LOW report for 1-5-06

[icerat]

The report I am giving is not favorable but honest. We fished out of zippel bay and hardly had anything show up on our fl-18's and when they did come around they bit soft but did bite. It was even worse than a slow February LOW trip, the worst I have seen in 20 years of fishing the big lake and the reports I got from others were the same for them. I did here a little better reports near the channel because the current has started to clear up that area and I am sure the area around Zippel will clear up to. In a nutshell my opinion would be to get near the river and fish if you are going up in the next few weeks. Colors are glow red and green lot of jigging shallow in the morning and deep in the afternoon if you are able to move. On a good note I was talking to some resort owners and found that they didn't have many people complaining about not catching fish like you sometimes see. GOOD LUCK GUYS IT HAS TO CHANGE SOMETIME.

[woodman]

Icerat- We were up at Zipple also this weekend, and we only caught 21 fish for 10 guys fishing. Two of us caught 7, and one guy got skunked. We were fishing 12 ft on Friday and landed 14 and threw back one little one. On Sat we caught the rest. I only caught 2 fish on Sat.

This was the worst trip we have ever had on LOW!

I even lost the big fish Trophy this weekend to an 18" walleye. I caught one that was 15", but could not catch anything bigger. I did loose 3 nice fish about half way up. You are right on the light bite.

We found out that glow red, green, and white was the best!

Good times had by all even though we didn't catch many fish.

[coldmark]

Thanks for the updates fellas?

Why weren't the fisherman complaining, because they caught fish or because they were being polite?

Just my luck, my one and only trip to LOTW and it's the worst fishing in 20 years.

[icerat]

They were not catching fish but neither was anybody else

so they couldn't blame there guides. As for your trip it has to clear up here soon and by staying near the river it

will help your chances a great deal in my opinion. It seemed like the fish wanted to bite but could not see the bait until it was right in front of them and then they just sucked it up instead of stalking and attacking. That is why I think we didn't get as much on our flashers as we usually would get because the poor visability made it tuff to bring them in from the normal ranges. Sound and smell still works for them though.

[holepopper]

i was up on lake this weekend fishing in 30 feet past pine island and fishing was very slow i was in a border view house . pink and white worked the best but have to be glow jig

[wallydiver]

I was up at Morris Point saturday evening and sunday morning in 12 feet. 2 small (14") walleyes, 1 in the evening and 1 in the morning. Wasn't pretty.

[curt quesnell]

Had the South Dakota delegation with me on Saturday. Fished

over Pine Island to the East and fished shallow. Started

at 14 feet, lots of fish but few biters. Finally I caught

a Tulibee and figured it was time to move deeper.

We set up in 21 feet deep water and caught fish pretty much

all day. We kept 9 good keepers (nothing real nice) and

tossed back 20 or more. Not great but I was encouraged to

see fish were willing to bite. Things seem to be picking

up. Shallow seemed to be the key. However, Charlie at Riverbend

said his houses were set up in 17 to 31 feet deep and fishing was about the same

in all of them (fair).

Gonna try it again this weekend

[Prairiefire]

We brought the permanent up on Fri. night; bought our shiners and road pass at Adrian's at about midnight. It sure is nice having them open late, everything else in town is closed at that time. We set up out about a mile past pine in 29' because we were told the morning shallow bite hadn't been very good. Fish started biting about 9:30 sat morning and didn't quit until about 3:30. Should have moved shallow after that, but we were lazy. There were way more houses in 4 mile bay than I have ever seen, must be catching a few at night in there. Key baits for us was a gold gemeni spoon with a whole shiner hooked in the back, and anything else jigged very aggresively to bring them in. My buddy out fished everyone else using a pink airplane jig, the ones with the little prop above the jig. Four of us ended up with about 24 nice keepers in a day and a half. A little slow by LOTW standards, but a great trip as usual.

[srj]

Wallydiver--ouch. Was anybody doing better deeper off Morris? I'm planning on fishing Wed-Thurs and had planned on setting the house fairly shallow. Maybe have to rethink. The resort told me shallow was better than deeper.

Good luck.

[jasongp99]

Wow I didn't realize Adrians was open that late. Nice to know if you get up there late after working and the long drive up you can get your house out and be ready for the morning with no set up time. They make you pay to set up that late or they count it towards the next day? I am wrestling with what depth to place the permanent this weekend but now I see there is a bite over by pine island. I have been fishing Morris Point since the new owners, they are so good to you over there. What to do, what to do??? Then I have the added pressure to catch fish cuz I am bringing the in-laws up. Hope they are biting and we are sitting on them!!

[wallydiver]

srj, i failed to mention that we just wanted to get my buddies sleeper up to the lake. which we did. but we weren't fishing until about 3 on saturday and probably slept a little too late for the morning bite.