The Country Angler Returns

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Detritus
Posts: 538
Joined: Mon Apr 15, 2019 8:50 pm
Species: Anything we can catch
Location: Vergennes

The Country Angler Returns

Post by Detritus »

We had a long fishless streak a while back, with only one fish on in weeks of fishing through March. It was a big fish too, probably pushing a PR for salmon, for anyone on the boat. That's saying something too, since Liam was there. But, he spit the hook maybe 2 feet away from the boat.

The coolest thing that happened in all of those fishless trips though, was probably when we discovered a shipwreck.


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We had no Idea what it was at the time, but, it sure looked weird, way out in the middle of Bulwagga bay, about a 1/4 of a mile away from land in any direction. Check out the size of that thing against the scale at the bottom of the sidescan. Looked to be about 250' long. Which, by the way, turned out to be incredibly accurate to the actual dimensions of the ship.

After getting home, I started poking around to see what we had we found. Apparently this wreck was discovered by a couple of guys from our community here in Vergennes, working for the Maritime Museum back in 1999. It's the Port Henry Drawboat. Guess we were about 20 years too late to take credit for the actual discovery. Still pretty cool though.

After that, we tried up north. Other guys were catching fish up around Keeler Bay, again, no fish for us. We decided that maybe we had to give the Country Angler a break. That boat has been trolling us around the lake nearly every single week, for a year straight.

Well, looking at the weather this week, hearing and seeing reports of some nice fish being caught out there on the troll, we planned on waking her up for the weekend. We had a great couple of trips out on Strike Three with several master angler fish being boated, and even landed our crew above Digitroll in Shawn Good's Vermont Fish and Wildlife State Fishing Report for April.

Here's the report if you haven't read it. https://vtfishandwildlife.com/vt-fishin ... il-23-2021

But on to this trip.

It definately started off with a bang Friday after work. I hooked onto the boat at work with the Excursion, and started heading home. About 4 miles down the road, I heard a funny screech out the window. Slowed down, and was looking at the trailer in the mirror, and saw a wicked wheel wobble suddenly on the drivers side of the trailer. I pulled over as far as I could, and went back to check it out.

The outer wheel bearing had failed on the trailer, and the wheel was about 1/4" away from being completely off of the trailer. After I jacked it up slightly, and the wheel and hub did in fact fall off on the ground. Got pretty lucky. Pretty annoyed too, since I had just replaced all of the trailer wheel bearings a year ago. They were cheap bearings, and that one just blew apart. Totally lubricated still, and installed correctly. Just a crap bearing.

Long story short, about 4 hours and a few auto parts stores later, along with playing mechanic in the middle of the road, I was back on my way home. Luckily I had my 3 emergency Triangles with me to divert people around where I was working, and it was in a 25mph zone almost to a Stop sign. I almost took a picture of that mess, but, I wasn't really in the mood.

I woke up this morning to gray skies, about 45 degree air temperature, no wind. Got the boys up, and got ready for the trip. Launched at Redgate, and the fishing conditions looked pretty good. The plan was to fish right out of the river, and set up breakfast on the grill, since the fishing would be pretty slow we thought. Of course, when you plan on that, you often get surprised.


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All right ladies and gentelmen, boys and girls, we're back on the cold water board. That fish came 100' back, probably 35' to the side, on a planer board, small youzuri pin minnow pink stick bait.

We did however, continue with our plan of getting breakfast going.


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Some nice Egg and Cheese sandwiches, grapes, and grape juice. Don't forget the sausages.

As all veterans of the LCU fleet know, one of the best techniques that you can employ to start getting fish to bite, is to light the grill. Next up was Brody.


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A PR lake trout for him. We did'nt weigh it since it was bleeding a little, but, the fish was 30". Adult Master Angler length in fact. Im guessing about 8 lbs. We tied a dock line to the lip gripper lanyard, and tied him to a cleat beside the boat with the water washing through his gills. The bleeding quickly stopped, and we attempted a release. He just floated back up. So, we did a big circle, figuring we'd just pick him up, and bring him home to eat. Well, the second time we netted him, he was having none of it. I put him back in the water, and a hard kick, and to the bottom he went. I'd say more often than not for us, when we circle back for a dazed fish, they are just messing with us, and swim away.

This fish was on a Honeybee size 1 (small).


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The back side is silver, and has Jim's trademark honeycomb hammering. This spoon had the most hits and fish of anything else we ran today. Definately the hot lure of the day. It was running on a rigger, 35' down, 100' back over about 40 feet of water. Water temperature by the way, was 44 at the surface, and 42 at that 35' depth. We had put that rigger down there because of all of the fish we saw zipping around on the bottom. Figured we'd drop in on the laker party we thought we were seeing on the graph.



But, they were'nt all lakers down there.


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This fish took another Honeybee, this time on a cheater. That rigger was running at 35, so this spoon was at about 17' down. The speed all morning was between 2.0, and 2.3 mph gps. Here's the spoon.


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A little later on, Brody had his first samon of the year.


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this fish came off of 1.5 colors of lead with a 50' flourocarbon leader, 35' to the side on a planer board. Here's the spoon, a Mottled Chart-Green/White. Honeybee of course.


