Recon Day

Hi all,
I have not posted here in a couple years so I thought I would start again. I had not been to the lake pretty much all year due to work and it was tough knowing that the lake had so much water in it and some people were doing really well. So I finally fished it last week with my wife and our furry kids. All my normal spots are now about 30ft. deeper so it was interesting finding new structure that held fish. I found the best concentrations at 25ft. but it was a mix of 8 in bass to 4 lbs. models. I even hooked a small bass and had a 4lbs. bass come and try to eat it. I wound up catching both fish, both released unharmed, well the small bass got beat up somewhat but swam off. Most of the good concentrations of fish were along the dam and the wife and I tried multiple baits with some success and ended up catching about 10 fish including a monster 15.4 lbs striped bass on a 2 inch medium diving shad bait, small bass rod and 10 lbs test so it took me about 15 minutes or so to get it in (fun fight with lots of runs) I think the key was trolling through a bunch of diving birds were I metered lots of bait with big fish under the shad and bingo the striped bassAttachment 51684 crushed it. Hopefully ill get some more time off work this winter to catch some more good fish.

Tight lines

Great report, thank you for posting!

This time of the year, for the last several years, someone almost always catches a big striper or two in that portion of the lake. Something about the fall turnover + bait + deep water near the dam seems to result in a few hookups.
I tried throwing swimbaits there several times, no dice. Happy to see someone catch another toad.

Nice catch...your dog is not sure what to think about that big striper. Is it friend or foe? Is it a toy or food? He is just not sure. Great to see your fury buddies out there with you. sounds like you did dang good.

that is a nice striper dude

Great job on the fish, especially getting a striper out of there.