NebSchmidty

Just between Indian point and the marina now, and I can pick it up as deep as 15ft

Came down with the family for the week and am fishing out of Indian Point. Have been out a few hours each morning and again in the evenings. Feels like I'm on a scavenger hunt each time I hit the water -- can't just repeat our usual patterns from prior late April to early May trips. Sunday and Monday evenings we found decent success just inside to halfway back on a pair of secondary points which were part of a larger cove. Boat in 20'ish, fish in about 8-15, mostly on the ned. Monday morning we found success on primary points (both relative to the main lake and the creek arm), out a hair deeper, with a 1/8 dirt ned and 3/16 watermelon candy tube being the ticket. Although we didn't have massive numbers (8 Sunday, 17 Monday) or any giants over the first few days, the keeper/short ratio was one of the better ones that we've had in recent memory. Most of the spots were chunky and the SM were all fighters. Made the run on Tuesday morning down to Cow and tried ned/tube/shakey without a sniff. Went up creek to the next point that had submerged timber and moved boat out to 30-35 ft. Switched lures to 1/4oz keitech 2.8, and it was on. 5 to 8 count, then a slow retrieve. Interestingly (or maybe not?), I switched halfway through to a jerkbait and found no love... so back to the keitech. Pulled 7 off of that point, with another 4 drifting back out to main lake (staying 30-35 again). Family hopped aboard for lunch and we fished by docks in a couple pockets, but only turned up a couple fish. Tuesday evening ended up being a snooze fest with just a couple shorts to show for it on ned and drag baits in areas that had worked prior. Wednesday's forecast - cloudy, moderate wind, yet still warm for comfort - motivated me to set the alarm early and make a run further up river hoping for a better bite . Popped into a few north-side gravel pockets around the bend, without much doing on the sonar. Several lost lures and 0 fish to show for it set the tone for the morning. Any remaining enthusiasm was shot when I ran out of the last cove before Whiterock and got a few hundred yards into the main channel before the boat decided to check out like a grocery store clerk. No odd noises prior, no warning beeps, no nothing... just 4k rpm to 0, like that. After a brief troll to nearest dock, I found that my fuel filter had decided to work loose. I guess filters should be checked more than every 5-6 years -- note taken. Tightened it back down and she fired right back up. Made my way up to Schooner to confirm prior reports that there are indeed no fish there. Lol. Heavier rock snot out to 10' or so. Saw some beds, but no fish on em. Tried ned, tube, shakey, keitech, split shot centipede, and a fluke through the first few points, pockets, and docks on the east side with no luck fishing inside of 25'. Higher powers took mercy on me by blowing me deeper and allowing me to hook up with a short spot in about 30' of water on a chunkier/steeper point (2.8 again). With the wind really going by then, it was mission accomplished and back to the condo. While tying up back at the dock, had a pair of blowups only a few feet away. Determination renewed, I retrieved the keitech rod from storage and doubled my fish count for the day. Opting for eggs and bacon this morning, then Fritz's for the kids. Back out later on today. This post has been promoted to an article

Yards, parks, parking lots, and boat launches? I think the Landing has some extra storage capacity as well...

First two are the biggest fish of the day. I liked the coloring on the darker one. Sonar shot is how that cow stretch looked over 20-30' when I kept seeing shad busting, but couldn't buy a bite. If anyone has a suggestion on how to approach that differently, I'd be all ears. Throwing in a 10" goggle and a Table Rock since, for good measure.

Decided it was time to sleep in for a change, so I didn't get on the water until 830 this morning. Having spent time running various areas since arriving this weekend, I opted to zero in on the common denominator for just about every bite for me this week -- chuck to ledge rock shorelines with a relatively quick drop to nearby deep water. Started out by heading north up Indian to such a point. Confirmation one came when I started marking fish in the 20' range. Confirmation two was a tussle with a nice 17.5" SM... big fish of the vacation thus far. Stayed there for almost two hours picking it apart from all angles and scraped out another barely keeper KY and a pair of short SM. Three on the 1/8oz Canada craw ned, one on the keitech 2.8 sexy shad on 1/4oz ballhead. No love for the tube, or 5 different jig combos fished from 5'-30'. On to the next spot. At this point, the east wind had come up a bit. Wind and waves were going to make it difficult to keep my high-profile fish/ski (aka sailboat) in a desireable position on just about every western section between Indian Pt and dang-near point 5. But because I'm determined when I get an idea, I opted to head for the backside of a mainlake runout, and fish an a-rig through some submerged trees... because I'd read a report about it, and we'd caught several fish amongst these trees on the day prior. Moral of this part of the story? You may think you're all rigged up... but if your heavy duty swimbait rod and 30lb big game mono connect to your a-rig via a small wire quick connect for cranks/topwaters, the cedar tree will win every time. There's that teambuilding saying -- you're only as strong as your weakest link. ~$20 worth of further validation of that. On to Cow. Pulled into Cow and not much action on the point. Went in a little ways and spotted the fisherman's best friend -- a blue heron. I started marking and catching in relatively short order thereafter. By this time the clouds had rolled in, so the fish depth change had paused and a color swap was in order. Went to PBJ on the ned and pick up a few shorts with a keeper SM, casting 45 degrees against the bank. Lots of quick nibblers - bluegill or very small SM - in the shallows. After PBJ was just attracting the nibblers, I tried GP and GP/red with no change in fortune. I then started seeing a few more running off the shore, so picked up the 2.8 keitech and caught another keeper SM and a couple shorts. The further I got in the creek, the more consistent the sonar was for suspended fish around 18-25. I also saw the most surface action that I had all week, but just could not get anything to bite a reaction bait. Dixie jet, plopper, spook, or even running a keitech through the areas where shad had busted... didn't matter. 0 love today in cow for jigs or tube (caught 3 the evening prior on a tube, near the same area). Ended the day with 4 keeps, 7 shorts.

