Rockport Disappointment 9-5-23

[Freakyfisherman]

After all the good recent reports on Rockport I pointed my float tube that direction for a perchfest.  But found that the Labor Day weekend storms and cold front had really dropped the water temps...and changed the fishing. Air temp at launch was a chilly 41 degrees...and I put on some gloves.  Water temp was only 62 at the ramp and barely 64 in the open lake.

The results of the drop in water temp completely changed the ecology and the food chain.  The hordes of baby perch formerly swarming the shallows...and attracting bigger perch and smallies...had disappeared out into the depths.   I saw some schools of baby perch at mid depth in deep water...down as far as 35 feet.  But no schools of larger perch near them.

I did find some perch in depths from about 12 feet out to 30 feet...but no big schools.  My best bites came at the 20 - 25 foot zones.  I did catch quite a few perch but mostly dinks..."sub-toads".  I did catch a couple around 10 inches but that was the largest.  Oh yeah, I also hooked a planter bow out in 35 feet of water.
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There were only a half dozen other boats on the lake.  Some trolling for trout and kokes.  Some fishing the known perch spots.  There were three boats anchored up on "Perch Point"...the rock outcropping south of the ramp.  I saw them bring in a few perch while dropping straight down in deeper water.  But from what I could see their fish were mostly sub-toads too.


I covered a lot of water.  I started to the south...past "perch point" and up toward the inlet.  Made lots of S turns from shallow to deeper...watching sonar and dragging worm-baited whirly fligs.  Lots of dink bites in some areas but noting on TV or my line in most areas.  Finally fired up the "big motor" and headed up past the ramp to fish the rocky shoreline between the ramp and the dam.  Never went all the way the dam.  Saw very little on sonar and caught only a few more dinks in an hour and a half of serious searching.  Off the water by noon.

I'm sure that once the weather stabilizes and surface temps bounce back up a bit that the perchin' will get better again.  It is usually good through about the first of October most years.  Might give it another shot soon to allow it to be nicer to me next time.

Pat,
I was gonna try and do a quick trip from the tube this evening after work since it is really close by. Too bad you didn't find the nicer perch. I hope the spot I hit last month will still have some of the bigger ones there. Gonna kick around and look for schools and vertical fish them. Thanks for the report and info. 
Gabe