It's ON at Da'Berry! (I added the pics...)

[N.E.T.O.]

...I added the photos...and my text went away. Retyping:

We (me, my cousin and his buddy) went to Mudcreek Saturday morning. We launched my 14 foot boat right at mudcreek and went out to the middle of the bay and dropped anchor. We immediately started catching fish! Started about 8:15, with water temp 45ish, air temp high 20's ish and no wind. By 11:00 we had caught over 90 fish. Doing some quick math, we calculated one fish to the boat every 2 minutes! (One fish per fisherman every 6 minutes average).
Multiple doubles and even triples were caught.
We left at 1:00 and we had caught 129 fish. This was my personal best at Strawberry this year, I caught 51 with one being a Rainbow, Arron (cousin) caught 47 with one being a Rainbow and his buddy (Micheal Bolton) catching 31 with 2 being Rainbows. Our biggest was just under 25 inches, with 8 confirmed over the slot. None were caught under the slot. All were caught vertical jigging, in about 30 feet of water.

Pics:
26= Morning glass
34= Doubles!
37= This is what my fishfinder looked like the whole morning. Multiple fish under us at all times! Sorry about the blur, while I was taking the photo, I was setting the hook on my pole with my other hand!
38=Tube Jig
44=Our big fish of the day, 24 3/4 inches.
45=One of the Rainbows we caught. We kept it. They are very colorful right now, and they fight really well!
47=The view to the west of the mudcreek parking lot from our secret spot.

Randy
[signature]

[MGB]

Your report makes me regret staying home today. Thanks for the update Randy.
[signature]

[Theekillerbee]

You guys really layed the smack down on them. Nice work.
[signature]

[Flycasting]

Nice job! Sounds like you guys had a great time. []
[signature]

[flygoddess]

[font "Comic Sans MS"][black][size 3]WOW! I would think that it would take more than two minutes for that jig to get down 30' let alone bringing one of those fish in that quick, but then I have never jigged.[/size][/black][/font]
[signature]

[Kent]

Not bad Randy.[] Were you tipping your jigs and if yes with what? It sure appears that it is going to be a great ice fishing year up to Strawberry. Imagine having them hit like that and trying to fish with two rods!
[signature]

[N.E.T.O.]

[font "Comic Sans MS"]Flygoddess said: "WOW! I would think that it would take more than two minutes for that jig to get down 30' let alone bringing one of those fish in that quick, but then I have never jigged."[/font][size 1] [/size]

...I WISH I were that good!...when I said an average of 1 fish to the boat every two minutes, that is accurate, but that was between the 3 of us! I guess that makes the average about 1 fish per fisherman every 6 minutes! Heck, it takes me almost 2 minutes to release a fish and put some more bait on! However, for each fish caught we probably missed one or two! I'm going to post a pic of the screen of my fishfinder tomorrow, that is what it looked like the whole morning! Multiple fish on the bottom the whole time!
Just for the record, it takes about 15 to 20 seconds to get your jig to the bottom in 30 feet of water...if it makes it there! Sometimes a fish takes it on the way down!
Randy
[signature]

[N.E.T.O.]

Hey Kent!
I used about a 1/4" chunk of chub meat to tip the jigs with. I tried a worm once or twice, and they wouldn't touch the worms. I like to buy the chubs at sportsmans that come with 6 chubs in the pack. I cut them up the night before into little 1/4" chunks then refreeze them in baggies. Makes it easy to re-bait the jig each time!
I noticed this time that the fish are fighting a LOT harder than they were a month ago (especially the Rainbows!). I loosened my drag a few times and had some fun with a few of them!
The other two fisherman in the boat with me were also using chub meat. White tube jigs were the ticket, but even when I ran out of white ones, the speckled green ones worked just as good.
Randy
[signature]

[ironworker]

great report and pictures.
i knew i should have went to the berry instead of deer creek. oh well there is always next weekend.
thanks for sharing.
[signature]

[flygoddess]

I believe your screen on the fish finder, I was there last week in my pontoon and I have sonar and you don't lie[cool]. I only fly so I have no idea on jigging, but, it does seem to work for you guys.
Last week while I was retrieving a fish, (I fish two flies on a "Y" connection)I noticed three other large fish chasing the other fly. I tried leading the hooked fish to entise the others, but by then they noticed my flippers. That was fun, and yes I have caught two at one time on numerous occasion, even on two dries before.

I am only asking you questions, because all I can do is compare it to fly fishing, which I am sure there isn't that much similarity. I do know when I have hooked a fish (pretty much any fish) at Strawberry, it is NOT a quick retrieve (those fish fight harder than any fish I have ever encountered).

