Okauchee and Nagawicka Weedline Fishing

 It has been pretty hot out lately so the fish seem to have gone fairly deep.  This week I made it out fishing twice, once on Okauchee Lake and once on Nagawicka.  Both times I rigged one rod with an egg sinker, large hook, and medium sucker or large golden shiner and dropped it to the bottom along weed lines.

While the minnow was being dragged I used another rod to cast crawlers, leeches, or twister tails.

The bass were caught on Okauchee in my usual spots.  The gills and pike were from Nagawicka which I had only fished once in the summer.  The pike was kept not only because it will be tasty, but because it was hooked deeply and had a previously torn gill.

I really enjoyed Nagawicka.  We caught both largemouth and smallmouth bass, pike, bluegills, and even a nice 16" walleye.

Texas Fishing

My brother John has lived in Texas for quite some time now, but has relied on coming to Wisconsin for most of his fishing adventures.  A few years ago, we started taking guided trips out on Lake Fork, and now John has bought his own boat and started learning to fish Texas.

My niece Ella has been enjoying her time on the water with John and has recently been able to catch some nice fish.

I look forward to being able to fish with her next time we see each other!

Family and Friend Vacation in Minocqua

 We had a great time staying in Minocqua for a few days.  We were able to get a place at The Beacons of Minocqua and it was a great place.  They had excellent shorefront property with convenient boat docking, sandy lake bottom for swimming, fire pits, grills, playgrounds, and an indoor swimming pool (which was handy the day it was 60 and raining out).

We ended each evening doing a little fishing on the Minocqua chain of lakes and had great success on panfish.  A jig and twister tail under a bobber caught crappies on almost every cast and a piece of worm kept the kids busy with bluegills for as long as they wanted to catch them.

Although he is too young to reel anything in, I consider this Carter's first fishing trip.

We rented a pontoon from Lakeside in Minocqua and we were really happy with their boat.

One day Travis and I snuck out on a less populated lake to try for bass and walleye.  We ended up catching some nice 12-17" smallies and two walleye.

It was difficult for me to not just fish all day, but Minocqua proved to have plenty to do with the whole family.

Lake Winnebago Update

It turns out that just when you feel like you have figured out a lake, the lake changes.  This year, we have yet to catch a perch on Lake Winnebago and the DNR perch estimates are not good.

We have spent most of our time jigging and casting small reefs on the west side of Lake Winnebago for walleyes.  The most effective strategy has just been to use a jig and a third of a crawler suspended under a bobber.

Unfortunately, sheephead also very much enjoy this technique, so bring plenty of crawlers.

To fish the reefs, you really need a fishfinder with a Lakemaster chip or some other type of topographic map.  I use the Lakemaster chip, but I have found the Navionics App on my phone (for only $10) to be almost as good.

I have not noticed many people trolling lately so the best I can figure is that most people are struggling like we are.

St. Germain...Trip #4

Ok, until I learn how to do HTML coding or something like that, this is the best I am going to be able to organize the pictures.

To start, this was our 4th trip to St. Germain in the last three years.  I guess it would by my 5th trip if you include a short day trip with Carly over Memorial Day weekend last year.  That said, the trip to St. Germain is one of the highlights of my fishing year...probably actually my year in general.

We started going to St. Germain after watching John Gillespie fish there so regularly on his show.  It is only 4.5 hours from my house, so I figured why not give it a chance.  My dad, brothers and I started fishing there with literally no knowledge of the area, but we now feel pretty good about catching fish on no fewer than six lakes.  We have found lakes we like to fish in the morning, some we like in the afternoon, and some we prefer in the evening.  This means we are able to fish from sun up to sun down for the entire trip.

While we have successfully found some fish on our own, I credit Rob Manthei with teaching us how to fish up here.  He has not only taught us through the guided trips we have booked with him, but he is incredibly generous with information to the people who choose to stay at his resort (LINKED HERE).  Rob is pretty much responsible for saving our trips with tips and suggestions.  There are so many lakes in the St. Germain area that without someone's help, it would be nearly impossible to figure out where and when to fish the various bodies of water.  This is why I strongly suggest staying at St. Germain Lodge and Resort and booking a couple trips with Rob Manthei.

We caught fish from as shallow as 4 ft of water to as deep as 25 ft of water.  We caught them on rocks and in weeds.  We caught them casting and we caught them drifting.  While most of our walleyes came on a jig and crawler combination, I had a great time catching bass and pike by casting a jerk bait over weeds in 7-9 ft of water.

After a four day trip, we ended up catching almost 50 walleyes, 30 of which would have been keeper size and 8 of them being too big to keep.

We caught countless bass both smallmouth and largemouth.

We caught a dozen or so northern pike, the biggest of which was 32".

And we caught dozens of keeper sized bluegills and perch.

While I do not judge the success of a fishing trip by the amount of meat that ends up in my freezer, it sure was exciting to catch so many quality fish.

I FINALLY CAUGHT A MUSKIE

Is it the prettiest muskie in the world?  No.  It was still pretty beaten up from spawning.  That does not take away from the fact that I finally hooked, fought, and landed a muskie.  I have boated muskies before that hit another fish I was already reeling in, but this is actually the first muskie that I caught while actually fishing for the toothy critters.

Last fall, I was river fishing, and I caught a rod and reel combo with a jerk bait attached.  It must have been lost by someone fairly recently before I caught it as everything was in great shape.  I figure it must have been destiny because it had a left handed baitcasting reel (just like I like them), and it had the lure that caught me this fish.

Fishing with Norah

Now that Norah is three she is able to do more on the fishing front.  She is able to cast her bait (sometimes) and reel in her own fish.  We have worked her fishing stamina up to the point where she can fish for about 45 minutes before wanting to quit.  She has a great time just playing with the worms, and she loves touching the fish.  It is my goal to never keep her out longer than she wants to be there, so that she does not lose the desire to keep coming out.  In the video, Norah's bluegill spot ended up containing a surprise.  I held the rod while she reeled.