Wonder Lake

Wondertucky1 took his boat out today for the first time this year.  It was a good day catching bass (25% smallmouth and 75% largemouth) and crappie (60% black and 40% white). The unusual thing that happened was, I was throwing a plastic on an EWG 3/O hook and felt a gentle "tick" from the line.  I reeled in the slack, set the hook, and thought I snagged a rock because it didn't budge.  The "rock" started swimming into deeper water.  The fish did not want to surface and really not sure how long the fight lasted, but I was tired afterwards.  I must reiterate that the carp is one of the hardest fighting freshwater fish.   

Went out this morning. We caught a few decent large mouth bass, a couple nice crappies and a few small gills. It was slow and all were released. Most caught on a jig and plastic or worm. Water temps were 71-74 degrees.

Im not gona BS here. Been fishing WL my whole life and never knew the pan fish limit was 10!! I never really keep fish from this lake. I kept 8 panfish once. Pic is below. I kept 2 walleye on 2 different occasions. Thats it. In my entire life. Always CPR here. Fished this lake since I was a young boy. Caught thousands of fish on the Tuckey Puddle. I would have thought at least 15 panfish was ok.

QUICK REMINDER THIS LAKE HAS SPECIAL FISHING REGULATIONS AND NO MORE THAN 10 PANFISH. 

Shore-fished for carp yesterday afternoon.  It rained on us and the bright sun blinded us, all within 30 minutes.  Worst of all, no carp.  We did manage to pull in one 2 lbs channel cat.  As the sun was setting, it happened.  We started casting minnow-mimicking lures because we were getting nothing from still fishing.  We caught a largemouth, a smallmouth, and 28 crappies.  WT1 is pictured with a 9” black crappie.  It wasn’t the best one, but it needed extra attention unhooking, so we took the opportunity to get a picture.  The average size was 10” and we had several 12-inchers.  In the past years, when we were on crappie bites, the white crappie outnumbered the black crappie 9-to-1.  Yesterday, of the 28, only four were white crappies (1-in-7).   Not sure what that means, but I thought to share that information.  Needless to say, but I'll say it for those who don't know Wondertucky1 and me; we are strictly catch-and-release anglers. BTW - that was the "team" report.  Individual efforts - WT1 caught the two bass and 17 crappies; I caught the catfish and 11 crappies.  

Can you still get on the lake, or are the shorelines shot? 

Today I checked the Southwest side and found 4 inches of ice. Then I went to the Northwest side and checked two spots up there. Both spots had 5 inches of white ice. Shoreline was 3 to 3.5 inches. I caught quite a few small perch. Kept three 9 inch perch and two 7.5 inch gills. Most were caught with a size 14 gold tungsten jig, plastics and spikes both worked.  

Wondertucky1 took out his boat this afternoon.  I would classify today as “quality over quantity.”  Okay, we only caught three fish; two bass and one walleye.  The walleye measured 28” and weighed in at 8 lbs 4 oz.  The walleye smacked a lipless crank and the two bass were fooled by a spinnerbait.  

Not seeing too many posts this year.  Here's a crappie that hit Wondertucky1's soft stickbait.  He definitely out-fished me last week, more than doubling my catch.  He caught a dozen bass, but only one was a smallmouth.  We normally catch more smallies than largemouths, so it was an unusual day . . .