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We thought we would work a bunch of Jim's lures today, while he was working towards getting out of the in-patient Physical Therapy program. So far, Liam's PR salmon came on a Honeybee, and today Brody's PR Lake Trout came on a different Honeybee.

We finished the morning 6 for 9 total, 4 lakers, 2 salmon, and 3 lost unknown fish. We caught more fish off of downriggers than planers, but the split was pretty close. A really fun morning of fishing.

By the way, Brody saw a baby Champ today. About 50' back behind the boat, he saw something swimming along behind the boat making a "V" in the water out in front of the Swift Estate. He says it had 2 eyes on the front of it's face kind of like a frog. It was fairly small, and then it just submerged. That's when he decided to tell Liam and I what he saw. I would have preferred he alerted us to it beforehand, but, I guess it happened kind of fast.

We speculated that it might have been a bird or muskrat or something, and waited for it to surface. It never did. I think we would have seen it too if it breathed air, since the conditions looked like this.


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So there you have it. The first fishing report from the Country Angler in a while. I've heard people say that fishing is boring. Well, maybe they're just not doing it right. It helps a lot if you replace wheel bearings by the side of the road, discover shipwrecks, catch fish, and spot a sea monster once in a while.
"Country Angler" - '93 Trophy 2002 - Cold water boat
"Strike Three" - '04 Triton SF21 - Warm water boat
"The Dumpster" - '90 Starcraft SF14 - Camping Boat

Jack
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fishy1
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Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by fishy1 »

awsome keep on chasing i bet the kids were happy.
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Reelax
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Species: Salmon, steelhead, brown trout
Location: Fletcher, Vt

Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by Reelax »

Great report Jack. You definitely earned a good trip... sounds like the honey bee #1’s made the day for you...

Fish on!
Matt B
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Crayfish
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Location: Jericho, Vermont

Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by Crayfish »

Awesome job, Jack and Crew! That giant carp is getting some good press, I see! You'll see a picture of my son, Jacob (aka Perchbait), in that fishing report, too, with a 32.75" laker we caught off Colchester Pt a couple of weeks ago.
TruViking
Posts: 308
Joined: Sun Nov 15, 2020 10:25 pm
Species: Those who thrive in Cold H20
Location: Burlington, Vt

Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by TruViking »

Difficult start but a satisfying beginning of the Season for the "Country Angler" Crew!
Looking forward to net Report.

P.S. Congrats on the Personal Best! You and your Brother's are definitely worthy of the "Master Angler" Title!!!!
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Detritus
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Joined: Mon Apr 15, 2019 8:50 pm
Species: Anything we can catch
Location: Vergennes

Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by Detritus »

Crayfish wrote: Mon Apr 26, 2021 9:10 am Awesome job, Jack and Crew! That giant carp is getting some good press, I see! You'll see a picture of my son, Jacob (aka Perchbait), in that fishing report, too, with a 32.75" laker we caught off Colchester Pt a couple of weeks ago.
I've heard of Perchbait. I think you guys were going to fish Bulwagga a while back, but couldn't make it or something? Good to see you guys in the report as well. It's our first time making the state fishing report. Kids think it's pretty cool. Kind of like being in the newspaper when I was a kid.

My wife put that picture on facebook, and she says that it has a record number of "likes" for her page. We've had 6 babies together too. Guess people like that carp picture better than baby pictures.
"Country Angler" - '93 Trophy 2002 - Cold water boat
"Strike Three" - '04 Triton SF21 - Warm water boat
"The Dumpster" - '90 Starcraft SF14 - Camping Boat

Jack
Gecha (Gerry)
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Joined: Mon Aug 29, 2011 12:26 pm
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Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by Gecha (Gerry) »

Another exciting report from the Country Angler. Always pleasant to read.
Congrats on Brody's PR laker.
I always keep a set of trailer bearing on the boat glove box. As you said, you never know when they'll go bad.
Gecha (Gerry North of the Border)
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Dilly Worm
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Joined: Tue Jul 16, 2019 9:22 pm
Species: target salmon & catch togue

Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by Dilly Worm »

Great report, the baby Champ sighting is intriguing !

You guys had the right plan for Sunday. Great to see the new honeybees are catching the lakers and salmon.
I do not exaggerate when I talk about fishing - I underestimate, like I say "just one more cast honey, then I'll come home" !
Keep Calm and... Fish On !
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Crayfish
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Re: The Country Angler Returns

Post by Crayfish »

That's funny about the Facebook likes!

Perchbait (my son) doesn't post on here, but he used to be well known on the "iceshanty" and "myfishfinder" boards. He also has his own blog, but he hasn't had time to write anything for quite a while between college and a girlfriend. Click on "blog" at the top of the page to see his stories. This all started when he won the Vt Fish and Wildlife writing contest one year with the story of his first deer, including awards given out at the Sportsman's show at the fairgrounds. Hopefully he gets back to it. He's got a way with words!

https://jacobcrawford8.wixsite.com/pboutdooradventure

Maybe your boys should start writing the stories of your fishing adventures? You never know where it might lead.
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