11-19-2007, 05:56 AM
"The Champ" and I headed up to Strawberry Friday morning--not too early because we thought it would be cold in the early morning. When we got there at 9:00 am, we were surprised with how warm and sunny it was--about the same temperatures as down in the valleys. We launched the boat at the Strawberry Bay marina and headed across to Salamander Bay where we started fishing. I got my line in the water first, and while The Champ was still getting her line ready and I was preparing my second pole, I shouted "Fish on!" My lure (a red-sided minnow bunny streamer on leaded line and a fly rod) hadn't been in the water two minutes, and we were just drifting, but the fish hooked itself and started bending my rod. I thought, "This is going to be a great day of fishing!" Well, as things turned out, it wasn't that hot all day long, but it was still a good day.
Pretty soon, about 10:30, the wind started, so we took refuge in the narrows, where The Champ hooked a couple of nice slot cuts while trolling and I experienced several "long-line releases." Then we saw a big school of fish on the finder, so we anchored and tried jigging. No luck! Someday I'm going to learn to jig for trout at Strawberry. I do fine jigging through the ice, and I've caught plenty of splake jigging at FIsh Lake, but I just can't seem to do it successfully at Strawberry. We tried several different jigs--large and small and in different colors--tipped with pieces of worm, but after nearly an hour ¡Nada! Any pointers on jigging at Strawberry would be very welcome!
After a while, we motored up into Badger Hollow where some guys were slaughtering them by slow trolling along the shore line and casting Pointer Minnows almost right up to the shoreline and then fast retrieving back to the boat. They caught a fish every couple of minutes, and at the end of the day (when we saw them at the marina) said they had hooked around 60. Unfortunately, we didn't have the right lures or technique to duplicate their success. We tried for a while but finally went back to trolling and drifting.
Well, to wrap up this long story, we ended up at Indian Creek near Renegade in the early afternoon. The weather was beautiful, sunny with just a slight wind, and the fish were biting. My minnow streamer attracted quite a few slot cuts, as did a perch pattern needle fish. The Champ did fine with a Jakes Spin-a-lure. Trolling/drifting, we caught about a dozen--all slot cuts. As the sun neared the horizon, we motored back to the marina and trolled around Strawberry Bay for a while, with the same rate of success we'd had at Indian Creek. It was just a beautiful day to be out fishing, and the fish were very cooperative. With the cold weather forecast for this week, conditions will change, so I'm glad we went when we did.
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Pretty soon, about 10:30, the wind started, so we took refuge in the narrows, where The Champ hooked a couple of nice slot cuts while trolling and I experienced several "long-line releases." Then we saw a big school of fish on the finder, so we anchored and tried jigging. No luck! Someday I'm going to learn to jig for trout at Strawberry. I do fine jigging through the ice, and I've caught plenty of splake jigging at FIsh Lake, but I just can't seem to do it successfully at Strawberry. We tried several different jigs--large and small and in different colors--tipped with pieces of worm, but after nearly an hour ¡Nada! Any pointers on jigging at Strawberry would be very welcome!
After a while, we motored up into Badger Hollow where some guys were slaughtering them by slow trolling along the shore line and casting Pointer Minnows almost right up to the shoreline and then fast retrieving back to the boat. They caught a fish every couple of minutes, and at the end of the day (when we saw them at the marina) said they had hooked around 60. Unfortunately, we didn't have the right lures or technique to duplicate their success. We tried for a while but finally went back to trolling and drifting.
Well, to wrap up this long story, we ended up at Indian Creek near Renegade in the early afternoon. The weather was beautiful, sunny with just a slight wind, and the fish were biting. My minnow streamer attracted quite a few slot cuts, as did a perch pattern needle fish. The Champ did fine with a Jakes Spin-a-lure. Trolling/drifting, we caught about a dozen--all slot cuts. As the sun neared the horizon, we motored back to the marina and trolled around Strawberry Bay for a while, with the same rate of success we'd had at Indian Creek. It was just a beautiful day to be out fishing, and the fish were very cooperative. With the cold weather forecast for this week, conditions will change, so I'm glad we went when we did.
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