Read about all of my Fishing Adventures!
Follow my Fish of 2017
Between all the work associated with fixing my Yukon after it was totaled, thanks to a deer, and some of the work on my boat, I had been really nervous about getting Big Booty Judy out on the water.
Guess I am turning into a nervous fellow in my old age. I reckon when your job is to find broken rocket parts and bad hardware, it makes you that kind of guy. Granted, I had put hundreds of miles on the Yukon since I received the rebuilt title for it and I had even pulled Judy out of the shop and let her run since putting on a new impeller and flushing the engine. Still, I had worries that the lower unit wasn't sealed up and running down the river at 60+ miles and hour isn't my way of finding out. Nor had I towed with the Yukon since its face to face encounter with a deer that smashed up every coolant component in the front end.
But when my wife suggested that I meet her down on the river after work, well, I figured I'd risk it.
Pulling the boat to work wasn't an issue and I didn't expect it to be. Still, I kept a close eye on the trans temp gauge and the water temp gauge. No issues there, aside from the new exhaust is, uh, loud. See, I MIGHT have put long tube headers and built a custom 3" exhaust through a Magnaflow muffler.....
Anyways, after work I dunked the boat. Lower unit fluid didn't come bubbling up, so that was a start. I really wanted to fish inside of Ditto. This time of year, the fish get stacked inside the marina to spawn. But, even though that's a quick 3 miles, I didn't want to run that far quite yet.
There was decent current and the water color was surprisingly clear on the main lake but the banks were fairly muddy. You know what they say, muddy fish are the dumbest fish.
There was decent current and the water color was surprisingly clear on the main lake but the banks were fairly muddy. You know what they say, muddy fish are the dumbest fish.
As we putted around, Alyse pointed to a culvert that was spewing water. She said she thought we should start there. With the water in Wheeler being so low and all the cover being out of the water, something like that would create muddy eddies and current, both should bring in fish.
After making a couple of casts with the Bama rig, I noticed bait being chased right up on the bank, so I picked up my AKRods custom squarebill rod with an Ardent Elite 5:3 reel and shot a Spro Little John as close to the bank as I could.
Smack! I boated a healthy white bass. No, it wasn't a green fish, but I wasn't going to be picky today. After all, we had only a few short hours until dark. After catching a few more, I handed Alyse the rod and I picked the Bama Rig back up. Nothing for me, though she caught several whites. I picked up my other cranking rod and cast a Luhr-Jensen speed trap. I couldn't manage a bite, though she continued to catch them nearly every cast.
So, I cut off the speed trap and tied on an identical Spro Little John. First cast, fish. Second cast, fish. Third cast, fish. But that third one broke off when I set the hook. Sad face. There's $10 down the drain.
I didn't have another one, so I tied on the closest thing I could find which was a Normal Little N in ghost. Set the hook and it broke again. Apparently, I had a bad section of line so I stripped off several feet. I found out that I did have a Little John MD, so I tied it on and began catching whites, though I had a tough job of catching up with my wife, who refuses to deal with unhooking white bass.
On one of my casts, I cast to the eddy created by the flow instead of into the flow itself. Though I did catch a white bass, a largemouth followed the white bass to the boat. I decided to make some casts to the eddy and that resulted in several largemouth. Following my lead, Alyse made some casts and soon caught her very own largemouth.
Over the two hours, we caught white bass after white bass but mixed in around 10 largemouth.
Smack! I boated a healthy white bass. No, it wasn't a green fish, but I wasn't going to be picky today. After all, we had only a few short hours until dark. After catching a few more, I handed Alyse the rod and I picked the Bama Rig back up. Nothing for me, though she caught several whites. I picked up my other cranking rod and cast a Luhr-Jensen speed trap. I couldn't manage a bite, though she continued to catch them nearly every cast.
So, I cut off the speed trap and tied on an identical Spro Little John. First cast, fish. Second cast, fish. Third cast, fish. But that third one broke off when I set the hook. Sad face. There's $10 down the drain.
I didn't have another one, so I tied on the closest thing I could find which was a Normal Little N in ghost. Set the hook and it broke again. Apparently, I had a bad section of line so I stripped off several feet. I found out that I did have a Little John MD, so I tied it on and began catching whites, though I had a tough job of catching up with my wife, who refuses to deal with unhooking white bass.
On one of my casts, I cast to the eddy created by the flow instead of into the flow itself. Though I did catch a white bass, a largemouth followed the white bass to the boat. I decided to make some casts to the eddy and that resulted in several largemouth. Following my lead, Alyse made some casts and soon caught her very own largemouth.
Over the two hours, we caught white bass after white bass but mixed in around 10 largemouth.
Also, the boat ran fine.....so far.
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