Lake Champlain United - Forums

Hi, I have been absent a lot this year to many factors but I did get out this past weekend. Saturday morning (07/0718) set out on some old runs with little success, one false release but that could be from the debris floating around. Then finally marked some bait and fish, dropped it down 105' with a slider. It wasn't long when the line tripped, a nice fight ensued and much to my surprise a 19" long white fish came to the surface...it hit the slider, a new .32 mp6 PPE/lemon ice honey bee. we trolled back through but the current down below were wicked. a 1.8 surface speed with a 3.3 mph ball speed.

We continued on and My buddy took the next fish, on the same rig, a nice fat 23" salmon...it hit the same bee. Trolled around and found scum lines starting to form in many places with lots of debris rolling around in them, tried the old Ontario trick of skirting them. A little while later the right rod goes off. Another tussle was on and a 20" white fish, just as fat as can be came to the boat. This one hit a slightly modified #1 honey bee a chartreuse and green split. I painted 6 bars on the side to mimic a perch pattern, I encluded 2 pix to show you what I did, easy to duplicate with just a black magic marker.



As the morning went on the heat rose and water temps along with them. The temp "line" (55 degrees) dropped from 50' to 80' in 3 hours in the area i was trolling. Scum lines popped up every were and the current below was changing by the minute. Sometimes as much as 2 mph...If you don't have a fish hawk you should leave the boat on the trailer because you would believe it unless you saw it. We had one other hit but no one was home by the time we realized what had happened. So we decided to call it a day. These rising temps over a long period of time are churning things up, so expect the summertime hot weather blues, it takes a little more effort to get fish into the boat.

great report jim. where are the pics of the whitefish and salmon. 2 whitefish in one day thats an accomplishment to say the least.

Nice report Jim. It's nice to see your out fishing.

Thanks for the report Jim. A Fish Hawk is a very good tool to have aboard.

Nice!

If the batteries die in my x4d I just pack it in for the day....... fishing is over... or at least the catching is......

Reelax wrote: If the batteries die in my x4d I just pack it in for the day....... fishing is over... or at least the catching is......

Matt, the current out there was absolutely crazy...and would shift 2 mph depending on the direction you were heading (ie: north as apposed to south) Without the fish hawk you wouldn't have a clue. That is why the heavier mp6 was great, it can take the speed changes without flipping out. The one fish that came on the #1, came during a "normal run" and the speed wasn't a factor. A lot people don't know how much current plays a part in the lure action..Again a 1.8 mph speed on top and 3.3 at the ball that day is a huge difference, if you went by surface speed of say 2.5 -2.7 you could have been push 4 mph or more below.

Also the thermoclime was crazy too, it dropped 30 feet in 3 hours...tell me that doesn't make a difference. A fish Hawk is a must for summer fishing....

The best part about it is salmon love current. They are usually near then you,have a 1mph difference between fishhawk and gps.... won’t know where or what speed to fish without it...

Hope people are paying attention!!

Sometimes it works out to be lucky and not know exactly what is going on. Last week with a dead probe, I caught 2 nice Salmon. I was guessing on the speeds and temp, but it just happened to work out.

Wow! I've been driving myself crazy, trying to catch a whitefish from my kayak. Nice catch!