Down around Indian Point was slow going yesterday as well. Marked a fair number on sonar, on and just inside main lake point in the 20' or so range... but only caught 1 barely keep and 2 shorts in almost 3 hours of morning fishing. Went back out for a few hours in the evening and got 5 shorts between the wife and I. Steeper chunk rock bank, off secondary point, farther back into the pocket than I initially expected. Might try a little further back today and see if that doesn't yield better results. All fish caught on ned - Canada craw in the am, dirt was best in the PM.

The updates are much appreciated. I knew there was a reason I ordered those GP/orange-flake speed craws on a whim. Looks like I'll need to pack those, as well as the kitchen sink. And I think bombardment might be an understatement. By my count, water patrol lists 483 tourney boats on Saturday, 400 on Sunday. Am I actually looking forward to a Monday??

Thanks for the report and fun read. Curious of folk's thoughts for the coming weeks. According to accuweather, at least, fall weather sure looks to be on the way -- 85H/70L today becomes 65H/40L by the 15th. Will that deep jig bite come back into play for a while as things cool off and the days keep getting shorter... or is it better odds that they could start transitioning shallower or towards the backs of creeks and pockets? Or maybe it's a few weeks where they just scatter to wherever the shad happen to be on a given day? We've only gotten down there a few times in Oct/Sept, but it's usually been warmer weather and that spoon/dropshot/jig bite. Bringing the family down on the 19th and will have a week to try to figure something out.

Yep, they're on the move. I spotted one yesterday floating down the Platte river, west of Omaha, NE. If these things keep multiplying, Game & Parks may need to look at adding a summer waterfowl season. I'm sure Johnny would be happy to offer up some Cabelas-branded, Gore-Tex lined, camouflage swim trunks and flip-flops so that folks could be properly outfitted for summer flamingo hunts.

The snot is here, there, and everywhere... until all of a sudden it isn't. It's broken loose in spots from moonshine to cow over the last week, but still is a strong/annoying factor in many other areas. The suspended gunk seems to drift with the wind. Some spots are slimy out to around 8' while others have to be 15+ to steer clear. Even deep, the trees will slime you. 1/16 ned and 1/8 keitech seemed to be the only things that would stay mostly gunk-free on a consistent enough basis.

Normally I'm one to fish with the conditions. However, this spring trip has been an entirely different ball of wax from the last 9 years down here. How far do I have to go from Indian Point to get away from the entire bottom <15' being coated in snot? Wife and 5/9 year olds can normally fish 'ol ned all day long from late april to mid may and have a ball... but nobody's having any fun this year with with "tick, thud, pull, oh it's slime". Not gonna lie... I as the "fisherman", am already bored with trying to stumble upon the random secondary point which holds roaming suspended fish chasing shad that are willing to bite a kietech in 8-12 over 15-22, depending on the sun and wind. Give me a drag/bottom bait of some kind... but how much fuel do I need to run there to be able to do so? If I can't get the family on some fish, it's probably going to mean more trips to Grand Country "Fun Spot" or the Disney store at the outlet. Help! Or maybe I'm just SOL along with everyone else on this pond, given the terrific weather we've had this year. Globull warming my a$$.

I've used automotive 3m rubbing/buffing compound with good success on mine. It's the stuff they use when wetsanding and buffing clear coat. I think if your gel coat is in good condition, and the stains are just from regular outings (rather than being docked in water for months) then you'll be fine. We've got pretty stained water at home from lots of vegetation, so my white hull usually gets a discolored ring after several outings on the lake... but it usually comes off pretty easily. A cheap electrical orbital buffer makes it a lot easier than doing it by hand.

