Rockport 7/27

[joatmon]

I needed a break from the valley and headed to Rockport yesterday. It was about 15 degrees cooler when I arrived at the state park than when I left Riverton. Not the only early visitor as I saw several flocks of turkeys out with their youngsters (over 50 total in three different flocks). Due to overcast skies, wind, and a little rain, it was quite pleasant. I fished from 6:30-noon from shore between the ramp and the dam. 

I had two objectives - catch some perch and catch some smallmouth bass. Accomplished both, but the smallies were super small (5-7”). Luckily, the perch were playing and I brought home ten 10” perch for dinner. 

I initially tried a drop shot rig, but was in a very rocky area and lost a few rigs. Switched over to a small curly tail with dark green body and chartreuse tail and the catching increased dramatically. Early on the perch would hit that rig with nothing on it but later I had to sweeten it with a nub of nightcrawler. Most fish on this rig were caught within 20 feet of shore in water I guess was up to about 8 feet deep. I only caught a couple of smaller perch and was quite pleased with the average length around 10”. I fished the same area on ice last winter and rarely caught anything over 8”. 

On my other pole I had a quick strike rig with a chub minnow (3-5”) below a slip float (my latest tinkering). I fished this rig further from shore, in 10-20 feet of water. I caught several perch on that rig as well, but nothing after about 10 am. 

Beautiful day to get away and have some fishing fun. 

[doitall5000]

Great looking perch, especially when they don't have a belly full of eggs. Thanks for your report.

[Jmorfish]

Nicely done..hard to beat a good perch fry..Rockport has been good to me for a lot of years - trolling in Spring, Summer, Fall, and then ice fishing for the perch in Winter, when we have ice..hope we'll see some biggun's again this Winter..