April Fishing Reports & Pictures

April should be a great month, walleye run is going good, water levels are behaving and ice and stuff should be out of the system by the end of next week. Everyone is picking up nice walleyes vertical jigging plastic and live bait in 9 to 15 fow. Shore anglers in Fort area are start to catch fish also so the walleyes are moving and getting ready for some pleasure. I caught this nice walleye by the Bark River where it comes into the Rock River using Zone-R jig by Fin-tech tackle tipped with a berkley ripple Shad piggy back with a minnow.

Nice fish partner looks like your hat is straight to me. Found a new tackle shop when taking a detour to Popeye’s chicken Saturday.

WeFish

Nauga- my brother and I would like to sign up for the tourney. Let me know what/how I need to do to get you what you need to get us squared away for the tourney. Lookin forward to some competitive fishing after a couple years of not doing it. Thanks

@ Rdisel23,
Give me your email address and I’ll send you the Registration Form that you will need to print out, then fill out and send to me asap.

Nauga

Night time is producing some good quality fish. Here’s my boy with a 22 incher that he released Sunday, and with the 3 eaters that we kept last night.

All fish caught on a 1/8oz Firetiger Odd’Ball Jig rigged with a 3″ Peanut Butter and Jelly Moxie Ringle

Nice fish!

Very nice , always fun to bring the kids out fishing

Good fish nauga, my boy is just starting to get the itch to fish. Hopefully in a couple years hell be a seasoned vet.

Pretty quiet on the IDO front. That must mean that all the walleyes are in Fort. I’ll bet the locals are slayin em up there and keeping tight lipped about it! Arnt they Jeff

No, not really. Rare fish here and there from what i hear. I’ve tried afternoons almost daily and haven’t felt a fish yet.

Hey nauga, how’d you do today? Seen you fishing all the way from the mouth of the lake up past the Bark… It was pretty slow for my boat a hand full of shorts and one 17″er. Only thing that got bit was a pink 3/8oz Zone-R jig with a white moxie and tipped with a minnow. Tried just jig and minnow, 3 ways with a fly and minnow, also gave a half a crawler a washing for a while too. Only seen 3 other fish boated and there were quite a few boats out today. I had to park on the street under the overpass when I launched at 9:45, so prolly close to 20 rigs there. Gonna try to get out again in the morning before the wind gets too bad for my boat..

Well ProDrive Al, I can tell you this, I learned one thing today. That Databoy is a BIG FAT LIAR!!!! Let’s put it this way, put in 6 hours from 26 to the lake, caught and released a 21 incher on my 1st drift this morning, then nothing for almost 5 hours. Headed further up river than I normally go, I won’t disclose the exact location where I stopped, (Im sure you know anyway) but I drifted once, I mean 1 time, maybe a 15-20 minute drift, caught 6 fish and 4 legals!!! Right at the beginning of my 2nd drift I got my line caught up in my trolling motor prop, I took it apart in an attempt to unwind it and I dropped the metal pin right in the drink. So there went my fishing, spent the next hour attempting to drift with no trolling motor!!! LMAO, boy would that have been funny to watch, I was so damn mad!!! I was cussing every other word, throwing stuff around in my boat…etc.. figures, I find a bunch of fish and then cripple myself!!! LOL!! My shift starts at 11:00pm, and I’m counting down the minutes until it’s over, I’ll be drifting the same stretch by 8:30-9:00, **new trolling motor** he he..

Thanks Nauga, I will take being called a liar as a compliment. But unfortunately in my case it’s true. I haven’t caught a legal walleye since i last fish with Jeff the last day of league two years ago. I missed most of last year recovering from surgeries and am back at it this year – surgery that is. I only have one good left arm. I’m having thoracic outlet surgery this summer. I’ll likely be fishing with one rod because i can’t feel my right hand and my shoulder feels like it’s going to fall off. What’s a tourney without a handicap? I’ll be fishing in my canoe Friday and Sunday afternoon so don’t run me over.

Sorry to hear about your health issues. I hope you get better soon. Fished near Fort today,CRUSHED EM.. I mean CRUSHED!!! Jigged for the 1st 4 hours, only picked up 2 legals, I knew there was a lot more fish there then was being caught, I just had to figure out a way to present a bait to them really slow, and keep it in the strike zone longer. Mastered the presentation at about 1:00pm. No b/s, in 45 seconds I had a double, two 20 inchers!!! Some guy screamed, I mean screamed and swore at me and told me I was trolling. I had my outboard on, idling in reverse, I was moving down stream at a snails pace. Anyways, I called Boyd Richter right from the river. Told him what I was doing. He said I was fine and that he would call Ryan. Ryan called my cell at 3:00. He said as long as I wasn’t progressivly moving up stream that I was A ok, He said it makes no difference if you have your motor on and in gear. I already knew these things, I just wanted to prove a point to the [censored] that screamed at me. We did, VERY well.

