August 30, 2010 Fishing Report


Hi folks

Well August is virtually out of here and we have a new month to look forward to. Personally, I want to see some cooler temperatures and less wind. If we can get the water temps to begin to drop and get back to a minnow bite, life should be pretty good. Crawlers are still the ticket when it comes to chasing walleyes and weeds are the type of structure you still want to concentrate on. Fish are not chasing bait right now, so keep your retrieves VERY slow and back off 15 to 20 seconds once a hit is detected. Slip bobbers can also be effective when fishing thick weeds. Area flowages have been producing fish and while they’re not just jumping on the line yet, the bite is beginning to pick up. Smaller waters are still a challenge and a lot of algae bloom is taking place, so pick and choose your battles carefully on these types of waters.

BASS continue to put on a good bite – both largemouth and smallmouth have been hitting pretty well. Largemouth in particular. Just about anything will work on these fish and we are finding both species in mid to deep weeds. Smallmouth will hang in the timber and on the rocks more than the largemouth.

MUSKY fishing has been pretty decent throughout the year. While there’s no particular lake you can point to as being extremely hot, many nice-sized fish have been boated in the area this year. My experiences on the water and talking to other fishermen is action-sized fish seem to be on the down side. The fish that are being caught and seen are in that low to upper 40-inch bracket and beyond. I’m finding my best luck still taking place on smaller, mid-sized lures. I’m really just starting to catch some fish on 9” Suicks and mantas. Surface lures did slow down over the past couple of weeks mainly due to a 20 degree drop in surface temps, but this past weekend is seeing a dramatic increase in those temps as we’re pushing 80 again.

Good luck fishing. Jeff Winters