Haven't had time to post this yet. Went out Sunday for a half day and had a good one come to the boat. Fished in 25-35 fow, drifted whole gizzard shad (6"-8") at about .4 mph. Landed 14 total with only 3 over 9 or 10 lbs. This was the biggest at 40....






Most of the fish I landed were in the 3-5 lb range. I had one that couldn't have been more than a pound and a half that came on an 8" gizzard shad. It always surprises me how big of a bait smaller fish attempt to eat. I guess it was planning on shredding that bait to get it in its mouth.

This winter trophy season is shaping up to be a good one. The rains are helping for sure.

Just a note, I noticed that the bite was consistent as long as I stayed around .4 mph. A couple of times I got up to around .9 and wasn't getting bit. On the other side of that, when my speed dropped below .3 I wasn't getting bit either.

Also, for those interested, Almost all of my fish were on a large flat and nowhere near a channel or a ledge. I tried the channels and ledges first but was marking fish out in open flats.

Nice fish Geno! What was your surface temp? Interesting they were being picky about the speed.

Skeet,

Wow, really nice pix and awesome big blue. Good info shared as well man too. Did you by chance try your drifts in opposing directions and if so, any difference in those? I would think with those fish on a Big flat that they are out on the hunt and not going to be just looking into a current flow or just one direction so much. There can be so many variables in putting things together and get fish on lol.

You guys so willing to share things with everyone on here really helps those of us that are less talented, like myself lol... Not that I have my boat ready yet gurrr. Still tweaking my rod holder rack to get what I expect from it. I mess with it one day and then the weather pushes me back in the house, so back and forth on it. All honey do's excluded here of coarse, those are always first thing done lol.

These freakin' awesome pix you guys post on here are just what I need to keep me working on things though. I have yet to figure out how to get pix to post here, heck even my hyperlink pix get resized and cut much of the pic out. I was able to post hyperlink pix here from my host site of shutterfly, but even those now are getting chopied lol. I messed around with some new fluorocarbon leader and knots in it the other day while it was so cold out and never could get my pix on as they should. So obviously I not only benefit from your info shared on the bite lol. Gets back to me being dumb as a box of rocks lol.

I do have talents, just not so many involving catching such nice fish or posting any pix lol... The gearhead in me does rule my drive and keeps things going around here though lol. You guys rock here and I really appreciate the stuff you tack up on this forum...

Well done sir!

Good job brother !

Nice work buddy!

Ken

Great job, Geno, and appreciate the intel on the drifting speed.

I try and aim for 0.5 mph and use the drift sock when needed to slow it down as much as I can, but not worried if its below 0.5 as I much prefer to let the natural forces of nature pull me along rather than use the trolling motor to assist. I guess I am lazy.

Interesting you caught them on whole gizzard shad rather than smaller cut baits. I might try the same if I ever catch any in my cast net (oh man I am hopeless...).

Tim, if i remember right, the surface temps were between 53 and 56 degrees. Thinking back now, the comment i made about speed probably doesn't hold much water because now that i think about it, i spent 90 percent of my time at .4 or .5. I didn't spend enough time out of that range to really make a factual observation about it. I did forget to mention that most of my fish came on frozen shad but the big one came on fresh. Guess that speaks for itself lol!

It amazes me the sizes of bait that I have caught fish eating. I have had small stripers and black bass in my net before and while sorting through everything, chucking what needed to go back in the lake and see one of those little monsters with a shad of minnow halfway down the gullet and thrashing around trying to get the rest of it down. The whole time, that bait was bigger than the little monster trying to choke it down lol...

The other thing I have seen personally is the head piece of cut shad or perch I have used did much better than the other pieces. I have it in my mind, it's about the eyes on the head piece, but that is just my pointed brain trying to make sense of it. I make the head piece of my cut bait the bigger piece anymore, and it's the first piece I want to fish with, if not using the whole bait.

I got my rod rack finished enough so it's ready for it's maiden voyage. So, I am going to have to go see how it's going to work now. Pix like this big monster here certainly helped me get this project to at least a testing point now anyway. You guys really rock the boat around this forum lol...

Nice fish.

Great fish man

Geno, I'm off the water the next couple weeks. Leaving today for Detroit. Be up there til Wednesday and then gotta go up home for some family stuff next weekend, and then got the duck hunt the following weekend. Dock Holiday is a mess. I need to get it home and clean it up, and change the oil. Probably be back at it the week before Christmas. Hope we get to fish together again soon!

Very Nice!