Norm M Posted September 30, 2015 Posted September 30, 2015 river dropped some more, few more leaves other wise no change there. Overcast all day it got windier as the day went, cooler as well, started in tee shirt, finished wearing a jacket . herons, hawks active, geese in larger bunches, still have turkey buzzards checking me out . squirrels really frantic today .The IDNR has never reported this river as holding musky, in 5 decades never had a follow, much less caught one. Pike, gar and bowfin from this flow, gar taking over pike niche in most stretches as spawning areas for pike disappear . I have caught musky in other rivers, lakes, reservoirs, and cooling lake so I know the difference twixt pike and musky . Today I hit a spot that had been producing smallmouth but hadn't the last couple times I checked. It's a water willow/slack spot on the side of an island . I decided to check up into the willows so I tied on a 5/16 oz War Eagle Tandem Spin tipped with a 5 inch twister. On the third cast , I got hit, knew it wasn't a smallmouth when I saw some of the fish after the hook set. I got lucky, it took the spinnerbait at the front of the mouth, so with no leader I was able to land it. A quick, not real precise check with a tape indicated 25 to 27 inches, not huge , but no complaints. I talked to Nick at the Trading Post[local bait shop] , he told me he had two reports of similar sized musky from the river in the last year or so. I have no idea if it's freelance stocking or not .The smallmouth action was intense in the three areas it occurred, the rest of the places I fished nothing doing. A dozen smallmouth on rattlebaits in an area where two channels came together, doubt it was much more than 50 casts. Ten smallmouth off a point down from an outside bend on rattlebaits, about 30 casts. 5 smallmouth on a one knock spook in the slack behind an island , very short amount of time but fun while it lasted.Eleven walleyes , all on swimbaits on flats off the channel, below river bends or neckdowns twixt islands produced the best .I tossed a Berkley heavy weight worm on a 5/0 worm hook on top of riffles, let it sink to the bottom of the vertical eddy at the base of the riffle, ended up with three very respectable channel cats .It's not fall yet, but the fish were chewing enough to make it a very nice trip BilletHead 1 what a long strange trip it's been , put a dip in your hip, a glide in your stride and come on to the mother ship , the learning never ends
Norm M Posted October 8, 2015 Author Posted October 8, 2015 http://chicago.suntimes.com/sports/7/71/1018895/muskie-spots-chicago-fishing-really-usual follow up article yesterday what a long strange trip it's been , put a dip in your hip, a glide in your stride and come on to the mother ship , the learning never ends
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