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Techny Prairie Lake 7/2/20

2K views 3 replies 3 participants last post by  jonny2can 
#1 ·
If you're looking for photos of some nice bass pulled out of this lake...prepare to be disappointed. :lol:

A couple of weeks ago I was checking out Lake Glenview and met a guy fishing off the long pier. He showed me some photos of bass that his son had caught at Techny Prairie Lake. They were pretty decent size. He said he caught them on live minnows. So this morning I decided to get up early and give Prairie Lake a shot. I had checked out the map and some photos of the lake so I had an idea of where I wanted to go. I got to the lake about 6:30.

It's an odd lake, surrounded on 3 sides by a golf course. There's 3 "fishing stations" set aside on the south end of the lake, west, south and east, just behind the clubhouse. I'm not a big fan of lakes that restrict you to only certain areas, I like to explore and try different spots. There was a guy already fishing the west spot and I didn't like the look of the south end so I took the east fishing station next to the soccer field. There was a nice looking little bay with bulrushes to the southeast and a tree overhanging the lake to the north. I started hitting the shady area along the shore by the tree with a buzzbait. and worked my way back around to the bay and got nothing. Tied on a wacky senko and got nothing. Tried a spinner bait and no luck. I just received a Ugly Stik light rod that I had purchased from Cabela's back in May so I set down the St. Croix and decided to try for panfish with the light rig.

I cast straight out off the fishing station and within a minute started to get hits. I was using some nightcrawlers that I had leftover from May. These must have been some real dinks. Constant nibbles and dragging the bobber but no hits. Tried setting the hook but they weren't having it. I finally caught one and it's among the smallest bluegill I have ever caught. I decided to cast over underneath the tree. The sun was up by this time but that area was still in shade. Same thing. Hits galore, but no takers. I lost two that I thought were hooked but they must have just been clamping down on the piece of worm. One of them looked like it might have been a decent size (by this time, "decent size" meant as big as my hand). I finally caught another one and ran out of worms. I gave the spinner bait another try.

The lake is not real weedy. I tried slow rolling a spinner bait on the bottom and didn't get really get snagged or pull up any weeds. The lake looks like classic bass pond material but as we know, looks can be deceiving. I've been watching one too many youtube fishing videos. One guy I watched was fishing a golf course pond on his parents condo complex in Florida. He pulled up quite a few decent bass. I kept thinking, "All I have to do is slow roll this spinner bait and I'm going to get one!" Alas, it was not meant to be. It's a pretty little pond and I probably should have explored more along a path toward the north. If more than one person uses those fishing stations you're not really going to be able to work the shoreline very much. So it's probably good for still fisherman, but if you want to work it you need to get there early.

I think I'll try Lake Shermerville or Lake Potawatomi next just to see what they're like. They're roughly in the same area.

Techny Prairie Lake 1 by Steve, on Flickr

Techny Prairie Lake 2 by Steve, on Flickr

Techny Prairie Lake Bluegill 1 by Steve, on Flickr

Techny Prairie Lake Bluegill 2 by Steve, on Flickr

Various lures that caught jack squat by Steve, on Flickr
 
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#2 ·
I used to fish there a lot. Got a 20" bass once! Been pretty dead for me the last couple of years though. Once the golf pro shop would close i'd always sneak around to the other parts of the lake.
 
#3 ·
JasonN said:
I used to fish there a lot. Got a 20" bass once! Been pretty dead for me the last couple of years though. Once the golf pro shop would close i'd always sneak around to the other parts of the lake.
20", wow! I would have been happy getting anything over 8"! Unfortunately, that seems to be the same story for a number of lakes in our area: "it used to be productive, but not lately". I often wonder why that is. I guess it could be a different reason, or combination of reasons, for each body of water. Fishing pressure, poor stocking, certain people not practicing C&R and going home with anything they pull out of the water, weed kill programs that harm the fishery. And then there's always lack of fishing skills! Maybe I'm not using the right lures, techniques, or colors, at a given time. (Speaking of which, I wonder if a ned rig or shaky head might work at Techny Prairie. The bottom feels like it might be amenable to those techniques.)
 
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