ChooChooSnakeMan
Well-known member
Hadn't been out in my little Lowe on a solo fishing trip in a while. Looked at the weather forecast for Thursday and it looked hot but calm with some flow. On the spur of the moment I decided to leave work early which usually isn't possible and I launched from HBSP about 5:00 pm. Did I say it was supposed to be hot - whew it was still a scorcher even that late in the evening. I was one of the first at least in my group of fishermen many years ago to jump on the finessee worm. I remember when Jmax and I started fishing together he sort of snickered some at my "wheeney" worms. Anyway I always fished them T-rigged and had pretty good success. The last couple of years Jmax has done well with the shakey head rig. I didn't see much difference between that and my T-rig with a light 1/8 or 3/16 bullet sinker. Well the CFF we (really Jim) won with 18.65 lbs for 3 fish pushed me over the edge. I decided I was going to try this shakey head stuff. I got some 1/8 and 3/16 oz from Sportsmans to give it a try. I went to an area that I've had good luck for numbers of fish this time of year and started catching them. I managed 15 or so bass with some good solid 1 1/2 to 2 lb spots. I also noticed a lot of fish busting shad on top but only every once in a while would I get a hook up on a bass on my shakey head. I tried top water and nothing. I picked up my ultra light crappie rig with a pan fish assassin on it and that was the ticket for the schooling fish. I lost count of the white bass and small bass I caught. The whites were good ones going up to a couple of pounds which were a handful on my crappie rig with Mr. crappie line. It was a lot of fun. As it got close to 7:00 pm that action died down so I made my way to a grass flat to try the shakey head on some larger fish I hoped. I missed a few but started catching them. Mostly small 13" to 14" fish but also a few solid 2 to 3 lb fish. I was beginning to think there is something to this shakey head business! I moved from the 6' - 7' area to shallower and was still picking up a fish every now and then, enough to keep it interesting. I noticed a boil in the water to my left out in deeper water and pitched the shakey over there. BAM the fight was on. I took my time and landed a nice 4 1/2 lb LM. I just kept moving done the grass line fishing in everything from 3' to 10' and I kept catching fish. Finally about 10:00pm I had a terrible tangled mess on the main spinning reel I was using and decided I better call it an evening. I don't know how many fish I caught total but it had to be around 40 or so counting the white bass, not bad for less than 5 hours actually fishing. Water temps were 91 and I caught fish on several different colors. I don't think the color was all that important as the fish seemed to be in a feeding mood. Probably my best overall color was Culprit Fire & Ice. My best three fish would have went 9 1/2 to 10 lbs and my best 5 would have went 13 1/2 to 14 which isn't very good on the Chick these days but I sure enjoyed it. Everyone be safe and take a moment to say thanks for being able to enjoy the great outdoors!
Jmax
