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Last night was a different kind of smelt trip for us. I fished for a short period of time & caught 60. I had 8 doubles & 1 triple. Met a guy that knew me from a FB group & let him sit in my chair & use my rod. He beat his record catch by quite a bit & ended up w/ 97 in less than 1 1/2 hrs. . It was fun sitting there unhooking fish for him & re-baiting hooks. I am at the point where I'd rather do that than keep railing the fish every night. Smelt jr. gave half of his 125 smelt to the guy & the other 1/2 to another guy that was fishing near us. Giving my catch to a sport shop owner today .Gave some to the guys at Smittys in Battle Creek yesterday. These folks cant get out fishing,so just trying to share w/ them. Funny thing, I have given away so many smelt this year,I only have 50 for myself at this point .
Baseline rd. is a mess due to some guys that busted it up w/ a quad & trailer last night. Checked it this afternoon & with the cold weather coming, it should freeze back up if idiots dont destroy it. I picked up my season pass for the north end today, so I will now be able to check that too. I think the ice will be fine,its just the shore ice that we need to worry about right now.
Wed. Night Trip; Smelt jr. jigged up a couple of Slimers ! 206 Smelt.
Glad you had a good night again Smeltbuster. My night was slow. Had a hard time finding a consistent depth where the biters were. Might of been the last time on Gull. Suppoe to warm up this week. Baseline was a mess, people continually take Quads and dogs off there and braking up the shore ice. It has had time to freeze back up, then they drive on it.
Went out on the north end for a couple hours last night. Got there late, as usual. Quite about 9:30. Mostly a slow bite for me but there were fish on the graph the whole time. Fished 75 FOW. I had six hooks on my line and almost all came on the Hali at the bottom. Next jig up caught a couple. White spikes for bait. Still 8+ inches of good ice out in the lake but the shore ice at the launch is deteriorating. Be careful and stay away from the creek mouth if you go out. I only caught 21, which isn't good, but was about the same as what a couple other guys got. I don't have SB's touch. Must be all in the wrist. :-)
I start with a dead shiner or sucker and then upgrade to live smelt. So there is some truth to me eating my bait.
skibumm100, the twp. has gone to a new pin code program & they are having lots of problems w/ it. I have not tried my pass yet,but guess I should. They heav sent Smelt jr. 3 different pin #s & none of them have worked. Thye should refund your entrance fee, A few yrs. ago,before I was able to get my pass, I paid 2 times to get into the launch. They applied it to the purchase of my season pass. I did keep my receipts, so if you have yours, you should be good. As long as I can catch at least 45 smelt tonight, it will be my last trip of the year. Time to start tying more smelt flies for next year.