2/25 Report

[eyepatrol]

Mrwalleye and myself got together today on Washington intending to do some fishing and helping with the clean-up, but we got onto a lite, but very hot bite during that time and ended up catching a lot of fish today and missing the clean-up.

We hooked up at Westwood at 5:15am and were out fishing by around 5:45. We set up in about 12'-13' of water on a firmer bottom that sloped from about 6'. It wasn't long and we had marks coming in both near the bottom, which were sunnies, and about 5'-6' below the ice, which were crappies. We both wiffed on a few fish at first, but then started to catch some decent sized sunnies from 6" up to nearly 9" and some crappies from about 9"/10" up to about 11.5". A #8 pink&white glow ratfinke with a pinched off waxie seemed to be key on the fish before sun-up. We found the fish were finicky and biting lightly. A light jiggle of the rod followed by holding the rod still, or a very slow and steady raise up from the fish seemed to work best for us. Once the sun came up, the fish pretty well shut down and moved out, so we decided to make a move ourselves.

Sometime around 7:30 or 8:00 we moved to an area where shallow water extended further out into the lake. We drilled holes at the bottom of the slope in 12'-13' of water again and drilled additional holes out further on the 12'-13' flat. We started out near the toe of the slope, marked a few fish and caught a few, but the fish were in a pretty negative mood. Most fish in this location were bottom huggers. They'd come up off the bottom, stop, stare and then head back down to the bottom. Only caught a few fish in this spot.

We then decided to move about 50 yards to the furthest holes out that we drilled (still in 12-13fow) as I had marked a couple of fish suspended about 2'-4' off the bottom while checking holes we drilled. This was the key move and spot of the day for us. Those suspended fish (mostly sunnies and a couple crappies) were much more willing to bite than the bottom huggers we were previously over.

I started out with an orange/chartreuse teardrop jig tipped with a waxie and the fish were going strong on this color. Was catching some nice 6" - 9" gills consistently, caught a 9" white crappie and had an 11" black crappie get off at the top of the hole. Then I lost my wonderful jig on a fish because I didn't tie a good knot!

By that time mrwalleye had tied on an orange/chartreuse marmooska and immediately he was pulling them in one after the other, almost as fast as he could get his line down there. The fish were thick down there, constantly. I had a blue/orange marmooska, but they only looked at that. Tried shrimpos, ratsos, orange teardrops, chartreuse teardrops, chartreuse ratsos, ant jigs, you name it. Most everything would only look at my jig & waxie while they were eating mrwalleyee's jig. And I should mention mrwalleyee was tipping his marmooska with I believe 2 spikes. I went back to using the pink/white glow #8 ratfinke and picked up a couple more fish, but mrwalleyee outfished me at least 10:1 or better with that marmooska.

All in all we caught and kept I believe 7 or 8 crappies. Mrwalleyee would have to confirm this, but I'd say we caught probably 50-75 (maybe more) sunnies of all sizes in this spot. Many were in that 6" range and we kept one limit or so between 7" and 9". I believe mrwalleyee caught another 25-30 sunnies in the hour or so after I left plus he had a nice crappie get off at the hole according to an earlier post he made.

Light jigging movements were key again in this spot. Before I had to leave, we used the Aquaview for about an hour and it was VERY interesting to see what was happening with the fish mrwalleyee was catching. His little marmooska, after jigging it, would spin around in circles and when it came nearly to a stop, that's when the sunnies would bite. Plus, they would just nip at the jig at first, then open up and take it in. Most of the sunnies he caught acted in this way. So it was key to give a little jigging motion to get their attention, then let it sit until they bit the second time. Springbobbers were also very key today as the fish were biting very lightly. Most fish were 1'-3' off the bottom, but would follow to about 5' off the bottom until they headed back down.

All in all a GREAT day for not only fishing, but FINALLY catching!!! Horizontal jig presentations seemed to be key today as vertical jigs didn't produce much of anything. I used pinched off waxies, mrwalleyee used white spikes.

Thanks for the company mrwallyee!!! We'll have to hit'em up again!

