06-29-2019, 12:25 AM
ES: Launched at UL State park a little before 6 A.M. Lots of carp and White Bass surface activity. Water Temp 71 at launch and 73 at 11 AM departure. Working our way slowly out of the harbor we picked up 3 WB and a really dark cat. With the bait restocked we headed north a couple of miles. Worked our way in and out from 4 to 9.5 FOW dragging fresh cut WB on FLAITS at about 0.5 mph. Ended up boating about 30-35 cats from 20 to 26.” Most fish were not dark, but the bigger ones eluded us again. Great weather with SW winds from 0-7 mph and minimal bug attacks. I used the “photograph every fish” counting method again this time but I’ll only include a few of the pictures.
FS: A few weeks back there was a long discussion on the form about circle hooks. I’ve been pleased with them on my FLAIT setups, especially with less experienced anglers on board. The main downside I was seeing was that about 1 in 3 cats was still swallowing the hook, even with constantly moving baits. Reading the posts, I thought I saw a trend. They guys who said they used bigger baits and circle hooks seemed to fewer deep hooks. I had been using 1” chunks of cut bait, almost the same size as the 4/0 circles.
Today Julie and I tried the “bigger bait, fewer swallowed” theory. Working out of the harbor, we got 3 fresh whites in about 20 minute by casting toward surfacing fish. Several times there were 6 or 8 slurps fairly close to each other and I expected instant hits, but not so. They made us work the little bits of worm on little flies around a bit before they would hit. We still had only worked our way about a third of the way from the docks to the jaws when we had gotten enough bait for the morning. We also got 1 small black kitty on a thawed WB chunk that was dragging behind us while we hunted surfacing whites.
We picked up the gear and headed north a couple of miles. We started fishing in 5 FOW heading toward the reeds and then zig zagged between 4 and 5 FOW. The first hook-up went to Julie. It took about 5 minutes to land. While I was removing the hook and doing the PR part of CPR, another fish hit. Julie got both of them and ended up in the picture with a fish in each hand! We got fish about every 5-7 minutes for the first hour. It was looking like a good day!
After about an hour we decided to head back out into deeper water. We weren’t seeing any fish bigger than about 24” and no spawning colors, and we wanted to get away from all the floating reed sections that kept fouling our lines.
There was a lull between 5 and about 7 FOW and then things picked up again. We kept going deeper until we hit 9 FOW. The size of the fish did seem to improve. Now most of the fish were 23-25 and we got a couple at 26+. The main difference was that the shallower fish seemed to hit one at a time almost evenly spaced and the deeper fish came in flurries with longer waits between groups.
Julie commented that almost every time we hooked a fish, another one hit before the first one was done. Then there would be a pause.
In reviewing the time stamps on the pictures, the average catch rate was about the same shallow and deeper, there was just more evidence of groups of fish in deeper water.
We finished up in 9 FOW about half a mile north of the jaws.
We had a very productive morning for catching. The good news was I got to fish with my best friend again and that out of all the cats we landed, none of the larger baits were swallowed. My hands are loving it; they don’t even look like I went cat fishing today. We cut off only 1 hook and that was a j-hook that had a half inch sliver of WB and a piece of crawler on it intended for more bait. A 3-pound channel cat inhaled it and I couldn’t even feel the hook with my finger.
I was also pleased with the hooking performance. We only had about 3 fish that loaded the rod when they hit and didn’t get hooked. Each time we reeled in and inspected the bait and found the point of the hook covered by bait. We never sent any out without the hook point showing, so either the fish turned it or it happened casting.
Another observation had to do with size of the FLAITs and leader length. I have 3 sizes of wobble glo’s I use for FLATs. The largest caught almost zero cats last summer. I had quit using them. A few weeks back I realized I had been using them with long leaders (18-24” or more) to allow more wobble action. Recently I tied one on with an 8” leader and it has been producing as well as the smaller ones. Today it caught more fish than any other set-up. I would never have guessed the leader length would matter that much on a slow moving bait, but the evidence is mounting that it does.
The bad news was that the larger fish again eluded us. Darn it, we will have to try again!
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FS: A few weeks back there was a long discussion on the form about circle hooks. I’ve been pleased with them on my FLAIT setups, especially with less experienced anglers on board. The main downside I was seeing was that about 1 in 3 cats was still swallowing the hook, even with constantly moving baits. Reading the posts, I thought I saw a trend. They guys who said they used bigger baits and circle hooks seemed to fewer deep hooks. I had been using 1” chunks of cut bait, almost the same size as the 4/0 circles.
Today Julie and I tried the “bigger bait, fewer swallowed” theory. Working out of the harbor, we got 3 fresh whites in about 20 minute by casting toward surfacing fish. Several times there were 6 or 8 slurps fairly close to each other and I expected instant hits, but not so. They made us work the little bits of worm on little flies around a bit before they would hit. We still had only worked our way about a third of the way from the docks to the jaws when we had gotten enough bait for the morning. We also got 1 small black kitty on a thawed WB chunk that was dragging behind us while we hunted surfacing whites.
We picked up the gear and headed north a couple of miles. We started fishing in 5 FOW heading toward the reeds and then zig zagged between 4 and 5 FOW. The first hook-up went to Julie. It took about 5 minutes to land. While I was removing the hook and doing the PR part of CPR, another fish hit. Julie got both of them and ended up in the picture with a fish in each hand! We got fish about every 5-7 minutes for the first hour. It was looking like a good day!
After about an hour we decided to head back out into deeper water. We weren’t seeing any fish bigger than about 24” and no spawning colors, and we wanted to get away from all the floating reed sections that kept fouling our lines.
There was a lull between 5 and about 7 FOW and then things picked up again. We kept going deeper until we hit 9 FOW. The size of the fish did seem to improve. Now most of the fish were 23-25 and we got a couple at 26+. The main difference was that the shallower fish seemed to hit one at a time almost evenly spaced and the deeper fish came in flurries with longer waits between groups.
Julie commented that almost every time we hooked a fish, another one hit before the first one was done. Then there would be a pause.
In reviewing the time stamps on the pictures, the average catch rate was about the same shallow and deeper, there was just more evidence of groups of fish in deeper water.
We finished up in 9 FOW about half a mile north of the jaws.
We had a very productive morning for catching. The good news was I got to fish with my best friend again and that out of all the cats we landed, none of the larger baits were swallowed. My hands are loving it; they don’t even look like I went cat fishing today. We cut off only 1 hook and that was a j-hook that had a half inch sliver of WB and a piece of crawler on it intended for more bait. A 3-pound channel cat inhaled it and I couldn’t even feel the hook with my finger.
I was also pleased with the hooking performance. We only had about 3 fish that loaded the rod when they hit and didn’t get hooked. Each time we reeled in and inspected the bait and found the point of the hook covered by bait. We never sent any out without the hook point showing, so either the fish turned it or it happened casting.
Another observation had to do with size of the FLAITs and leader length. I have 3 sizes of wobble glo’s I use for FLATs. The largest caught almost zero cats last summer. I had quit using them. A few weeks back I realized I had been using them with long leaders (18-24” or more) to allow more wobble action. Recently I tied one on with an 8” leader and it has been producing as well as the smaller ones. Today it caught more fish than any other set-up. I would never have guessed the leader length would matter that much on a slow moving bait, but the evidence is mounting that it does.
The bad news was that the larger fish again eluded us. Darn it, we will have to try again!
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