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Swim jig sunday

5K views 9 replies 9 participants last post by  cletedius 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
Got out early to see if the hot crappie bite was still on. Shortly after setting up in my spot, after my 3rd crappie, the skies blackened & began to dump heavy rain. Picked up the TM, & ran about 2 miles to get under the nearest bridge. Spent the next 2 hours tied up underneath it, catching a handful of small eyes & a few smallmouth as I waited out the rain.
After the bulk of the weather seemed to have moved on, I decided today was the day I would finally spend a couple hours targetting smallies on this lake (Nokomis). A few days back, I had tied on a black/blue swim jig & spent about 30 minutes throwing it with posiive feedback until a tiny pike cut it off. While in Wasau on saturday, made a stop at fleet farm & bought a couple more jigs. Tied 1 on, put on the trailer & began working the nearest shoreline.
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Results were pretty instant. Had a (mis-shapened) beauty crush it in the 1st 10 casts.
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Spent about 2 hours burning the swim jig/ugly otter trailer. Think I only caught 5 or 6 fish, but, every 1 was good sized. It seemed that boat docks on steep rocky banks were the ticket. Im confident my best 5 fish went over 15lbs.
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Was a ton of fun, #'s werent great, but most of these were nice-sized. Nothing complicated, throw it out & burn it back to the boat. Tail-thump was the key. At a certain speed, that flat paddle really starts thumping like a chatterbait. Ripping off the side appendages on the ugly otter seem to allow it to fish faster & generate more thump from the tail. Most smallies I catch come on light & medium light spinning gear, or medium casting gear. Its a little different catching them on heavy gear with a buried drag on 50lbbraid/25leader.
I look forward to throwing this presentation a little more!
 

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#10 · (Edited by Moderator)
Had gusty winds creating the fabled "walleye chop", this morning......

So I went bass fishing.

Trying to replicate some of the positive results from throwing swim jigs @ brown bass in recent outings, I went out in the blasting winds to try & pile on a bunch of fish.
While I have always held the rubber bass jig /trailer combo in high regard for largemouth fishing, Ive never considered it an important piece of my smallmouth arsenal.
That may change.
The lake Im fishing lately is a 4200ish acre lake, stained water, with some of just about every type of cover imaginable.Basically a WI river flowage. I have fished it iess than a handful of times previous to july, so, I try NOT to settle on spots that produce as much as I focus on finding new spots. The swim jig really makes covering a lot of water quickly pretty easy. Plenty of baits would probably catch better #'s once you find them, but for covering/disecting ground or avg size of fish, Im finding the swim jig tough to beat, lately.
Started out where I got a few the other a.m., & only caught 2 tiny pike. Tried a few other wind-sheltered spots & blanked. I had been avoiding going out in the exposed areas of the lake because of the crazy winds, but I finally caved & put on the rain gear. Ran out into a big open section of the lake & sought out the shorelines, points getting hammered by the wind & started there. Found a stretch of docks with some depth close, gravel to softball-sized rock bottom, & rollers crashing from the waves. Results came pretty quick. Nailed 2 nice LM off the bat (not pictured, I was more focused on not getting blown into the dock I was fishing vs taking pics). As I rounded the point, I stuck a good smallie that unbuttoned boatside. Stumbled on to a large gravel/rock flat that extended way off the point & began fancasting the area. 2 more nice smallies, another half-asssed pike & 2 other bites that didnt connect.
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Caught a couple other similar fish that I didnt photo.

Somebody @ the ramp had a bad day. Ouch!
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And, while checking the battery charger overnight, I picked up my UL& made a cast & got this slab!
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