Craziness---Big Winds...Big Bait

The last few weeks have been challenging to say the least. Huge winds never make things easy, but the way warmer than normal water temperatures have make things tough...real tough. While water staying warm is good in the spring time, its not so good in the fall. The fish that have made it into the boat have made up for the lack of quantity.  I've been doing this long enough to know that its just a matter of a week before these fish really take off. The fish and bait are starting to stack up, so hold on, its coming.

It makes you a little uncomfortable to see the big ships stacked outside major ports because of the big winds blowing all of the water out of the rivers and bays!

These are just a few of the bait fish that a couple giant eyes spit up last week.  A educated guess is that the larger ones are either small white bass or gizzard shad.  The smaller ones look like medium sized smelt.  Hard to say for sure though...pretty rough shape.

Stay posted...we will be on more giants shortly

Capt. Ross Robertson

Fall Gorilla Walleye

The fall bite has started.  The unusual weather has made for unusual fishing.  Much warmer water than normal has the fish spread all the way from just a few feet below the surface to right on bottom.  Yesterday I caught a fish only a few feet below the surface to as deep as forty feet on the same day. Burning Reef Runners in white based patterns has been one of the few consistent variables. Quantity has been tough to come by the last few days...but the quality has made up for it!!!

This was a giant caught Monday while filming an episode of the Local Catch

Capt. Ross Robertson
www.bigwaterfishing.com

Time flies...but big fish don't

A couple months ago I was writing a few magazine pieces about ice fishing in order to hit the July deadline, all while starring at a thermometer that read nearly 100 degrees! I must be getting old, because time seems to be flying.  In a few weeks I'm getting ready to leave the house for my fall trips on Erie.  Literally one of the best times to fish out here, very few people and a bunch of really big fish. 

After checking the mail a few hours ago I was shocked to already see the Oct issue of FLW's Walleye magazine.  It has a article I did on fall night fishing for walleyes.  It must be time! Seriously...Am I the only one that struggles with getting ice fishing equipment prepped in 100 degree heat and Spinner rigs tied when there is ice hanging from the gutters.

A few other really big projects have consumed a bunch of my time (you'll hear shortly), but I'm ready to ditch the computer and paperwork for a couple month bender of crankbaits and slob walleyes.  Got a handful of dates open if you'd like to partake.

Ross Robertson
www.bigwaterfishing.com

Walleye Limits and a lil Press

This last week we had limits daily, some coming in the first pass.  That's not to say that we didn't have to work for them. The long runs and rough water took a few days off my life expectancy.  The programs have varied from divers, to down rods, to heavy in-lines on boards.  Seems like these walleyes make up their minds like you know who guys...smirk! When you're over fish make sure to switch it up a lot. Speed changes, varying the presentations as previously mentioned, and of course the colors has all been necessary to keep the lines tight.

Here is a pic of an article that Matt Markey did on some big ones we caught fishing the Eastern Basin of Erie near the town of Erie, PA.

It won't be long before the fall bite is upon us...just saying

Ross Robertson
www.bigwaterfishing.com

Canadian Panty Raid

That was the proposed title of the article Steve Pollick wrote for Outdoor News after spending a day on the lake with me. Instead, it ended up as a line in the intro, still makes me smirk.  "Panty Raid" because we caught almost everyone of our fish on Silver Streak Pink Panties, Anti-freeze panties, and pretty panties...no lie. It's on the shelves now...good read. The action was as fast as we could move lines, had about 13 in the first 45 minutes.  Funny thing was that we slide off the contour breaklines and literally caught nothing.  If we would have stayed on the contours the whole time it could have gotten really ugly. It is truly amazing how many different species of fish relate to them in a wide variety of lakes and rivers.

With the recent cool own in most of the Midwest, look for fall patterns to start sooner than you think

Capt. Ross Robertson
www.bigwaterfishing.com

Road Trip Continues

Loaded up the rig and headed over to Lake Michigan to chase some King Salmon.  The heat and "slower" walleye action of late summer typically means big kings relatively close to shore and cooler temps up north. While the action wasn't as fast as it had been the previous couple of weeks, we did manage to fill some coolers with salmon that averaged 16-20lbs, with a couple dinks removed.  No real hot ticket, as fish were caught on riggers, boards and copper, and both braid and wire divers. Caught a few on plugs and one or two on flys, but they primarily wanted big spoons.  Testing out some new and newer patterns of Silver Streak magnums seemed to be the ticket. Anyone that hasn't used Silver Streak's UV spoons are really missing out, amazing to see how many times they actually outperform glow lures in low light conditions.

The water was so warm that using a Fish Hawk temperature and speed probe really made a huge difference.  It was amazing to see how warm the water was for lake Michigan.  At one point we had nearly a twenty degree temp change at the same depth, instead of the typical horizontal thermocline.  Shocker, the kings were sitting in the cooler water pockets gorging on smelt.

Capt. Ross Robertson
www.bigwaterfishing.com

ROAD TRIP

Sometimes we forget that Lake Erie is so big that a road trip is required just to get to where the big ones have traveled.  I jumped in the truck to meet up with my longtime fishing buddy Bob Henton and Field and Stream fishing editor Joe Cermele.  To say that we had a good time is an understatement. The first fish to make it into the boat was over 30'' and 10lbs. Fishing the deep waters of Pennsylvania meant using a combination of heavy snap weights, Dipsy Divers, and in-line weights... with both spinners and cranks. Cranks ruled early, with spinners dominating after the wind layed down and sun shined bright.

The day will run as an episode of "Hook Shots" on Field and Streams site in a few weeks.  The episode will make you cry with laughter...we were busting on each other all day.

Ross Robertson
www.bigwaterfishing.com