Spring Fishing and Urban Bass

Lately, I have been doing a lot of fishing in the Looking Glass in Clinton County.  Although water levels have been high, I have had several good battles with my old friends, the pike!  On one occasion, while throwing a banjo minnow, I caught a 27-inch pike fishing around the Bridge Street bridge in DeWitt.

Although pike fishing has been pretty successful, I wonder how it will be this summer with all the brush.  After the ice storm and the severe winter, there is a lot of debris in the water, which is making fishing complicated.  For example, on an expedition to the Looking Glass in early May, my Dad and I saw a 30-inch pike swimming near a brush pile.  I could have easily cast to the fish, but I would have had a hard time landing it without hurting the fish or getting snagged.

I have, however, had good success in one of my other favorite fishing spots, the Grand River in downtown Lansing.

On a recent trip to the Grand River, I caught a 14-inch bass and an 11-inch bass, plus a nice rock bass.  To catch these fish, I used a jigging approach from the dock in Adado Park.

 What I found interesting is that none of the small mouth bass were caught more than five feet from the dock.  I purchased the gold shiners I used as bait at Grand River Bait and Tackle.

Spring fishing has been complicated, but fun.  I hope that the weeks to come will be filled with many pike and bass!

Frostbitten February

This February has been my most successful time for ice fishing.  I recently did an ice fishing derby on Park Lake in Bath Twp., Michigan with my friend, Logan.  Together, we caught more than 60 fish!  On Park Lake, if you fish about 75 feet closer to shore from where everyone else is fishing, you seem to have more success.  In my opinion, even though you are closer to shore, you will catch more fish and will still have the same chance as everyone else to catch big crappie, bluegill and perch.

A week after the ice fishing derby, I headed out on a very windy day.  The first set of holes we drilled were in water that was too shallow and that didn't have enough weeds to make me interested.  Our next spot, however, in about 10 feet of water, got me very excited.  As soon as my dad finished drilling the first hole, I dropped in a Northland buckshot rattlespoon and quickly caught a nice bluegill.  That fish was to set the score for the day!  Throughout my time on the lake, we had constant action with some pretty big bluegills. One of the bluegill was pushing eight inches, which is large for Park Lake.  All together, I caught 20 fish during this trip.

Something that I have found this year that has greatly increased my fishing percentages is the use of a spring bobber, that I attach to the end of my pole.  The spring bobber detects the subtlest of all bites from panfish, and shows you exactly when to set the hook.

The ice on Park Lake is 16 inches thick, but I can tell the days are getting longer, and I know it will soon be time to be thinking about the pike in the Looking Glass!

Whopper in the Winter

Usually, around this time of the year, I ask myself where the fish are, because I don't have good luck fishing on ice.  In 2014, I'm not just looking for fish under the hard water, I am catching them, too!

This ice season, we invested in a flip-over ice fishing shanty from Grand River Bait and Tackle in Lansing, my favorite bait shop.  The staff at Grand River Bait and Tackle are always very helpful and give me good information.  I encourage anyone in the Lansing area to give Grand River Bait and Tackle a try.  Our new shanty is a Shapell FX-200 and has a two-person bench and a built-in sled that makes it easy to travel with.

On January 25, we took the shanty on its second ice fishing expedition to Park Lake in Bath, Michigan.  We set up in a lot deeper water than we have in the past.  I picked my location by asking other ice fishermen if they knew of a good spot and if the fish were biting.  We got a lead from an angler who was just leaving, and, in a few minutes, I was catching bluegill.

Also this winter, I have been catching small perch, like the one below, at Park Lake.  I catch perch on a vertical tear drop with a wax worm, while I have been  using a double teardrop rig tipped with wax worms when I fish for bluegill.  I am very excited to have a shanty in my ice fishing arsenal and look forward to going out more this cold winter of 2014.

I sometimes like to share my nature pictures with Whopper in the Water readers.  During winter break, I was fortunate to be given permission to put up my trail camera at Fenner Nature Center in Lansing.  I was expecting to get pictures of deer, but this is what I got instead, a great big red fox!  My picture lead to a very interesting program on foxes put on by Fenner in late January.

On a Sunday afternoon

Although fishing at the Looking Glass has been slow the last few weeks, I still enjoy my time there.  This past Sunday, my dad and I went to our usual spots in the Looking Glass.  I didn't even see any fish for most of the day, although I did enjoy the sight of dad diving after my fishing pole when I had put it down.  There was a big pike on the end!  Unfortunately, this pike got off, but I did manage to catch a nice, 27-inch pike just a few minutes later.  My bait was a gold shiner.

But that was not the best part of the day.  When we first arrived at the park, we met a couple of 7th-grade fishermen who recognized me from my blog.  Later, a man walking through the park stopped to say hello and asked if I was Joseph.  He knew me from my blog, too.  We got to talking and he recommended a few areas for fishing:  behind Furstenau Elementary for pike, and by the Schavey Road bridge for suckers.  I was very glad to see that people read my blog and are able to use some of my fishing tips and the advice I share.

Whopper in the River

This past Saturday, I went on a fishing trip with pro bass fisherman Chad Pipkens.  I got to go on the trip because my mom had the winning bid in an auction sponsored by the Brain Injury Association of Michigan.

I met Chad Pipkens on Saturday morning at the Lake Erie Metropark, where the Detroit River empties into Lake Erie.  We started off by loading our gear into his boat and then sailed over to a popular small mouth area in the middle of the Detroit River.  Before we could start fishing, Chad tied a drop-shot rig with a Poor Boys four-inch Erie darter.  He told me to cast into a rock pile he had saved on his fish finder.  As I was bouncing the rig along the bottom, I felt a tug on my pole and then set the hook.  My first fish of the day was a nice bass, and was bigger than any bass I had ever caught in the Grand or Looking Glass Rivers.

