A big bucket of 'eyes

makes a lot of tasty meals.

So much for the conventional wisdom

There was a huge mayfly hatch on Cass Lake last Friday. In my experience, fisherman complain about such hatches because, they say, the fish gorge themselves on mayflies and thus lose their appetite for other offerings.

Well, I spent about an hour at dusk fishing Shallow Water Point in the usual manner and the bite was crazy good. It seemed the hatch turned the fish on.

This image represents the highpoint of the frenzy: two walleyes hit on a single lure on a single cast. Amazingly, neither managed to work his way free.

I've had the two fish/one cast experience once before, with two smallmouth. That was less shocking, though, since smallmouth are such famously aggressive feeders. But two walleyes on a single cast? That's weird.

Largemouths at Whitefish

Arnie and I tooled around in the canoe for about an hour last Wednesday, paddling along the north shore of upper Whitefish and tossing crank baits into the shallows.

We caught several dinky largemouth, a hammer handle and these two bass. The big one, which was swimming under a neighbor's dock, was a respectable 17 inches.

Good times on the Jesus dock

Last week I took an old gangplank--salvaged years ago from Island Station, the funky, late, lamented houseboat colony of St. Paul--and set it up as a dock. In my typical half-assed manner, I used random flotsam as piers. An old barrel. A log. A scrap pallet. You get the picture. It's not a cell-phone safe structure--at least, not if you don't have a water proof cell phone.

The dock extends out a nice distance but, in addition to being wobbly, stands only two to three inches about the water. When you walk out, it feels like you're walking on water. Hence the moniker Jesus dock.

As you can see from the images, it's quite fishy out there. I hit four smallies and a shrimp walleye in about 15 minutes the other night.

Thanks, Bob!

A belated note of thanks to Cousin Bob, who, in his alley wanderings, scrounged this hand-painted billboard for the Secret Weapon Bait Rig.

Needless to say, this fine piece of art now adorns the River Ranch.

They strapped on the feedbag

The Mississippi smallmouth, that is.

Hesler and I spent a good part of the afternoon struggling to find the smallies. Then, toward dusk, we started throwing crankbaits near the sewer drain by the condos just downstream.

It was a winning recipe. We didn't land any lunkers, and I managed to lose two rattling lures, but the action was fast and furious.

Chunky, tasty

J and I ran into some healthy walleyes at Cass Lake last week.

I love this time of year because the bite is so predictable.

All the fish hit on Raps, which we were casting at dusk on Shallow Water Point.

Multiple feasts were enjoyed.