Cold Water Crankin

With frost on the gunnel and a bone chilling breeze, we had decided to give the lake a try for some ample toothed fish. That being pickerel and pike. The weather had given us a chance to catch a mild day in February. Last April we were able to capitalize on these species of fish with a good catch of a dozen or so and each of us catching a hefty size fish in the mix. Although the other anglers on the lake we anxious to bag large mouths, we were perfectly content with our toothy friends. The adventure started on point that comes out toward the center of the lake. It has a shallow section comprised of rocky ledges that step down deeper like a pair of stairs.

This was the first freshwater fishing trip for me in years, so catching a tree or two from overcasting may have occurred. We worked the shoreline with our crank baits and eventually got a few bites. We decided to make another pass but a bit further away from the shoreline. By doing so, our crank baits would come across the first rock ledge and then come right over the deeper ledge step. Bingo bango. We fished this for the better part of an hour pulling our pickerel right and left. Other boats would cruise by saying we only caught a few pikes, like it was a bad thing. We couldn't disagree more, the fish were following our baits clear up to the boat and striking. The splashes were hitting us in the face even though the water felt like ice.

When felt as though we had fished the spot out, we moved on to some deeper coves on the far side of the lake. Changing up to some deeper diving cranks and putting on some brighter colors. Again it wasn't long that we pulled in a few nice pikes. This was a treat for me, being that I never caught pike or pickerel before in my life. They would put up a great fight and struck our lures like freight trains.

We decided to try one more spot before returning to shore to boast our fun. It was a shallow shoreline covered with cat tails and broken off stumps. We switched back to lip less crank baits and gave it our best. My buddy was able to pull out a pike that what was a giant to us. It was awesome, it was an anglers dream to have such a day filled with strikes, bites, and pikes. Our trip today though was nothing of the sort. We beat shorelines with our baits, the rock ledges, and even our honey holes. The water temps were just too cold still to activate the fish. It still beats any day at work, even with some frozen snot on your face. Below are our catches from last April.