So, with that, I can't figure out how you can retrieve, release and rebait for a few hours and do this in 6 minutes at a time.
Just curious, I don't want to come off as atrouble maker, these are honest questons...really[]
PEACE
FG
[signature]

[Kent]

Most of us are fishing with 6 or 8 pound line, combined with a spinning reel, so we can get them in much faster than one probably does on a flyrod. Also, I often have a second rod already rigged up and ready to send down immediately after landing the first fish, so I don't even have to spend any time rebaiting. Even if one has to rebait it takes very little time to put a chunk of bait, that is already cut and ready to go, on the tip of a jig. Plus, if I am fishing with a spinning reel (I use both spinning reels and a bait casting reels) one can just flip the bail and let the jig drop to the bottom in probably about 15 to 20 seconds.
[signature]

[flygoddess]

Thanks Hon, that makes sense on the two rigs, one in the batting cage. []
I have had some incredible days on the berry myself with an every cast situation for a couple of hours (but in my case, maybe 8 to 10 minutes to get fish in pull hook out-barbless hooks, hold its tail till he takes off) And of course the two fish thing which takes a lot longer for obvious reasons[laugh][laugh]I too use 6wt and 6 top 8lb tippet.

BUT, I do know "When your on, YOUR ON! "
My hat is off to you guys in a serious way.

RIGHT ON AND TIGHT LINES!!!
[signature]

[N.E.T.O.]

flygoddess,
Kent summed it up perfectly. With 8 lb line and a good spinning reel or levelwind reel, those fish can sometimes come up pretty quickly and easily. I hadn't thought about it from a flyrod perspective, and since I do own one and have even used it a few times, I can see how these Strawberry-esque fish can take a while to get in with a fly rod.

My wife has been fishing with me at Strawberry when its like that and during the "lull" (whenever it arrives!) she says "I thought you fished to relax!" (As I'm wiping the sweat off my brow and eating a snack and trying to take a whiz in the pee bucket before the next barrage of fish start biting again!)

I probably should relax more, but if you've ever fished with people like MGB or Kentofnsl, most fishing trips are far from relaxing, but very rewarding! I went out with MGB to Strawberry once and we had a day similar if not better than I did yesterday. We lost track WELL after 100 fish between us. Our wrists were sore for a week from catching fish! I refer to that now as "Strawberry-Wrist".
I get the same "Strawberry-Wrist" casting into Pineview all day trying to catch those darn Tiger Muskie!

And to think, I gave up waterskiing because I wanted to relax a little bit! I work harder fishing than I ever did water skiing!
[signature]

[piscispursuit]

Nice work man, it is on.
[signature]

[Bigfishrule]

Another thing that makes the time a little decieving is doubles or any triples equals two or three fish in the boat at the same time. And when the fishing is fast at the Berry there will usually be a lot of doubles and triples.
[signature]

[trollboy8]

We went to Jordanelle instead of Strawberry because my dad didn't want to launch the boat without the docks in. Gonna have to start trying to toughen up dad so or we will miss more days like you all had. Nice report, thanks!
[signature]

[hlfmoon]

I don't dought you caught a lot of fish. Flygoddess got me thinking so I got out the calculator. You fished from 8:15 to 11:00 a total of 165 minutes and had 90 fish, that means you caught 1.8 fish per minute for 1 person, for 3 you caught 0.6 every minute
[signature]

[N.E.T.O.]

Hlfmoon,
Being a computer programmer, and working with math all day every day, I started doubting my own quick calculations that I made out on the boat, so I sat down and got out the calculator myself. Here is what I came up with:...(not that it matters, but you got my curiosity going!)

Minutes fished (total, from 8:15 to 1:00) = 285.
Fish caught (total, between all 3 of us) = 129.

(We kept a very accurate count because the loser was buying lunch that day, and it became VERY competitive!)

285 minutes divided by 129 fish = 2.2 minutes per fish, at the boat.
(2.2 minutes = 2 minutes and 12 seconds)
But since there were 3 of us, that means that you need to multiply that time by 3 to get the average time between fish per fisherman. My calculations make the average time between fish per fisherman, 6 minutes and 36 seconds average over the whole morning. I didn't realize it was quite that slow...[]

Our 11:00 average was a little better, since at time:
We had fished (8:15 to 11:00) = 165 minutes
And we had caught (at least) 90 fish.
165 minutes divided by 90 fish = 1.83 minutes per fish, at the boat, which figures out to one fish per fisherman every 5.49 minutes (x3), or one fish per fisherman every 5 minutes and 30 seconds.

It was definitely faster fishing earlier in the morning. After 11:00 we actually had time to snack, whiz and tell jokes! [cool]
There was a lot of smack talk going on the whole time and it made the other two fisherman bust out laughing when one fisherman broke off and had to spend a few minutes rerigging a whole 'nuther jighead and tubejig!

I've had a few pm's asking a few basic questions about location and technique. I'm no pro by any means, we just had a really good day when all the planets aligned, but I will share any info I have with anybody if they ask. That is how I learned, from people on this board.

Randy
[signature]

[Kent]

[size 1]"I probably should relax more, but if you've ever fished with people like MGB or Kentofnsl, most fishing trips are far from relaxing, but very rewarding!"[/size]
[size 1][/size]
[size 1]We got enough relaxation while fishing at Willard to last the rest of the year![cool][/size]
[signature]

[N.E.T.O.]

Kent,
Unfortunately that was not the only time this year I have relaxed at Willard!
I'm trying to forget those trips!
Randy
[signature]