"The charm of fishing is that it is the pursuit of what is elusive but attainable, a perpetual series of occasions for hope." John Buchan

Sunday, May 18, 2014

May 15th Trip to Willard in the Tubes

So as our opening trip of the year on the tubes Jason and I picked Willard Bay to see if we could get in on some of the action others had been reporting.  We got up there and setup and on the water just before 7am at the south marina.  We had been planning on the north marina but a bit of intel suggested south might offer some good activity.  I still consider myself a novice when it comes to Willard so any guidance I can get is more then welcome.


Weather was looking great and the water was calm and glassy.  So we kicked out and started to pitch plastics as we worked out into the channel before heading out to the main lake.  We didn't get any response to the plastics nor to the cat rigs we were dragging as well while we moved out.  Water is lower then my previous trips and temps were in the mid 50's at launch.  Once on the main lake we got a surprise look at the number of boats that were out there.  For a Thursday there sure were a lot of people that SHOULD have been at work...  Nobody really every bothered us, nor did they really get near us (though maybe they knew something we didn't).  We moved down the shoreline toward the feed lots.  We had to stay pretty far out from the shore line to get into a depth greater then about 8'.



I was a bit further down the shoreline on the way to the feed lot when I managed the first fish of the day for use, a nice cat.  Never measured it but it looked close to 20" long.


Not that much later Jason landed the first wiper.  I was a bit off so the picture leaves a lot to be desired.



We had a breeze come up just enough to put a light ripple on the water but things stayed pretty darn mellow for the day.




Some time just before noon we started to head back toward the marina.  Jason had 2 wipers in his basket at this time and I still just had the 1 cat.  While approaching the marina Jason brought in his 3rd wiper to fill his limit.  He then tried to focus on adding a cat to his basket.  I was able to add my first wiper to my basket a bit later.


We ended up drifting down past the marina seeing if we would get anything more as we approached 2pm and when nothing much more happened we headed back in.  While cleaning up a fellow fisherman stopped over to see how our day had gone and reported that he had dome quite well trolling over on the west side and south side of the lake.  He noted that the crappie were out along the south end too.  Some food for thought for a future trip but it also fit with where we saw all the boats too.  Where we went didn't seem to attract many people and maybe for good reasons.  This also got me thinking about a map I saw posted that gives some details of the bay: Willard Bay Map

Well that's it for now.  Was a very nice day to be out for sure.  BTW Water temps got up to the low 60's before we got off the water.

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