Man I have horrible timing for spring vacations on this pond. Ok, cool ,record flood, good, good, snow, ok, good, great, record flood, 800 boats in 3 weeks. Sept/Oct trips are just gravy on the turkey. At least we caught 2 on ol' ned in 15 before the rain chased us off tonight. First quick day down, 8 full ones to go.

Not necessarily -- if one is willing to deal in used equipment. I own a clean champ 734 that cost me $160. If you have the time to search and aren't in a hurry, lots of good deals can be found on ebay, BBC, and other online fishing forums. I used to buy my Dobyns stuff (no I don't own a jersey ) new during the usual online sale times... but by the time the rod count approached double digits, my better half had become rather cynical of my "it's on sale" schtick. So I started shopping used and found that I could pick up most stuff for 35 to sometimes 50% off of original retail. The less popular the rod is, the bigger your discount usually is. Now that's just the market for used Dobyns gear, but I'd think you could find other niche brands for similar. My general experience is that the majority of people who have sunk $200+ into a fishing stick will have taken reasonably decent care of it (if not, you can easily tell by the pics). The extent of any scratching or cork soiling/dings will have more impact on your discount, versus your ability to fish with it. Used reels can be a bargain too, but IMPO, you need to be a little more particular due to the mechanical aspects. So in short, don't be afraid to also look at used if you want a higher end model but don't want to spend the $ for it new.

Have no worries -- I will be venturing from the Great (somewhat) North on Saturday and bringing you cooler temps for next week. The weatherman says its going to top out in the 60s and drop into the 40s overnight. Also calling a round of showers with the front Saturday night into Sunday AM. That should help some, shouldn't it? Or is it still a couple weeks away from really starting to pick back up? If I get down this time of year it's usually around Columbus Day, so I don't have as good of feel for the transition out of the September/early-October funk.

What's the water clarity looking like lately? Looks pretty bluegeeen there, but wondered if the gold double willow was in response to some sort of dirt or tannin stain... or just the lighting/cloud cover). Will be down for a week in just a little over a week.

Never would I have thought I'd come to OAF and find a report with pics from Wanahoo. And let's just dispense with all this ned talk in relation to said lake. It will certainly NOT catch fish at wanahoo or anywhere else around these parts. Nope, no fish. Those wanahoo bass will completely ignore anything you throw in a gp/red or Canada craw on one of Dave's 1/16oz heads. Spend your hard earned money on something else if you want a 30+ fish morning. With that said, let's get back to normal debates about wart knockoffs and frustrations over increased lake traffic.

That's the concern I have with where we're staying (not my call to make though). My hope is if I fish the weekdays prior to 9am and after ~8pm then I can hop between a few nearby pockets/coves and avoid the brunt of what you just described. Now if that's not even possible due to the sheer number of crazies, then maybe I'm better off saving some mpg's and leaving the boat at home.

Wrench, would those be good patterns to try in main-lake coves as well? I gather that most folks are fishing upstream to avoid the traffic this time of year... but a family event will have us staying in the MM14 area next week. First time on LOZ.

Wow! I highly advise against throwing gp/orange on the ned. It's downright opressive.... makes them them upset and angry. Too many people start throwing it, we're gonna run out of safe spaces for all these triggered fish.

Haven't tried the GP/orange yet... but have found the canada craw to be working pretty well in place of the usual PBJ.

I wish I had a ton of profound insight to add, but all the reports since Saturday are pretty spot on with what I've come across thus far during our weeklong stay. Limited spinnerbait bite (assuming there's wind), zilch on a topwater, and not a whole lot for a suspended/keitech bite (finally started to see a few of those fish show up on the graph today, more during our late-evening outing)... which leaves you the bottom of the lake. Bearing in mind that I take the kitchen-sink approach when I first get a few hours away from the kids/nedheads, I've caught them on shakey finesse worms, tubes, 5/16 eakins jigs, heavier football jigs, and a biffle head / structure bug. The tube though has been about my most consistent bite. 3/16 weight, 3.5" tube, gp/orange bps if you want to be specific. I'm beginning to think though that you can pretty much catch them on whatever you have the patience to drag across the bottom, in the right depth. So maybe returning to typical spring pattern?? Oh, and another plug for +/- a few feet of the old bank line. And slow. If the trees are just too tempting to leave alone, the first row is the most productive with the drawdown.

I'll throw my hat in this ring as well. After a day of travel and unpacking, got the family out for about 45 minutes prior to sundown. Buzzed up to one of our usual haunts near Indian Point and put m&m's report to use. As promised, marked and caught fish parked right near that old bank line under about 15-20 ft of water. Ended up with 5 shorts and one barely keeper before two tired kids became too unruly to push staying out later. Shaky worm and ned accounted for the hooked fish. Had two nibble a tube but wouldn't commit, and one shallow fish throw loose a 5/16 finesse war eagle halfway to the boat. Back at it tomorrow AM.