12/26/2014

Water Temp - 38 degrees
Air Temp - 48 degrees
Conditions - Sunny & Blue Bird Sky's & winds - 5-10 MPH

Christmas was exciting as usual - the kids woke up, unwrapped gifts, posed for pictures and were happy with what the FAT guy left under the tree.  My Christmas morning should have been December 26th.  Christmas is all about the kids and we wouldn't have it any other way.  However, the fishing GODS were offering a Merry Fishmas to me as well.

Ken Varilek and I met up at 6:00AM and headed for the main stem of the Susquehanna River.  The weather was perfect for late December.  Our only concern was reports of a local catching (1) fish just a week earlier.  You can't catch fish if you sit at home and read others' reports so we headed out to see how the smallies were feeling.

Let's just say the fish were willing to come on board and take a few pictures with us! Here is one of many BIG fish.  We landed 46 total smallies during today's trip.  This included Ken's 20th 20 inch fish of the year.  Ken landed 2 other 19's and I was able to pull in 3 19's myself.  The biggest coming in at 19.75.  There were 5 other boats on the water with us today.  Everyone seemed to be catching fish!  Not exactly sure how well the other guys did though.  We were too busy having a blast!

Sometimes pictures give away locations of fish being caught!  This place is no secret! However, you must still know what the fish are looking to feed on that day.  Today, fish were going for jerkbaits, tubes, spoons and swimbaits.

Early morning catch pictured above.  We knew it was going to be a good day!

Merry Christmas!

Happy New Year!

Notice Ken's celebratory cigar smoke! I do believe he lit this up after catching that 20 inch chunk!

This was the first fish brought in this morning.  It took about 5 minutes to catch a case of "stinky finger!" Hope you enjoyed today's post!  Wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

steeler

Cold Weather Line Sides

                                                                                                              Saturday, December 13, 2014

Air Temperatures - 38 degrees at 4:00 launch & 34 degrees at midnight
Water Temperatures - 39 to 40 degrees
Conditions - overcast and changing winds up to 10 mph - No moon!

This was just the 1st fish of many we pulled out of Beltzville tonight.  My wife asked why I never smile like this when we take pictures together?  My response: I put them back after taking a picture.  I'm keeping you forever!  Good comeback but she doesn't understand the adrenaline rush catching a 34 inch striper in 90 feet of water! 

Some may think we are crazy for launching at 4:00 PM on a chilly late fall day.  However, there were some extraordinary circumstances that caused this delay:

1. Chad's 15 year old cat decided to become a math teacher.  Apparently, he was teaching everyone in their household about the NUMBER 2.  I know ... bad joke!  Chad stepped in it and had to wash and dry his fishing sneakers before we could head out.

2. Chad pulled his usual "U-ee" upon arriving at my house.  Unfortunately, this time the curb decided to reach out and bite a hole in his tire.  Chad changed it in about 10 minutes so it wasn't that much of a delay.  Hope that new tire didn't cost too much buddy!

As you can see from the first picture, there's a GOOD reason we come out and brave the cold weather!  I had tears in my eyes most the night from the 10 MPH winds.  Even though I think they were more like 15-20 at times.  Here are some more pictures from our trip:

We landed a total of 6 line sides tonight.  4 of these fish were over 30 inches.  It was a great night! 

These guys were very energetic once pulled out of the water tonight!  I had fish stains everywhere.  Haha!

"Incidental Fish"  


It was a cold but eventful night on the lake.  The fish cooperated generously for our photo shoot.  The lake has risen about 5 feet from two weeks ago.  The steady rains and snow have helped!  Hopefully we can get back out a few more times before 2015 arrives.  Thanks for reading my blog.  Have a great night!

steeler