5 July out on the big pond

Fished hard all day with nothing to report. Hit all depths from 50-75 all colors that have been productive. The only redeeming thing that came out of the day is it didn't rain. Wish I had something better to report but that's why they call it fishing and not catching.

Lake Wawasee

I was trying to find a spot to go fishing this weekend and couldn't nail anything down until the day before I went. I hadn't been to this lake in years so I decided to revisit Indiana's largest natural lake. The lake did not welcome me as far as weather goes, it was supposed to be low winds and sunny. The opposite was true all day; it was very windy and mostly mostly cloudy. Still the fishing was pretty good. I hit fish from one end of the lake to the other on a variety of lures. So all in all, I did manage to have a very good productive day.

I did have one dilemma: I found a washer on the front deck of the boat that wasn't there when I started fishing....  So.....where did it come from? Where's the bolt and nut? I looked during the rest of the day to try and find out where it came from with no luck. I was pretty concerned when I found it, but since I cannot definitively prove that it came off of anything I can only wait for something to fall apart. 

Story of my life.

from dawn 'til dusk

I went up to the big pond yesterday. I started at 6am and didn't get off the lake until 8pm. I started right out front of the ditch and started an east troll. After a couple hours of nothing but cleaning lures I was listening to the radio and there was a bite on over by Chicago. So against my better judgement I pulled gear and ran 1 hour and 45 min to where the bite "was".
Well you guessed it by the time I got there all I had to show for it was a very light gas tank. Oh well it was only noon and I thought I would be able to troll all the way back, so I started trolling. I went until 1pm when I got my first hit. He was only on for a matter of seconds before he came unbuttoned. As it got later I began to wonder about my kicker's gas level so I reached down and checked it, it too was getting light.

My next bit of action came at 6:17 when I hooked into a 4 pound (I thought King at the time) Coho. No more did I turn my back to put the Coho into the cooler all hell broke loose. As I was putting water into the cooler I heard something break behind me, after a quick inventory of my gear I realized a rod was gone. I grabbed the tether and started to pull the rod only to realize that there was a fish on the other end. After getting the rod and starting to fight the fish I saw it had hit the lure with such ferocity that it broke my rod holder leaving only the peg on board. Well with all this going on it put the boat in a terrible shit hook so I had to straighten that out.  Once I was able to get the fish and the boat in such a way that he couldn't get back in the other lines or gear in the water I cut the motor, to make landing him easier.

With 2 fish in the box I really wanted to be done but with the both engine's almost out of gas I decided to troll in until 8pm, then kick over the big motor and that should get me the rest of the way in...
NOT
As you can see in the pic I did not make it in, actually I thought my kicker would run out of gas before I got in. Fortunately I did make it in without being towed or rowing.

  Boy did I learn my lesson I won't go out again on anything less than a full tank of gas.

13# and 4# Coho the ruler is 2' long

This pic does not do this Coho justice it was HUGE.
This is the biggest Coho I have ever caught and actually it even tops any of the Kings I have caught. When I got home and realized I had caught Coho and not Kings I looked up the state record and saw I only missed it by 7 pounds. If you print off this pic it would weight 10 pounds..... that's how big this fish was.

My summer vacation

Well my vacation started with my parents not being home when I got home to start my vacation. Turns out I showed up on the wrong week...... according to my Mom. So with no one around I went over and hung out with my brother all day, which was great. Around 11 pm my Mom and Dad roll in, they were in the cities for my nieces' graduation. Once my Mom got home it was time to make plans, and it turned out best if I was to go to Canada fishing the first couple days. (Because lets keep in mind I arrived on the wrong week.)  So I got a hold of my Uncle Rick and headed North. I spent three days in Canada fishing. It wasn't as good as recent years... We caught a lot of fish but most of them were rats; we caught very few slotters but we did catch some nice fish too.




















 I caught a 22" walleye and Rick wasn't far behind with a 20".... and then there was the muskie.

Well turns out I couldn't net 'em.  As soon as I put the camera down he made a surge under the boat and broke the line. That fish pulled us around the lake for 25+ minutes before showing himself.
Well we left the cabin on Fri morning to get ready for my cousin's wedding on Sat.

 When we got back to Ricks house we unloaded everything and started to prep the motor home for the trip. That's when he saw a dead humming bird on the ground.

What I thought was really cool is you couldn't see the red unless it was at the perfect angle.











So I got back home and went fishing with my cousin Corey. He took me to Fish Lake which is right by his house and we caught some nice fish there also.... I can't remember but I think his biggest was around 23 something.

I caught a couple walleye and pike but nothing worth getting a pic of. From there I put on my best camo and crashed the wedding reception. It was a good time and I got to see a lot of the family I never get to see.

CONGRATS LANCE I hope your marriage is healthy and happy.

While I was at the reception my Uncle Dave invited me to go out the next morning with him on Lake Superior. So we met up in the a.m. Sunday morning for a couple hours of trolling. We hooked up right out the gate with this little greaser and then didn't get a sniff the rest of the time.

 With the winds coming from the N NE it wasn't too long before the rollers started to stack up and we headed for the barn. I just want to give a shout out to Dave's boat, I think he said it's a Dory.  Man what an awesome little boat for the big lake.

This is the lift bridge on the way in.

So when we got in it was off to my Aunt Renee's for a little get together at her cabin on Prairie Lake. Super nice cabin and time catching up with everyone. The food was very good and those taters....mmmmm.
Thanks Nae.
Since we were at a lake Corey and I with his daughter Addy went out fishing for a while. I think the only fish caught was my pike but it was a good time. Addy did a great job and hung with us in the wind until it was time to go. That was a lot of fun to go out with her.
Monday we rallied the troops and headed for the shack to mow the lawn. On the way out we saw something I have never seen up there and that was a TURKEY. Yep, saw a hen turkey trying to cross the road and then decided better of it. I had been hearing that they have been seeing turkeys up that way but that was the first one I have seen up there. AWESOME

This is a shot of my Dad mowing, it just struck me funny and to quote Forrest Gump," And 'cause I was gazillionaire and I liked doing it so much, I cut that grass for free. ..."

 So that was my vacation I hung around Monday and left Tuesday morning to get home to my beautiful loving wife Tuesday evening.
I just wanted to say a huge "Thank you" to my whole family it was a great vacation and it was really great to see everyone again.

What a difference a week makes

Last week I went to Max and really got into the smallies. I also landed a couple largemouth but the white bass and walleye eluded me on this trip. I was in fish all day and the wind got a little brisk in the afternoon which tended to push me around a little but other than that I had a great day.
Here's the pics

look close you can see the lure in his mouth... That's what's commonly known as choking it!!!

All of these fish were 2 to 3 pounders I had a pretty awesome day.

Now on to this week.... I left late (again) for the big lake on Wednesday morning. I have been seeing that some silver fish have been caught out of Washington park. So off I went to stretch a line and wash some lures. If I only knew how true that statement was I probably would've stayed home and mowed the lawn again. As you may have guessed I got the big ole goose egg.... the old skunkapoloosa. I did have a steelhead on for about 10 seconds then he straightened the hook and went on about his day. I stayed until around 6 and decided to pack-er in and head for the house with my tail between my legs and a very empty cooler. The only good thing to come out of this excursion is all my equipment worked flawlessly.... next time I'll really get into them..