idn713

Good to hear I wasn’t the only one. Nothing on cams and almost no tracks on the property. Assuming the afternoon should get them up?

I’m hearing more and more things about crossbows of all brands not being able to stand up to the limb pressure they generate. I was actually eyeing up going to Ravin next year but in going down that rabbit hole apparently those bows are really notorious for string snapping after very little use. Might be staying in the Tenpoint brand but keeping the FPS closer to 400. Anyway, that’s a huge bummer, especially RIGHT NOW.

Scrub bucks everywhere the last 2-3 days and the shooters are vanished. I’m sure all the big boys are on that first good doe hard. Only thing I’m seeing is dinks and yearling does. Hope to catch a good one cruising on the morning sit here.

Anyone feel like everything is super behind? I’m not see hardly any sign laid down by bucks.

I do appreciate your hopefulness, but I will tell you that you have some seasoned and good anglers telling you the truth. 40" pike in our area are a trophy, and as such, they are very hard to come by. You will need to study the habits and feeding patterns of 30 inch fish and then dial your approach in from there. I have a friend who has caught a few 40's out of Conesus, and he dedicated LOTS of time to doing so. Bigger jerkbaits, glidebaits, and spoons (believe it or not) worked on the deeper weed breaks will get you started in the right direction. Typing on the keyboard about theoretical fish sure as heck aint gonna get you the 40!

Well. Erie is hilariously insane. We have never tried this before so I gave it a go today. Ran out to 69 fow out of the Catt, put down 2 harnesses on two #2 chinook divers on a 2 setting. We had the divers out 115. We set down two riggers with harnesses at 55, 50 feet behind the ball. And well………we never once stopped reeling on fish. Keeping four rods in the water is an absolute chore. Had the 3 man limit in under 2 hours. This fishery is just bonkers. Best down speed was 1.8-2mph at the ball. Big thanks to Fisherman21 for some pointers from his trip out, helped us be on fish from the jump!

A fellow member (Gator) and I got out this morning to check on the kings…..and they were not around! We were greeted with ice water on the inside and some of the worst screens we have seen all year. I went 1/2 on lakers and Gator had a few nice marks storm in on his jig but they were reluctant to hit. Essentially it wasn’t the target rich environment you need to get it done on the jig. Once the water stabilizes a bit the screens will come back. My buddy did quite well on the jig yesterday on kings. Crazy what one day and a hard flip can do! Still a nice morning to get out and it was a pleasure to have Gator on the boat. Made for some nice conversation and getting to know a fellow angler better!

I certainly managed!

It's about as much fun as you can have in the summer!

The fight was one of the best of the year!

Forgot to check the forecast (Thought it was calling for 1ft or less all week) and was greeted by a rolling lake. Slow chug out to 130 and I didn’t like that screen. So we putter into 105 and we are in business, went 3/3 on kings (two small guys and one nice fish) and probably had 4-5 other kings really smack the jig but not get hooks. Dropped to a laker around 8:30 and nailed that fish. Pretty uncomfortable morning with 3-4 foot rollers but calm enough to do some damage on the jig. Screen dried up around 9 so that’s when the morning session ended.

A little lost in all of this is electronics. You do need a good graph. Marking your jig with high ping speed to see how fish are moving on it and reacting is key.

A 2 ounce flutter jig. The EJ jigs they sell at sportsman’s tend to work well. I also do well on some custom ones a buddy and I made up.

Went 3 for 6 today. Landed two little kings and a nice mature. Dumped a smaller king, a nice king and a nice unknown fish. Could have been a laker but the king I landed came five minutes later so who knows. Either way, good outing and it’s fun to see that even in tougher years, these fish still eat the jig! Best screen was 125, tons of bait inside 100.

