Fishing Report 8-11-12

Not much new to report, if you check into this blog regularly or follow my posts on lake-link.

Water is cooling off, days are getting shorter. It is time to start fishing.

Panfish are still running late summer patterns. You can find quality fish suspended over deeper water, or in middepth weeds. Live bait rigs are you best bet, but plastics tipped with waxies or spikes and fished on slip bobbers can be crazy good at times. Night fishing has been very good for bluegills, as it typically is this time of year.

Bass are starting to patrol the shallow areas for soft shells. As I said earlier this week, the fish are in the shallow water around the rock/sand/weed transition areas. I'm catching a bunch of fish on a rootbeer jig and craw combo right now, but skirted grubs, small cranks and wacky rigs are still catching lots of fish. Out deeper, I'm fishing a jigworm (6" Yum Rib Worm- watermelon red and watermelon with goldflake) with my clients. They have been knocking the smaller fish (12-15") out on the watermelon/gold flake color. (56 On Monday, 60 on Tuesday, and 57 Friday -yes-173 fish-in three half day trips.) Bass will be moving up to the rocks over the next couple of days as the crayfish start to molt, but I haven't seen any softshells get spit up yet.

Northern Pike fishing has picked up substantially with the cooler weather. Deep weedlines are holding lots of fish throughout the day. Cranks, slow rolled spinnerbaits, swimbaits or suspending jerkbaits can really produce right now.

Walleye fishing: I don't have any current reports from the area. Check back next week.

Musky: Lots of people are reporting seeing musky making runs into shallow water. I haven't heard many reports like that this summer, but the cooler weather and shorter photocycle has probably awoken a few fish. Not much to report in the way of catching, but a few anglers are reporting some limited success throwing bucktails or gilders around submergent weed clumps at the end of mainlake points with steep drops into deeper water.

Good Luck out there.