NBC At Willard 8-26-21

[TubeDude]

Met up with Lee at the north marina this morning.  Wow.  The tide is going out fast.  Had to launch in the far west corner with my tube.  Too much "ramp snot" to launch on the slick concrete.  Air temp at 7 am launch was a nice 60...warming to 80 by noon departure.  Water temp was 69...gaining a couple of degrees by noon.  Depth in the channel going out was 7 feet. 



Was hoping for a multi-species day, but alas it was not to be.  No wipers, walleyes, crappies or other non-cat species were harmed today.  Okay, I did catch a small bullhead...along with the channel cats...but that don't count.  Only the second bullhead I have caught in recent years from Willard.

Lee and I split up and went different directions...both of us making S turns from shallow to deeper and fishing different lures and baits.  I was dragging a minnow-sweetened whirly flig on one rod and throwing plastics on the other.  Only had a couple of pop and drops before 8 am.  Then I caught my first cat on a blue back silver mini whirly flig.  And that turned out to be the lure dujour.  Although I rotated through several other colors, every cat (and bullhead) came on the blue-silver.













It was what I would call slow fishing for Willard.  Didn't find any concentrations of fish...that would bite.  Saw lots of bait balls and larger fish on sonar but saw a lot more than I caught.  There  were long gaps of time between bites.  And some bites were just WHAM and then nothing.  Not the typical gulp and go of catfish.  Lots of small dead shad in the water so I suspect the fish were mostly well fed and were not being aggressive.

Over the course of the morning, I worked water anywhere from 4 feet deep to over 12 feet deep.  Most of my hookups occurred in 10-11 feet of water.  But I did get some tentative "inquiries" in other depths.

As others have reported, there were a lot of dead baby shad on the surface of the lake.  But there were few birds actively working them.  I could swear I heard a nearby grebe burping.

Only one boat on the lake today...a fairly stout one.  And there was a 2-axle trailer in the lot when we came in.  So launching is still feasible for larger boats...as long as you stay in the middle of the ramp.

Last cat of the morning was fun.  I was almost all the way back in to the boat channel when the fish climbed on.  There were several young ladies on paddleboards passing nearby and they got all excited about me catching that fish.  I warned them that they needed to maintain wakeless speed...but I think my senior attempt at humor was largely wasted.  Anyway, that was the worst of the power squadron today.


Lee had a tougher time today and only had one fish between him and skunkdom.  But at least the smell of catfish is better than the other smell.  I ended up with five cats caught...and kept two for the table.  Could be worse.

[Cowboypirate]

Wish Cookie and I could have made it. Would like to see how Lee's hand is fairing from his fight with the whiskerfish. Your trip was likey more fun than mine. That bride of mine is a tough boss - had me loading her auction haul in the heat and then had me load a few other ladies cars for them. Did get a nice dle. To bad I don't have a horse right now, but ought to be able to flip it for enough to get some more worms for the next time we meet up.

[wiperhunter2]

Glad you were able to get out and get some fish even if it was NBC. Now I don't feel so bad after our recent slow outing. Hopefully all those hungry fish at Willard will thin out those shad in the next two months so they will be willing to take out offers. It could take even less time, if the shad keep dying off.

[TubeDude]

Glad you were able to get out and get some fish even if it was NBC. Now I don't feel so bad after our recent slow outing. Hopefully all those hungry fish at Willard will thin out those shad in the next two months so they will be willing to take out offers. It could take even less time, if the shad keep dying off.

Gonna be intermesting to see what develops on Willard over the next couple of months.  I have fished Willard for a long time and this year has been kinda different.  First of all, the up and down weather patterns during the shad spawn months spread out the spawn over a longer period.  Consequently, there are more tiny shad in the system this late in the year than normal...and that seems to be the age class that is dying off.  During "normal" years, all the shad are getting to be at least 3" long by now and they are developed enough to be able to live on foods other than zooplankton...which also start to decline about now.

There are still a lot of shad in the system.  Saw bait balls all over the place yesterday...at all depths and in most areas.  What I couldn't tell on my sonar was how large the shad were in any of the bait balls.  Bottom line is that right now there is an abundance of food in the ecosystem.  And with a shortage of wipers to help clean the shad out it will probably be slow for walleyes for the rest of the year...if they stay well fed.

Remains to be seen how the fall perch congregations will fare.  With lower water levels they may still come in close to the marinas, but will likely not show up inside the marinas.  I was hoping to maybe find a couple of early perch yesterday but I think the water temps still have to drop a bit before they move in.  However, I have started catching them by mid September some years.

Also going to be watching for the crappies.  Like the perch, crappies are not likely to be moving into the shallower marinas in the fall.  But who knows?  I have caught them right around the docks in Utah Lake in water depths less than 2 feet.  Fish are sometimes more adaptable than fishermen.  In years past...during low water times...there have been some good crappies caught out over the humps and bumps off Eagle Beach both during the spring fling and again during late fall.  Crappie numbers have been down the past couple of years but there have been some larger fish caught...up to 15".  Maybe this year.....