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Fished Chester Woods on Saturday, February 9th with good results. Fished from 8:00 AM to noon & managed to catch around 20 gills, 2 crappies, & 1 bass. Didn't keep any fish at all. Caught some larger gills closer to noon including 1 9" gill. I was fishing in 22-24' of water next to timber but most of the fish were suspended at about 16-18. Had best luck using Custom Jigs Ratsos & Shrimpos tipped with waxworms. There is still 6-7" of ice but be careful due to our warm weather! Anyone else care to report about fishing here locally this past weekend? Lets hear from you guys.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I have been fishing Chester quite a bit lately. I have been doing pretty well with sunfish and a few crappies. The ice was a little thin on Sunday when I was out there about 4 inches and I had to jump onto the lake to avoid open water at the edges. I am wonderign where the crappies are in that lake? For good sunfish I have been in the trees in 20-25ft water with waxy worms.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi

My boys and I went to Chester for the 1st time on Sunday (3-17). Ice was pretty broken
up around the edges - but w/ a good leap, you
could get on. Out in the open, its still about a foot thick, but turning white - not
clear any more.

We only had 3 hours - so we didn't spend alot
of time wandering around. Fished just past the 2nd fishing dock on the arm that the
launch ramp is in - on the opposite side
from the docks.

We had 22' of water - fish were on the bottom, with the exception of one group that
I marked at 13'. We ended up w/ 6 sunfish
that went the 7" size requirement, had 5-6
more that were to close for comfort (was using a tape measure - not one of the boards
at the launch - didn't see those 'til we
came back in).

Bites weren't hard - your bobber might twitch
a time or two - and if you didn't get them,
your waxie was gone. My boys tryed minnows, but no takers on those. My older son did the
best w/ 4 of the fish - me 1, youngest one.

Older son had a orange jig, I was using green, don't know what youngest had.

UG

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Hey Grump, Nut and Big D,

Thanks for the info! Chester woods can be a hard nut to crack. There are nice crappies to be had, at times hard to find. I am looking forward to some open water bassin' there this year!

Keep the rods bendin'!!!

Jim W

[This message has been edited by Jim W (edited 03-19-2002).]

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I hope that fish was released. That is 1 of only 25 adult fish which are the original stock fish in that lake. It is going to be an awesome bass lake in the next few years as the 9 and 12 inchers grow and get a little bigger. The current regulation is to release all largemouth under 15 inches...which means all fish except the original stock fish (which should also be released in my opinion.) It is a developing fishery and needs time to hit maturity.

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