Two Touchdowns and a Fumble on 4th and Goal

A little change of scenery yielded excellent results today. After several hours of fruitless casting (one small pike and something boiling behind a bait) I was able to boat a 44.5" that smacked a bucktail just as I was about to enter the figure 8. Quite the battle as the scrappy male made a couple runs under the boat, dodging the net in the process. The fish was processed quickly and swam away strong. It retreated back to the weeds it came from and continued to stay more or less in the same area for the next two hours.

Hedrik and I continued to fish between tracking periods (10 mins post-release, 30 mins, 1 hour, and 2 hours). I launched a cast with the same bucktail and was greeted promptly by a hard strike. Another good battle ensued, but the fish was hooked well on the front treble. This fish was a fair bit longer than the previous one, maxing out my 48" ruler! Clinging to her was a silver lamprey (see picture), a species native to the area.

As we sat again waiting to track the two fish, our drift down the structure was perfect . As I gathered the materials to process another fish if the opportunity were to arise, I hear an explosion out from the boat and look up to see Hedrik's rod doubled and his Top Raider connected to ANOTHER mid-upper 40" fish. I scrambled for the net, took the first scoop I could... and caught the Top Raider on the net! Yep you guessed it, with one quick flick of the fish's tail it was gone. Rookie mistake and a first for me, but 2-3 isn't bad (beats a sharp stick in the eye)!

Hopefully we have more days like this in the future (minus the netting mishap...)!