Willard 6/29 - First Boat Trip Success

[Hazzy_Hazbourne]

I drive past Willard Bay a frequently. In my commuting years, I drove past Willard Bay twice a day, every day.... for almost a decade. I have bank tangled a couple of times there and caught a couple catfish but never the prized wiper or walleye. I had never fished it from a boat and following fellow BFTer reports, I realized a boat is the best chance of finally hooking up with a wily wiper or walleye. With some convincing I got my dad to agree to a Saturday morning trip and without any convincing at all my oldest two daughters set their alarms and woke up on time to come with us.

We hit the water about 7:45 am and apparently that was our first mistake. We trolled shad raps, flicker shad, Rat-L-Traps, wally divers, Rapalas, crawler harnesses, spinners and spoons with only one light tap in almost four hours. Having other stuff that needed to get done at home, we decided to give up and started back for the boat ramp about 11:45 am. That's when the rod with the rat-l-trap went BENDO! My 10-year-old was the lucky one to pick up the rod. That fish put up quite the fight for her and I knew it had to be a decent one. A few minutes later, with my oldest girl manning the net, the first wiper for our family was brought aboard the boat. A 21" 4-pound fatty!!!


After we got the lines back out, my oldest daughter says "Hey Sis, turn on more of your fish charm." Turn on the fish charm she did, because right after she said "OK" another rod was bouncing. Big Sis reeled in her first wiper.

Shortly after that I was able to cross wiper off of my new species list. The first walleye for the family was brought on board within a short span by Big Sis and she was able to put her first check mark next to walleye.

Little Miss Fish Charm was also able to count catfish on her list of new fish when a 20" cookie cutter cat hit the crawler harness at 3.2 mph.

All in all, we caught 6 wipers, 1 walleye and 1 catfish and a couple missed fish between 11:45 am and 2:00 pm. One fish was caught on the black/chrome Rat-L-Trap; the other 7 fish were all caught on an orange/yellow crawler harness.

I released one of my smaller wiper to get bigger, but the girls were so excited to catch new fish that they didn't want to let any of their fish go. Maybe when we catch them consistently then I can convince them just to keep the bigger ones. We went home and the girls had their first lesson at fillet school. All the wiper, both big and small ended up being absolutely delicious both as fried fish tacos and broiled fillets.

All in all, it was a good day with Captain Grandpa and the Giggly Girl Gang. Next time though, we might sleep in and hitch up the boat about 10:30 am.
[signature]

[TheFishSlayer]

That's great!!!! good catch!!
[signature]

[EyLayo]

Well done. I've followed a similar path. Drove past Willard daily for many years before wanting to fish there, and also recently have been trying to hook my kids into fishing. Looks like a few generations got in on the action- people folk and wipers. Diggin your rod holders too. Looks like you took the advice to tether them down.
[signature]

[Hazzy_Hazbourne]

[quote EyLayo] Diggin your rod holders too. Looks like you took the advice to tether them down.[/quote]

Yeah....we go high tech on our boat!!! Since it's not my boat, I don't dare mount anything permanent on it. You should see some of my previous posts about the removable homemade downriggers we made to go on that boat. We just didn't take the downriggers to Willard since the average depth is a whopping 20 ft deep.
[signature]

[EyLayo]

I'll have to look them up for some starter ideas. I bought some used DR's a while back and haven't decided whether to mount them to the boat, or devise a removable/temporary mount. Thanks
[signature]

[jjannie]

Sounds like grandpa and the girls will be begging for another trip soon!

Nice catch! Enjoyed the pics as well..... []
[signature]

[Tin-Can]

GREAT batch of fish. 3 of the main species in Willard, you done good [][]

Nice to see a "power squadron" boat being used to fish out of also.

Bet your girls will be asking you "when are you getting a boat, Dad?" "When can we go back to Willard?"

[fishin]
[signature]

[Hazzy_Hazbourne]

[quote Tin-Can]GREAT batch of fish. 3 of the main species in Willard, you done good [][]

Nice to see a "power squadron" boat being used to fish out of also.

Bet your girls will be asking you "when are you getting a boat, Dad?" "When can we go back to Willard?"

[fishin][/quote]

We are occasionally a member of the power squadron on Bear Lake and Hyrum. But usually we try and keep our distance from all the smaller/slower fishing boats. We don't blast obnoxious music either. There sure was a line up of boats at the ramp when we went to pull out. I'll probably try to hit a weekday next time. I don't need to have my kids ask me about getting a boat, I ask myself that question every. []

[quote jjannie]Sounds like grandpa and the girls will be begging for another trip soon!
[][/quote]

I don't think it'll be too hard to convince anyone to go next time.
[signature]

[Hazzy_Hazbourne]

Part of my motivation for getting out to Willard was ZUKI BLUE's post from last week. In that post ZUKI said most the fish were caught from 12:30 - 2:00 pm. That is about the same time frame we caught our fish. I guess my question for those wise to the ways of Willard is this, is mid-day usually the time when the bite heats up, or is this out of the norm?
[signature]

[Tin-Can]

I believe Zuki-Blue's (Gene's) last trip was on a weekday, maybe Wednesday? That was probably the time frame that the fish were hitting on that day. Being Willard Bay, that can change from day to day. Since your trip was on a Saturday, with all the pleasure boats that can be on the water on the weekends, you were quite fortunate to do as well as you did. Gene is a PRO at finding fish, like several others on this forum. He usually targets Walleye more than anything. Sometimes the time of day isn't as critical as the location of where the fish are NOW, or at the time you are on the water.
The high water level in WB this year has provided a lot more places for the fish to "hide" [:/] so use the earlier time on the water to find the fish, then if there is a special "bite" time, you have a better chance of being where they are when they do start to bite.

I think I would have had a better day Sunday after the wife boated a Cat, but the wind came up quite constant, blowing some small white caps. That's not good in my little boat, so we got off the water about 12 noon.

Good luck on your next trip to Willard.
[signature]

[Hazzy_Hazbourne]

Thanks for the info. I realize that through more experience fishing the lake I'll get to understand it better. It was just interesting to me that Gene's report and my experience had the bulk of the fish being caught at the same time of day. I was just trying to figure out if all the fish were just typical teenagers who didn't wake up until noon.

The lake I fish the most (still not often enough) is Bear Lake. There are on days and off days. And then there are anomalies. Last year in August we were catching quite a few fish over sandy bottom and from 10:00am until about 1:00 pm We started the first few mornings about 6:00am and it was dead until about 10:00am. Then the fish were biting until 12:30 or 1:00 and it shut right off. I'd never seen a day like that at Bear Lake in the time I've been fishing it, but it was like that all week.

Thanks again!
[signature]