Hayward, Wisconsin Fishing Report 8-2-15

schott4

Nick Pretasky & Jeff Schott

If you like wind, this is the report for you…  We’ve gone from hot and flat to hot and windy and not a whole lot in between.  I had the opportunity to reconnect with an old friend this week.  Jeff Schott from LaCrosse, WI and his brother in law Nick Pretasky from Grand Rapid’s, MN spent Wednesday with me.  Jeff’s wife Avrie purchased a trip for his birthday, and I was looking forward to seeing him after too many years had gone by.  Our original plan was to fish Chequamegon Bay, but 40 mph winds nixed that.  What are you supposed to do in 40 mph winds???  We were able to work it out on an inland lake and found plenty of cooperative smallmouth throughout the day up to 20″ and a few walleyes up to 20″ as well.  Jeff and Nick did an excellent job as we worked breaklines with rock and weeds in 10′ – 15′ of water with plastics.  It ended up being a really fun day, and we caught more than I expected considering the conditions and the limited areas we could fish.  Water temps held at 75 degrees, and a little cloud cover helped it from getting too warm.  It was a blast to see Jeff again and a pleasure to have Nick along as well.  Congrats on some great fish fellas.  Let’s do it again soon!!!schott2

schott5

 

 

 

 

 

 

jones8

Dawson, Tim, & Landon Jones

The Jones family from Ladoga, IN returned, and the whole crew was back in the boat with me on Thursday.  Tim, Marni, Landon (9 yrs old), and Dawson (5 yrs old) had a little different weather than the last time they were here when the boys were bundled up in snow suits last fall.  Warm temps with gusty winds made things a bit challenging, but the Jones crew ended up putting a really good day together.  We started out a bit slow trying to locate some active crappies.  Without much action, we switched to bluegills and caught them one after another up to 9″ in 15′ of water on nightcrawlers.  Tim even landed a really nice 19″ smallmouth on light tackle.  After wearing the gills out, we decided to head to a different lake in the afternoon and immediately got into some really nice walleyes up to 22″ fishing rocks in 15′ – 20′ and weeds in 8′ -10′ with slip bobbers and leeches.  Landon and Dawson each cranked in their first walleyes, and we also boated some nice smallmouth up to 19″ to go along with them.  Water temps continued to hold around 75 degrees.  Landon and Dawson did a great job, but I’m not going to get in the middle of who caught the largest fish of the day.  They’ll have to settle that on their own…  I’ll have that bucket of leeches waiting for your next trip Marni…  Way to go gang!!!jones7

jones3

Marni Jones

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

roppe2

Scott Roppe & Rick Tutor

My old buddies Rick Tutor from Ashland, WI and Scott Roppe from Birchwood, WI were scheduled for two days and plans A – X were out the door with the wind that was forecasted.  We made lemonade out of lemons though and ended up having an incredibly fun couple of days.  In an attempt to negate the wind we decided to hit one of the many rivers in northern Wisconsin on Friday that have musky populations, and it was a hoot.  River fish usually run a bit smaller, but muskies are muskies…  They’re a blast to catch and we put together one heck of a day boating  30″, 32″, & 34″ fish along with 9 total sightings.  Rick and Scott threw bucktails all day, and we had some explosive strikes close to the boat that were heart stoppers.  Water temps were similar to the lakes and warmed to 76 degrees by the end of the day.  Make sure you’re extremely careful when handling fish in these warm temps as they’re very vulnerable.  Keep them in the water as long as possible, and limit out of water handling to a minimum.  With lots of laughs to go along with our fish, it couldn’t have been a better day with two better guys.roppe3

roppe1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

tutorAfter chasing muskies we headed the other direction on Saturday and went looking for a good crappie bite.  Josh Teigen gave me an “on the money” tip, and he was right on.  As usual!  It didn’t take us long to get into good fish up to 12″ working deep weed edges in 6′ – 12′ of water with a variety of plastics.  We spent a half day on the water, and the fish were active the entire time.  Once again, lots of laughs came along with lots of fish.  It’s always great to have these two guys in my boat, and I wish we could do it more often.  Winds finally started to calm down a bit, and we were able to access plenty of areas that held fish.  Sunny skies warmed the water to 76 as the hot weather continued.  Thanks for an incredible two days my roppefriends.  Good stuff and good times!!!  Looks like we’ve got a cool down in the forecast.  Should be interesting…

under-armor-blog-banner

Leave a Comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.