We had planned to end our week on the Gunflint Trail on Saturday afternoon. I had one more opportunity to wet a line before we left, so I took full advantage of it.
I headed out to Kloek Channel and I started with a green texas-rigged worm. On one of the retrieves I had a follow that tried to hit the worm just as it was coming to the boat. It made a splash, but missed the lure. It looked to be about a 14-incher.
On the next cast, I did get hit and it was a small smallie at 10″.
After action slowed on the green worm, I switched to a black shakey worm rigged wacky style. On a cast with that, I set the hook on what could have been a rock, but felt softer than what I would expect a rock to feel like. Sure enough, it started moving. It turned out to be this nice 13″ smallie.
Working the north shore, one of my casts started moving very quickly to the left. I looked for my worm and saw it moving to the left rapidly as well. I tried to set the hook, but I must have jerked the hook right out of the bandit’s mouth because only the worm came at me. That taught me to make sure I set the hook up with wacky rigs instead of swiping like I tend to do with texas-rigged baits. That lesson paid off later (post to come).
Looking at the week’s tally (below), it turned out to be a pretty good week. Fourteen fish in all including two for the BP Minnesocold Bass Derby bag. Those of you that have been paying attention may notice that a northern showed up in my tally. I remembered catching it under the dock at Kloek Island, but can’t remember which day it was. It was caught on a white super fluke.
A week on the Gunflint Trail is always fun, but tiring. There’s talk about returning there for a long weekend this fall. If so, you’ll of course hear all about it.
Week tally:
MNAngler: Smallmouth bass: 11, Walleye: 2, Northern: 1
George: Smallmouth bass: 1, Walleye: 1, Northern: 1
Ken: Walleye: 1, Northern: 1