[mrwalleyee]

I used to be a waxie man all the way. Never used to use the spikes. Now, it's completely opposite. For one, they seem to last a lot longer on the hook. I was easily catching 6-8 fish before I would have to rebait. It may have been more, I'm not sure. Second, you get a hell of a lot more spikes in a container than waxies. Even after all those sunnies yesterday, I still had 1/4 of a container left. Plus, I like to load up the hook and make the spikes dangle off of it by hooking them threw the eyes.

I only wished that I would have tied on one of those rat finky's earlier in the morning. I hate getting outfished on crappies . I'd say by the time I left, it was easily a 100 fish day between the 2 of us.

The door is always open for you to stop in if you see me out there. I'm sure we'll get out more as the fishing only gets better from here on out.

[clamtrap]

A friend and I where out there at 7:00 and we caught alot of sunnies, he was using a chartreuse lucky #7 and he caught the most fish with spikes I think that was the key. I was using everthing in my tackle box trying different things, but he was having the best luck. I was using waxies from little peices to two on the hook. we caught about 75 fish all day, everthing that we keped was 8" or over sunnies. All in all it was a great day to meet everyone that was out there it was fun we will have to get to gether and get in to those late ice crappies

We left there and stoped at clear lake in Waseca and caught a few there we let everthing grow up not as big as Washington.

That was my first time on Washington and it was great time I will be back. I'm going t Mexico a week from this monday so I'm hoping to get out either Sat or Sun.

[harvey lee]

Basscatcher,mrwalleye and clamtrap and group.Iam glad to see everyone caught at the least a meal of fish.

As far as being late or not showing for the clean-up,dont worry as myself and 4-5 others had it done in no time.We started a little earlier than planned and there wasnt that much stuff laying around.

[Team Otter]

Nice reports guys! Glad to see you didn't miss me too much! I was attacking the perch on Mille Lacs.

[delmuts]

did you catch any perch like the two pictured in the OutDoor News?

[james_walleye]

Hey Otter i was up there too, wish i would have known you were up there. How did u do? It was tough for us. We hopped around the mud flats and had a ton of fish everywhere but they were finicky. We did get a couple 10" fish and a bunch of little ones but not much too show. I did pop a 23" walleye at 7:00 last night so the last walleye of the season was a beauty full of eggs, back too do her thing.

[Team Otter]

Maybe we drove by each other? We "run and gun'd" on the mud all day too. Hit several nice areas with fish at all locations. Some schools were more active than others. It was tough but we managed to get a few perch "to go". The fish were active from sun-up until ~8:30 am and then they slowed from there. We got some of those afternoon fish to bite by pounding the bottom with our jigs and then resting them just an 1" or so off the bottom. The fish would just barely grab it and then you had to set quickly. They were feeding/holding right on the bottom, which is what made it difficult.

This Saturday should be a different story with a more favorable weather pattern.

[Team Otter]

No, our largest was ~12" yesterday. There are plenty of those true jumbos in there. Maybe this weekend...

[JD9400T]

Hi all I was on washington today 26th and I also noticed the sunfish did not care for the wax worms.They sure liked those spikes though. Started out with a black and orange demon, then that fell apart. So tried green and glow ants nada, the tried orange and chartruse ant, zip. Then found the magic flavor pink and glow ladybug. A lot of the same as Basscatcher said a lot of lookers. Not to many chasers as in the past. It was still nice to be out though........

[james_walleye]

Otter we hit Shermans and 7-mile for the most part. Were you anywhere near those areas? Looking at a map, and all the pods of houses, really made a guy realize how much water there is out there. A guy gets the feeling out there sometimes of where the heck do you go. And ya know the places that were so-so yesterday could have been hotter than heck today. I definately have better luck up there in a boat than on the ice.

[Team Otter]

No, we were working areas that have received little, if any, fishing pressure. We were off by ourselves all day.

It sure can be an intimidating lake, no doubt. But, that's part of the fun. More hiding spots!

[eyepatrol]

JD..

We found that the bottom hugging fish were the most inactive fish. Not sure if you found the same. A 50 yard move really paid off though. Ran into much more active and larger pods of suspended sunnies just from a short move.

The orange/chartreuse marmooska mrwalleyee had really outfished me, but it could very well have been the spikes too. Although mrwalleyee offered up his spikes, I stuck with my waxies. Next time I'll come armed with both.

[eyepatrol]

Harvey lee

Just wondering if you found any fish when you moved in shallower later in the a.m. that day?