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Saturday, May 31, 2014

Journal Sentinel Article - Lac Labelle

I was out with Paul Smith on Lac Labelle a couple weeks ago...but the article about our outing is now posted.


Landing a Labelle Walleye-From JSONLINE.Com

Check out the whole article at the Journal-Sentinel Outdoors Page.

Thursday, May 29, 2014

Fishing Report 5-29-14

Okauchee has a WABTA bass tournament on Sunday.

Panfish, especially bluegills were already spawning on many local lakes. Some fish were starting to make nests in the shallow sand. Look for active fish along the inside edges of weedlines at the end of points, a key staging area for panfish before the spawn. Some crappies can be caught off deeper fish attractors/brushpiles...but fishing vertically, tightlining tail hooked crappies minnows is probably your best approach. I heard some decent crappies were coming from Ashippun, Kessus and Pine, but I have not verified this.

Largemouth bass are more or less done with their spawning activity. Lots of fish are still schooled up and chasing bait on the shallow to mid depth weed flats with scattered cover. Baitfish remains the key factor on fish location so presentations made slow and very tight to cover (like flipping or texas rigs for example) willcatch fish. If the wind is laying down, one of my better tricks for these conditions is to twitch a size 11 floating rapala minnow, pop-r or pop-x around shallow structure/cover. This is also prime time for live bait presentations, especially larger shiners or small suckers on a slip sinker rig.

Smallmouth were finishing up the spawning ritual. Likely will be a tough bite until conditions stabilize a little, but when the bite is tough sometimes your best approach for brown bass is to get unconventional. I'd throw spinnerbaits and crankbaits for smallmouth, especially around the deep edges of transition areas. Tubes on the rocks or crawfish pattern crankbaits bounced through the sand and rocks in 8-15 FOW might just be the ticket to stick a big fish this weekend.

Northern Pike have been active-throw spinnerbaits, buzzbaits or lipless crankbaits around shallow patches of weeds for some action. Bigger fish can be taken on slip sinker rigs tipped with larger bait around the deeper edges of the roadbeds or rocky points.

Walleye: The bite has dropped off substantially with a lake fly hatch this past week, but some fish are being caught on live bait in 8-12 FOW. Oconomowoc has been active while the bite has dropped off some on Pine, North and Lac Labelle.

Around the area:  Trout are still coming, although in limited numbers, from the stocked lakes and ponds.

Good Luck.