Story - Fishing Report 05/03/14

Lake: Beaver
Location: Highway 12
Time: 6:30AM-1:00PM
Air temp: 45-80 degrees
Water temp: 55-60 degrees
Clarity: Clear.
Visibility: 4'
Wind: SW 5-15
Sky: Clear
Winning tactic: Slow roll jigs and straight line minnows 15' deep in 25' of water just before the channel dropoff.
Catch: 45 crappie and a few whites.

After limiting out the day before, we grabbed an extra guy and went back in the morning to the exact same spot. We fished for a while and nothing was happening. One big thing I have learned recently is that you can't do the same thing as last time and expect the same results. It is definitely a good starting point, but the fish change throughout the day and so do the conditions. I am thinking windy days have produced the most fish for us so far. I used to shy away from windy days, because when we were working the banks for bass it was too hard to keep the boat positioned. We don't even mess with the banks anymore, not on Beaver anyway. That is another thing, just because you fish one way your whole life (pitch a fluke outside the weedline) doesn't mean that tactic will work for another lake (what weedline?) or on another day. For Beaver, we either troll or straightline. Not much else seems to produce. Point being, adapt to the conditions, don't just blindly do what you always did before. Back to the story, we tried trolling around to find the fish. we made about a mile loop and picked up a few whites and stripers in deeper water, so we tried drifting minnows in about 30' of water. we picked up a few more, but the wind was blowing us back to the honeyhole like it was natures way of telling us where we needed to be. We finally caught a crappie and it was "game-on". We anchored up, dropped a couple minnows down on the rod holders, and started casting a few. We had several doubles and one time I actually netted Robert's and Allen's fish in the same swoop. There wasn't probably a ten minute period where we didn't catch a fish. We probably caught 80 total. We had to eventually make a pact that after we used our last live minnow, we would head to the house. Two days in a row we limited out and had to leave while the bite was still on. We have had many days of unsuccess, so this will boost our average. If they are biting, you have to go, because it won't last long.