The next fish I reeled in was a nice, 20-inch walleye.  He was very hard to hold for a photo!

This was the first walleye I have ever reeled in.  Another first for me followed just a few minutes later, after we moved to a new location, when I caught a freshwater drum, or a sheepshead, as some people call it.

During the balance of the morning, I caught several other nice bass, ranging from 16 to 18 inches.

 That's Chad Pipkens with me in the photo on the right.

The sunny weather we had enjoyed for most of the morning was coming to an end and the clouds were moving in when we headed into an area off Grosse Ile with a gravel bottom.  I quickly cast straight into the gravel bottom with a Poor Boys Lake Erie darter.  On my third retrieve, something big hammered my bait.  I set the hook, and the fight was on.  I knew I either had a big small mouth on, or a fair-sized walleye.  After 30 seconds of battling this beast, I got my first glimpse of the fish.  A four-and-a-half pound small mouth was at the end of my line.

My dad quickly netted him, we took the hook out, and then we put the fish in the live well for a photo when we were back at the dock.

After we had some fun fishing for deeper-water small mouth, Chad suggested that we go after some shallow-water small mouth that he said would jump right out of the water.  We strapped our rods to the deck of the bass boat and moved over to a shallow area.  Before I could start fishing, I needed to use a more-weedless lure.  Chad suggested that I use a fluke, while he used a lipless crank bait.  After casting for about 10 minutes, I thought I was caught up in weeds, but, in reality, a foot-long perch had grabbed my fluke, and, within a few seconds, I was reeling him in.  I barely knew he was hooked, and was surprised to see such a nice perch on my line.  I was also pleased to see how many nice fish inhabit the Detroit River, from big small mouth, to walleye, to freshwater drum, and even jumbo perch.

I really enjoyed fishing with Chad Pipkens, and hope I get the chance to fish again with such a great angler!

No fish were harmed in the making of this blog!

Pike Hat Trick

Labor Day Weekend was a great time for pike fishing.  It was the last week of summer for pike fishing, but it was also the best time I have ever had.  It all started in the first fifteen minutes of Labor Day afternoon, when my dad spotted a smaller pike near a brush pile in the Looking Glass River in Clinton County.  I quickly cast a gold shiner on a sinker rig and hoped for the best.  At first, my dad and I thought the pike was one of those spoon-fed pike, but slowly and surely the pike decided to take the minnow.  When I tried to set the hook, the hook and the minnow flew out of its mouth and landed near the riverbank.  But the pike took the minnow again, and the fight was on! The fish swam toward the brush pile and tried to snap my line, but my dad was too quick.  He scooped the pike up with our net and landed him on the shore.  When I was measuring the pike, he made a quick move, and smacked me in the face with his tail!  The pike was 27 inches long.

After we released this first pike, we walked upstream a few hundred feet and spotted a monster pike minding his own business in the bottom of a hole.  On another sinker rig, I put on the biggest gold shiner I had and tossed it out to him.  At first, he just looked at it and didn't pay much attention, but then in one quick move, he used his gigantic mouth to suck in the minnow!  This pike was like having a moving rock on my line.  Even though my reel was on full drag, he pulled my line halfway across DeWitt and then turned around and came back.  I finally fought this beast close enough to where my dad could try to net him.  After several attempts, we landed the pike, but my net actually bent under the weight of this huge fish!  I was astonished to look at the end of the tape measure and see that this pike was 41 inches long.  My dad and I estimated it at 18 or 19 pounds.  Without a doubt, this was my biggest fish ever!

To wrap up this great day of pike fishing,we walked downstream to a spot under the Bridge Street bridge in DeWitt.  When we arrived, I noticed that there were many people fishing, and I wondered if all the fish might have been caught.  But then, with a 5/0 hook and one of my trusty gold shiners from Grand River Bait and Tackle, I cast out under the middle of the bridge.  First, I caught a nice, 12-inch small mouth bass.  After I unhooked him and let him go, I put another gold shiner on my line and cast back to the same spot.  All of the sudden, my dad shouted "The bobber's gone down!"  I raced to the poll and set the hook.  Before I knew it, I was reeling in a nice, 28-inch pike.  He made great runs and even tried to break my line in a brush pile, but with my dad's help with the net, I was able to bring the fish in.  When I set the pike on the grass, I attracted a crowd of people who were surprised to see such a big fish..  Some of them asked if they could even take my picture with the pike!  I quickly measured him and let him go where I caught him.  Labor Day 2013 was truly a great day of pike fishing!

The Fish of Summer

 It has been a great summer of fishing on the Looking Glass River here in Clinton County, Michigan.  This year, many bass have found my pike minnows irresistible  Most times, small mouth bass beat the pike to my minnow.  The bass I have been catching have been 12 to 14 inches.  They are not huge bass, but are fun to catch.

Although I have not caught as many pike this summer as in past years, I think the pike are more aggressive.  I have had many exciting takes where pike have jetted as fast as they could to take my artificial or live bait.  I still think there was a summer die-off of pike in the hot summer of 2012 that affected the population, as the pike don't seem as plentiful as they were in the last few years.

While I think there are fewer pike, I enjoy watching wildlife along the Looking Glass and I always bring a camera to take pictures.  This is a shot of an Eastern Garter Snake basking in a tree in the Riverfront Park in downtown DeWitt.  Anyone who decides to hike along the Looking Glass has a chance to see Blue Herons, snapping turtles, map turtles, painted turtles, muskrats, mink, white tail deer and their fawns and wild turkeys.