First day back on the H2O

[dmills4124]

  I mentioned in a couple of threads that Kim and I were going out to prefish Long lake yesterday, Sun March 30th. Lets start with some stats. Long lake is part of the Portage Lakes chain here in Akron Ohio. It has 225 acres of water with 7.5 miles of shore at a max of 40 ft. A no wake lake. It's 20 miles from the house. Visibility is 2 to 3 ft with a greenish/brown cast to it. The Moon phase is the last quarter, pressure 30.18 steady and has been for 4 days, wind out of the SE at 15 with gusts to 25 or 30, Clear skies becomming more overcast with light misty rain starting around 3pm. Air temp 37F at 9AM with a high of 54, Yah right!
  I load the boat. Checking it twice, three times (not enough). I spent all night loading the boat in between dreams of big fish, and got out of bed at 5:30am. Kim makes a bag of drinks for the boat, pats the dog(rocky)on the head, gives him a couple of treats to keep him busy and we're on our first outing of the season.
   On our way. Finally. Did I lock the ball latch. No. Where's the lock? We'll stop at home depot and get one. There's speedway. Another stop. We'll get some coffee. I walk around the rig. Lights, tires, cover,tie downs all secure and working. At this point I still have this feeling that I have forgotten something. Can't find it. Yum, good idea Kim, the coffee is incredible. We're finally on our way! 10:30am.
  We pull up to the only ramp on long lake, It's a dirt or mud ramp. Not bad, a couple feet out then an easy slope that gets steeper. Its shouldn't be bad. Kim, put it in 4 wheel drive, you'll do fine. We look around the area. A couple of small boat trailers are in the lot. Somebody else had the same idea. I guess I'm learning. The other shore is 20-30 yards away. The wind is comming from the south to the north(right to left as we are looking at the opposit shore) There are birds and ducks feeding on the other side. While we are looking a goodsize bass breaks the surface causing the birds to scatter and minnows to jump out of the water in front of it. Not 20 feet away another good one does the same. This is going to be sweet.
   We get the cover off, all the tie downs and transom saver in the back of the durango. Hook up the Gps and front sonar. Turn on the battery switch to bank number 2. Wow 13.8 volts. That new battery bank charger did good over the winter. I wonder if it the motor will be hard to start till the fogging oil burns off.
  Kim hands me my rain/wind gear to put on and asks me "The Question." WHERE ARE THE SOS-PENDERS (you know, life jackets?). That's it! That's what I was forgetting. That's what that feeling was. We have one throw cushin between us. It's after 11am now. We can't go back to get the jackets and come back. Time for a new plan.
  Button it back up go back home get the jackets and Rocky and go to Nimisila lake. 5 min away. Our confidence lake with 4 concrete ramps.
  Well, we get to the ramp at the SE end of the lake( it's stat time again) and the wind is picking up with cloud cover now. Wind still out of the SE at 15, but a steady 15mph. Nim is 811 acres with a shore of 16 miles at a max 30ft deep, average 10ft. This is a creek reservoir electric only lake with little current depending on rain fall. This is the first lake in the portage lakes chain.
   We are getting better at getting in the water since we already did it once today. And yes the drain plug is in. In the water I got the poles set up in a protected cove and started out fishing and looking along the east bank. I know we should be on the other shoreline but the ramp and parking area was full of piles of gravel making the area unusable. I just don't want to use the batteries up going that far without testing to see if they are strong enough for a run like that. I may need to replace some if they went soft this winter.
  The water temp is 40 to 41 and its time to deploy a sea anchor. That slows us down but not enough I should have used 2 maybe more. I'm throwing a 3/4 oz black/char terminator jig with a silver with pumpkin/green/black flakes trailer on it. We see 3-4 inch black and white crappie dead floating all around. I check the bottom at 18 feet with the aquavu and the bottom is dead. Gravel, muck and lay down decomposing grass.
  The gps (a humminbird 161c) shows lots of bait balls with some large single fish below them. It seems to be the classic bass feeding on his own smorgasboard of baitfish to keep him going in snacks thru the winter. I tried a ratltrap, small blue/silver with black. I want to note that I bought the color-C-lector by spike-it last year. We had great luck with it when we first used it last year. I must say it was spot on. Whenever we matched the colors it called for we got hammered. The colors yesterday were electric blue/silver or blue with darker green.
   This wasn't as good as our Indiana brothers did, but we were on the water. By two oclock the rain started to spit, the wind was creating waves with some breaking little whitecaps. I turned the boat across the wind thinking we could fish a group of islands in the middle of the lake, BUT, Kim is sitting on the livewell with her hands in her sleeves, her hood up, her face covered and back to the wind. I pull up the sea anchor and head back to ramp. Kims a sport but I know when my marriage is in danger, not to mention my gastronomic future. It's time to call it a day. Just a quick question. Has anyone ever tried to load a 19 foot bass boat with a 20 to 25 mph crosswind useing an electric trolling motor, only? We did it. That's teamwork. I can without guilt or reservation truly state that I love my co-angler. Cool!
  Now I have this weird guestion ringing in my head. It keeps repeating like the "I feel like I forgot something." I think it sounds like "What did you learn from this grasshopper?".
  Till next time. If there aren't to many complaints.
Don and Kim M

[dmills4124]

Maybe I need to move this to a differant section, Like the general topic section. I don't know. We're trying to get on long lake today. We'll see if our luck is any better today. I am not going to use this as a diary. Just thought some might be interested.
later
don and kim m

[joshimoto son]

Don and Kim,

Well... at least you got to get on the water. That's the first step.
What depths were you fishing?
Where were you throwing the traps?
What depths were the bait fish in?

It doesn't sound like the weather gave you two enough time to really put something together.

Lets hope that today is a better day for ya's and you'll get a little more time on the water.

I'm heading to Orlando on Friday and won't be back until the 21st.
If I don't get the chance to talk to you... good luck.

joshimoto son

[spinninbug]

I am so jealous!!

We still have so much ice up here that I'm starting to wonder if we will ever get our boat out!!  And let me tell you,  it's starting to get very frustrating!!

Sounds like you had a great time,  any time on the water is better than....well sitting at home watching fishing on tv or that nasty four letter word....you know the one  WORK!!!

I too am lucky enough to have my fishing partner be the one that I love more than anything in the world,  and I'm looking forward to spending some more quality time with him in the boat on the water.

Take care and have a great time on the water.

[dmills4124]

The depth was 10 to 20 feet deep just south of a creek entrance. I was useing a varied speed return at differant depths. I tried on the surface to mid range. I bounced it off the bottom with the trap. The bait balls looked like an upside down water drop with the point down on the sonar. some were oval shaped and closer to the surface. I tried some jigs and tubes swimming mid range and dragging the bottom with jerks like an escaping fish. It'll be better today.
we're outa here for a while.
later
don m