#1702665 - 12/21/1609:39 AM
Cwood open Water Smallies 12/20!
CWood Man
Stop Bitchin' And Get Fishin'!
Registered: 02/13/04
Posts: 22811
Loc: Villas NJ
So persistence paid off, all though it didn't look good for a while. Did some scouting Monday as I was suppose to go to the City with Michelle but my ankle is in an air cast so we still took the day and drove around and had a good day. Checked the ramp at Lilli and the lake was wide open! Drove to the Squantz launch on Candy and that was open water, so Mitch and I had a choice.
Made the call to take the boat on Lilli for some big Pike and maybe some bass and other stuff. Plan was to meet at 9:30 and Mitch would get bait. So I go to uncover boat and I had the straps from the cover frozen on the ground, a few clips frozen, wheel chucks frozen, plug for boat was iced up, UGG!!!!! So got everything unfrozen and off to Lilli. Pulled into local market to grab some salt in case we needed it. Came out to the truck and one of the tires on the trailer was flat! Limped home, grabbed the compressor and pumped it up. Air starts pissing from valve stem so if you push it to one side it stops. Gorilla tape anyone!
So off to Lilli. Pulled in and the lake was iced over!!!!!!! No! Called Pat and Cwood Bait and Tackle and he said best bet may be Lynn Demming. Got there around 11:30 and free of ice! Pulled out the seat because I had to sit down and work the trolling motor and try and keep my foot elevated, I hate fishing sitting down! Noticed the pisser on the motor wasn't pumping out so we let it run and finally it came unfrozen.
Mitch and I had a blast for a good 4 hours. It was actually nice and calm, guides freezing up but we caught a few decent fish in 20-30 FOW. I have to say I thought the fish would be stacked by now. We hit reliable spots that we would catch double digits on and we would only get one here and one there. Nothing like it was even two years ago. Kietechs did the main damage and Mitch did get one 4.25 pounds.
Once the sun dipped down it got real cold and the wind picked up a bit so we were out. The lake is real low but with the upcoming temps may still be some open water fishing to be had!!!!
Good thing about this weather, no need for a cooler!!!!! Fun times Mitch! Merry Christmas everyone!
Mitch will add some pics!
CHANGE IS SCARY BUT IT IS REWARDING ON THE OTHER SIDE!
SURELY MISS MY CTF FRIENDS BUT ALWAYS WILL BE HERE TO GIVE ALL A HARD TIME!
Bum ankle, flat tire, iced over lake ... no problem for the 2015 CTF Member of the Year!
There was never any doubt we would be chasing fish somehow, or somewhere yesterday. As usual, good times on the water with Chris. Great to close out the open-water 2016 season a high note.
Nice to run into Striperboy at Candlewood Bait & Tackle in the a.m.
Water temps were 36. With the forecast, there will still be some open-water opportunities ahead, if you have the time to get out.
Keitech outproduced the baits yesterday. Slow & steady near the bottom worked best.
Here are some pics. I also have a vid of us running the lake that I'll add later.
Finding Lilly iced over. There were some members of the state crew out in boats doing work on the steel bridge. We even thought about asking them if they'd clear a channel for us.
We were happy to find no ice at Candlewood (we only saw a few sheets of floating ice out on the main lake ... and on the guides).
We really couldn't have asked for better weather yesterday. Water was like glass for most of the day.
We're actually running full throttle in these pics and it looks like we're standing still ...
Cwood broke the ice with our first smallie for the day, and they only got bigger from there.
A nice 4.25 pounder ...
Of course with us on board, things got goofy ...
Hope everyone enjoys a Merry Christmas and kicks off a great 2017 season soon!
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