keep it?

We had one keeper eye and caught some shorts and were just starting to put a game plan together when....  The bad luck that just kinda followed us last week reared its ugly head. The favorable SE winds were replaced with NE and along with that the need to get into the safety of South Bass Island. It took us a while and it was a slow and wet ride, but we made it in. We trolled the lee side of the island for a couple hours until the wind had a favorable switch, so we pulled lines and headed back out to where we started. Once we got out we started putting fish in the boat, so we trolled the same lines to try and tag out. I think it was around 6:45pm when we finally pulled lines, we were 5 walleye short of limits. We had a good time on the lake and were able to put some fish in the boat. For the last trip this year it could've been better but on the other hand, it could've been alot worse.

 I caught that perch on a Bandit fruit dots (you can google that) and Holbert wanted it for... well I really don't know why, but I filleted it and sent it home with him.
So to wrap it up on Erie this year; I had an outstanding year and hopefully next year will be just as bountiful.

Another defeat on Erie.... or was it?

Before I get into what happened this week lets back up to last Thursday🔙⟲⟲🔙. Last Thursday started like any other day except this is the day I set my appointment to get my decoy trailer titled. So at 8 am I headed down to the license branch only to find out my appt. wasn't until 8:30. I sat in the parking lot listening to Bob and Tom until it was time. Once I got in it went really quickly and relatively painlessly. When I got home I was walking up to the mudroom and saw something flying around in there. As I got closer I noticed they were wasps, no worries I grabbed my electric fly swatter and started the massacre. It was only after a couple minutes I saw there were just as many as there were when I started... then I saw it. There was a pencil-sized hole in the ceiling of the mudroom and that's where they were coming out of. So after a couple shots of wasp spray that I had in the garage I gave Cliff a call to help with the problem. By the time he showed up, I had all but killed the entire nest that was in the ceiling. We could only hear a couple buzzing around up there compared to the many that were there, to begin with. By the way, if you plan on doing this at your house keep in mind wasps don't like it when you destroy their nest. I did get hit once on the nose, but I felt that was a fair trade.

this was after I opened the hole a little bit more

I think the last owner had the same problem, this was a cut-out and patched before.

At the end of the day, I had defended my house against these tiny invaders and won. The next couple days I killed at least a dozen more that had gone out prior to the slaughter.
All I have left to do is fix the hole in the ceiling.

Now, about this week, well this week sucked. I finally got one of my buddies to go to Erie. I had been watching the weather since last Friday. Tues and Wed were looking to be good days. We made plans to go on Tues, he showed up right on time and we made it to Erie right when the sun was coming up. Even then I knew we were in trouble. Once again the waves were much bigger than they were supposed to be and I wasn't sure if we could even get out. Always the idiot, we launched the boat and headed out, only to make it 200 yards or so before the shelter of the island point wore off and the waves hit us full force. I turned around and headed back to the dock to load the boat. We hung around for a romantic day of watching boats go out and bounce around until about 10:30 when I finally called it. So as with my landowner, I shelled out another batch of walleye I had in the freezer so he wouldn't go home emptyhanded. I literally only have one week left to get back up there before hunting season starts.
Anyway, I worked Wed morning and fished my lake that afternoon. I definitely didn't tear it up but I did get to stretch a line.

Yeah they're small but at least I got out and got some slime on my hands

What does redemption look like?

they don't look like it but the bigger walleye are 21 and 22"

Got out at first light and after a short boat ride, I was in "the area" where I have been catching this summer. The first couple of hours landed me 3 walleye, then the great lull as I prospected some new territory. When the wind died a little and I was nearing the end of my troll I pulled lines and headed back to the beginning. When I dropped lines and started trolling again it didn't take long to catch the first walleye, he was short but at least I was on the right track. I was tagged out in only about an hour of fishing and it wasn't even noon yet. So after a quick dip, I broke the boat down, took another dip and headed in. Super good day.

Recharged the batteries

Ended up going to Wawasee this week to do some casting for bass for 2 reasons. One was, after the beat down last week on Erie, I was a little gun shy to head East this week. The second is that I wanted to stay kinda close to home because I had some goose to get ready to marinade for Thursday grill day. Anyway, I actually did pretty well yesterday, I caught quite a few bass. I didn't get into any big'ens but boy are they chunky on that lake. I caught most of my fish on a strike king strobe jerkbait, which is the way I prefer to catch them. I didn't fish all day but I did stay 'til around 3p. After that the lake beaters started coming out in force, that was my cue to head for the house.

Oh, yeah how 'bout some pics?

 All of the bass were pretty much cookie cutters, but man were they chunky.
Well, after this week I think I got the casting bug out of my system for a while. Next week weather willing I just might venture East again... What about West you ask? Well, I picked up a new set of downriggers for the boat a couple weeks ago and I'm going to tackle that project in March. I could use my old set but I kinda want to wait 'til I get the Cannons mounted. So the next time I'll get on Lake Michigan will be April for those spring Coho.