My fishing buddy Bill and I decided to do something different today so we headed out to Lake "Z", a small lake with lots small coves, points, cuts, ledges, tules, grass flats and rocks. The weather was cloudy with a 3mph south wind that kicked up to 15+ as the day progressed. Water temps were 67 in the morning to 70 in the afternoon. Depending on where you were, water clarity ranged from 1ft to 15 ft. Perfect morning for any number of reaction baits right?
So we get to the launch ramp and are on the water by 6:20am. I have a walking topwater bait, a blade, a lipless crank and an s-waver all tied on their respective rods for the sure to come reaction bait bite. Got to our first spot, a main lake long shallow cove with scattered rocks, rip rap and grass. I threw the walker first for nothing. Picked up the blade and fired away, for nothing. Next I threw the lipless, again for nothing. I threw the s-waver next and got a bunch of followers but no bites, but they showed me they were there so I decide to slow down a bit and tied on my go to jig and custom t-rig. I threw the t-rig first and immediately got bit but not swallowed. This went on for some time so I figured we were probably getting pecked by dinks and I told Bill we should move and come back here later. So onward we go.
Next spot was a cove farther down the lake and it was lined with tules and lots of grass. Using my t-rig I make my first cast to an isolated patch of tules that are spaced apart a little and in front of the main tule line and bam, I get hit hard but it didn't stick. Reeled it in and found my creature trailer bit in half. Put a new one on and cast to the end of the tule line where it transitioned into chunk rock and rip rap !!Pow!! I got slammed hard. This wasn't the standard hit run shake bite, this was more like a thump and then a steady hard pull. I swung and set the hook and this thing took off like a freight train peeling line for what seemed an eternity(a few seconds), I let her run for a little then put the breaks on her and got her head turned around and heading to the boat. She got within about 15 feet of the boat and decided she's having none of this and made another run for it once again peeling line off my reel. Got her head turned again and this time I got her to the boat and in the net. A huge, fat PIG!! She went 10-7 on the Bill's boat digital scale;
Fished here a few more minutes and stuck some small keepers then headed for the next spot, another long shallow main lake cove lined with tules and stretches of chunk/rip rap shoreline that led up to a long underwater point. Went through the reaction bait routine for no bites but once again got the fish to reveal themselves with the s-waver so I picked up the t-rig and started flippin' the tules and dragging and hopping the rocks while Bill threw a drop shot. We both started sticking keepers and had several by the time we hit the point. I told Bill we should back off and go out to the end of the point and work our way in as I wanted to hit the deep end with the s-waver first. Got out there and stuck two keepers right away with the s-waver, they aren't giants but they were fun;
No more swimmer fish so we start heading back towards the main shoreline fishing the ledges and cuts that step down the side of the point sticking a couple of keepers like this;
Next we went to the other side of the point that led into a cove that had a rip rap bank I wanted to hit. No one home on that bank but on the way in we marked some fish 20ft deep on some structure in the creek bottom so we hit that on the way out and I stuck this using my t-rig, a spawned out 7-1;
Next we hit the western point of the cove. It's slightly curved and formed kind of a large pocket that had ledges stepping down to 25ft deep. First cast with the t-rig I hit this;
Second cast this;
Got a bunch of light bites at that spot but they felt like dinks so onward we go. Spent the rest of the day playin' in the tules and rock piles and caught several more keepers including 4 more fish in the 4-5lbs range but the backgrounds in the pics are too revealing and I'd rather leave it to your imagination as to the location.
So the reaction bite never materialized, turns out they wanted it crawling and hopping on the bottom. The bite was good at Lake "Z" today but you had to earn it. Total fish-count for us today was 21-Blackjack!