Got out with my younger brother this morning and after the northeast wind I was expecting a tough screen and I found a tough screen. Hardly any of the marks that I was seeing in the previous weeks. We checked every depth from 75 to 135 and 125 was the most productive. Despite a weak screen, the marks we did run into were pretty willing. My brother went 3-5 with him landing a mature king, a beauty Atlantic (he let it flop out of his hands before the pic) and a small doinker king. He seemed to be hooking up just fine despite the lack of numbers, the ones we did see just wanted to smack his jig. I had a tougher morning with the fish coming to my jig for a bit only to shoot to Gabe’s jig and eat! I did manage to jig up a whitefish or a Cisco? Idk maybe someone on here can help with an ID. And I also got a laker a little later on in the morning. All in all, not a bad morning inshore after a big blow!

It’s as good a fight as you think it is!

Solo trip this morning. Another good screen for most of the morning between 100 and 110. Fish were there today but not chewing like yesterday. I ended the trip with 4 fish that tried to crush the spoon. Right off the bat I hooked a mature king and it popped off after a few seconds of pulling. About 45 min later I had a streaking fish meet my jig around 60 ft and that one pounded it. Ended up being a nice king in the 15-17 lb range. I ended up having two more fish blast the the jig like the first two but didn’t end up getting hooks in either. Most of the fish today were lookers and strongly relating to bait (which there was a ton of between 80 and 100). They would meet the jig and toy with it but then inevitably peel off to head to a bait ball. Lakers, kings and all the other pelagic fish were weaving in and out of the bait all morning. Great morning to be out and doing some work with the jig though!

Got out with Manny this morning and we were greeted by an awesome screen in 95 FOW. Manny quickly hooked a small king, and I tied into a beautiful, mature one. Manny landed his fish, but mine threw the jig after running under the boat and launching completely out of the water. We spent the rest of the morning working a lot of fish that were looking but not committing. Eventually, Manny landed a second king around 6–7 lbs. I missed a few hits during that time, and then Manny hooked and lost a nice laker—but followed up by landing another shortly after. I got one too, right after his. Later, I jigged through a bait cloud, got cracked, and briefly had a fish on before it came off. Manny also had a few fish hit and fight briefly before coming unhooked. I dropped him off at the launch at 8:30, then headed back out solo for a bit of redemption. Over the next hour and a half, I worked some incredible screens full of active fish, but they just wouldn’t bite. I was getting a little exasperated—until I saw a big mark, jigged once, and BOOM—hooked into another big king. It took off on a huge run, and then the hook pulled. Unreal. Fifteen minutes later, I spotted another suspended mark at 60 feet, dropped in, jigged once, and got hammered again. Another big king that tore off on several runs… and then came unbuttoned again. I just couldn’t catch a break this morning. All in all, a solid outing with plenty of bites and finally some jig action on mature kings. The screens were loaded with activity, all between 105 and 95 feet in front of the creek. Not bad for my first real jigging trip now that I’ve got my truck back!

Oh I’ll tell you hahah. Shoot me a PM. I’ll never ever ever say a good word about them for the rest of my existence.

FINALLY, I managed to make it out on the water to get jigging this year. Back in May I hit a deer with my truck and the collision shop I unfortunately used has had my truck in the shop for OVER A MONTH AND A HALF. I haven’t been able to pull my boat for all of June and all of July. It’s killing me inside, knowing fish are out there to jig. But I digress. A friend was kind enough to invite me out today for a combo jigging/trolling trip. We started out jigging and dropped a laker off the bat. We spent the next couple hours trolling without much to show for it besides a good rip on the 225 diver pulling a spoon. We pulled the trolling gear around 10 and started to try to put a brown program together with the jig. I quickly stuck a laker and got him landed and released. Shortly after my buddy hooked into a tanker brown and was able to land the beast after a fun battle on the jig. Not long after I stuck another brown the exact same size which came off after a spectacular leap at the boat. My buddy had two other fish he hooked and dropped along with hooking and landing a 14 inch brown 😂😂. All in all it was a fun morning with a good amount of bites coming on the jig despite it not being the main focus of the outing. I’ve been told I should have my truck back Monday, but they have also pushed my estimate back three times so, we will see if I need to lose my mind on them to get my means to tow my boat back! It’s enough to drive a guy crazy.