Frustrations Abound

Posted by MNAngler On August - 6 - 2009

Date: 7/30/2009
Time: 6:00-9:00pm
Body of water: Orchard Lake
Location: Burnsville, MN
Weather Conditions: Scattered clouds, light rain, wind from the West, thunderhead went by before getting on the lake

Matt and I went out last week and had a frustrating run. We went out to Orchard Lake and fished toward the reeds in the middle of the lake. I was casting with a white pearl super fluke and Matt was using a small spinner with small treble hooks.

We got to the Northwest side of the reeds and were seeing tons of baitfish. They were being scared out of the water by something. Every once in a while we would see splashes as if shotgun shot hit the water. We kept casting into it, but with no luck. I tried white pearl and bubble gum flukes, green spinnerbait, and orange/brown spinnerbait. Matt used his little spinner, a yellow/white spinnerbait, and rattling Rapala.

We decided to head for another reed island. I cast with a Rebel crayfish since it was deeper on the way and with no cabbage. An ominous cloud had been approaching us for more than an hour, and started sprinkling on us about this time. It ended up lightly raining on us for only 10 minutes before the cloud completely broke up. The fish still weren’t biting.

We decided we would try near some docks on the North shore of the lake and follow the shore around to the boat landing. I had a white pearl super fluke and split shot 10 inches in front of it. I cast it into the weeds between the last dock and the neighbor and hooked a weed. I pulled it and it let loose, but still felt like there were weeds on my line. I was reeling and pulling the line toward the boat until about 10 ft from the boat, there was a SPLASH. I got the glimpse of a thrashing fish and then my line broke. My whole rig was gone including the split shot. We figured it was a muskie whose teeth snapped the line in the thrash.

I put a steel leader on this time with a white pearl super fluke, but without the split shot. From the last dock, there are weeds until it gets to a peninsula. We followed the underwater weedline and got a couple of hits about halfway to the next residence. Matt got two hits on his small spinner and treble hook, but always pulled up weeds. I got one good hit on my fluke where my drag shrieked, but couldn’t get a good hook set. That one felt like a bass.

We came to the peninsula and I cast parallel to shore, again into some weeds. Got hung up again, but when I got my lure back to the boat, there were bite marks on my fluke. I guess I have to be on the mindset that there are no weed hang ups in this lake.

We followed the shore all the way back to the boat landing. Matt said he saw a huge bass follow his yellow/white spinnerbait in front of the last docks before the boat landing, but turned when he saw the boat. We turned back and tried to cast for it, but we never saw it again. I got one last hit just before going into the boat landing, but couldn’t hook it.

Overall a very frustrating outing. I had four known hits, Matt had a lot more, but we couldn’t pull any of them in. The lake was full of milfoil, but we saw weed harvester on shore. Hopefully, next time we’re out, there won’t be as many weeds and we can get closer to shore.

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