Is it only me or is the fort shore bite very off so far? Other than a rare fish here and there I’m not even seeing numbers of shorts. I did decent in the boat Saturday north of fort. But last spring for 6 weeks I caught fish all through town on shore. Seems I can hardly muster a bite this spring. Are any other bank anglers experiencing the same thing? I fished from the barq all the way out 106 towards the lake. Not much to show for my bank fishing hours. Really not even many guys fishing the bank.

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But last spring for 6 weeks I caught fish all through town on shore. Seems I can hardly muster a bite this spring.

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Keep in mind that the abnormally warm water last year pushed fish up near the spawning areas very early. Just because the water was warm, it didn’t mean that they spawning. Just that the water temps told them to get there. We were catching eyes in the sough mouths against dead cattails in less than 3 fow for nearly 6 weeks last year before they spawned. Reflect back to about 6 or 7 years ago when we had the combination of a later new moon phase (in relationship to April 1st) and a delayed ice-out. The fish just mysterious appeared thick in the river around the end of the first week of April. My opinion is this is a repeat of that type of year. Hang in there, they will arrive.

The water was so godly low on the lake almost all winter I think the fish might have been in the river all winter. That being the case it would explain why fish are being caught up from fort to the Jefferson dam. Blackhawk area is a dead zone and under your theory should be loaded with fish. That’s not the case now. Nobody got hardly any eyes this winter on the lake so did they not feed in the lake all winter then. Even winters with tons of small whitebass and sheepshead some were caught. I might be wrong but it sure seems strange to me. The water is perfect for shore fishing in fort yet no fish. None in blackhawk either means they are all in the lake still? Just doesn’t add up in my book but I hope I’m wrong. Will know if we don’t see many pre spawners. Then if post spawners show up they had already moved through the fort area before the ice came off. Only time will tell I guess!

I fished it a lot just before ice-up and didn’t do all that great. A lot of short fish, but mostly a couple here and there. Maybe a large number did winter in the river I tried to search for any netting data from the DNR between 2 years ago and this last fall and blanked on that. I don’t want to start speculating on a kill from the drought. But I am sure with the lake so low, they sought out other locations than “normal”

Nauga, still waiting on that tourney form. If you get a chance we’d like to get in. Thanks

Nauga’s been busy working on his “People” skills on the river Poor guy can’t do anything right. Drives too fast, too slow and plows a wake, catches fish, and even posted a recent picture of his son that was considered too old…. Geez, makes a guy wonder what this world is coming to.
BTW – Nauga, I wasn’t there but that huge blow up happened just up from a good friend of mine. (White Skeeter bass boat) He complimented how well you kept cool; really made the other dip-[censored] look like a horse’s When that guy started barking threats, I wonder if he even had a clue as to how many guys near by had conceal carry permits
Keep that little guy on them and spoil him proper!

Thanks Randy. The guy really was out of line that’s for sure. At least 4-5 other boats gave the guy and ear full after it happened. I appriciate everyone’s support.

@Rdisel – Entry form has been sent to your email.

The newest of my critics is on the Lake-Link 2013 Pictures Thread.



Rockbassman claims that the 54″ Flathead that Brayden pulled in a couple weeks ago was in fact no where near 54″. He bases his statement on the fact that it doesn’t look 54″ in the picture where Brayden is struggling to hold it up. Unfortunately for him The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources – Bureau of Fisheries Management disagrees with him ; ) Brayden recieved this certificate in the mail a couple days ago along with a letter that goes on to explain that based upon the pictures submitted the measurement of 54″ has been deemed accurate and that the fish is officially being documented by the Department of Natural Resources – Bureau of Fisheries Management at 54″.

Definitly one proud father here!!!!

See you guys on the water soon!!!

Nauga

Way to go Brayden !!

Time to get my bass gear out! 2008 I caught lots of eyes flipping trees like I do for bass. 1/4 oz chartreuse weedless Eakins jig with a large fathead. Looking like that bite will be on by the weekend. The river is supposed to keep rising through the weekend. She’s gonna be way up now till probably June. You guys fishing nauga monster tourney will not be able to get your boats under the newville bridge.

Tourney will either be postponed to a later date or the launch site will be changed if we can’t get under the 59 bridge.

Looks like today is BOLA’s birthday!!!

So what is it, 16 years old now.

Have a great one Jeff.

Derek

Happy B-Day Jeff

Here’s to another birthday, Jeff. Let’s plan on having a toast at the tourney, with your winnings or my winnings or whoever’s winnings…..see you then, unless, of course, you see me following you on the river in the next couple weeks.

Happy Birthday partner. As long as you keep on staying older than me we’re both doing good. Remember the warranty on my rods is for your lifetime not mine.

Happy birthday, old fart

Thank you all for the birthday wishes.