We were now 2 ½ days into our annual summer Canadian musky trip, and the action was as hot as the weather. Sweltering heat and high humidity aren’t always a welcomed sight to the outdoorsman, but it sure seemed to be a positive on this particular trip. Follows, strikes, blow-ups, thrashes, boils, and catches! We had already boated five fish, and had numerous other encounters as I idled the boat down to hit another yet spot. I was totally convinced that we were about to have a great week of action, if the present weather continued. The muskies were certainly agreeing with me up to this point.
However, as I approached the island cluster, I thought to myself -- this spot is still yet, unproven. In other words, I had never actually caught a good musky from this spot, but it had that look. It has always been my contention that a lot of spots that “look good” don’t produce simply because we don’t hit them during good times. Think about it, we spend the majority of our time during peak fishing hours on our best spots. This results in a self fullfilling prophecy more often than not. Spend a lot of quality time on a quality spot and you’ll usually score. However, it’s just as important to hit an unproven spot during good conditions. If it doesn’t produce at that point, then it’s time to maybe check it off the list.
Admittedly, when a spot produces in less-than-ideal conditions, it’s probably an exceptional one, and it generally gets even better when the conditions improve. Proven spots, that produce fish in all conditions time and time again, get hit harder and more frequently. Consequently expectations are fulfilled often enough that they become entrenched as “high confidence” areas. The angler begins to rely on these spots to produce when all else fails, and hits them at multiple times of the day. Then, when the spot produces yet another musky, the angler is further convinced that this spot is simply better than the rest.
But this is not always an accurate depiction. As we return to my opening story — understand we were about to fish another one of those spots that “looked good”, but had never actually produced big results. Since my partner on this trip, Tim Semman, had never fished this lake before, I was under no pressure to just “milk run” the hotspots. Instead, I was going to try them all, mixing in proven and unproven. This upcoming spot was definitely an “unproven”.
A warm southwesterly breeze sent big waves crashing into the partially exposed rocks that dotted the entrance to the small weed pocket behind it. Three rock islands protected these weeds from heavy wind/wave action, making it fishable with topwater lures in virtually any conditions. I’ve always thought that spots like this one are extra special because they receive intense solar heat no matter how hard the wind is blowing, nor what the actual air temperature. If the sun is not obscured by clouds, it’s a sure bet that the water in this small weed pocket will be warmer. The high banks and land mass of the island cluster reduced chilling winds and retarded water mixing wave action. Yet, the spot hadn’t produced much other than pike before this attempt.
I began by casting a personal favorite TopRaider that had produced many fish on this lake in the past. However, the cabbage weed tops were unusually thick on this trip, and emergent making it difficult to run the lure through without fouling weeds on the belly hook. After several fruitless attempts, I decided to detach the belly hook and run the lure with just the trailing treble. When I originally designed the TopRaider, I had just this situation/modification in mind. Therefore, we purposely built a counter-balancing internal weight inside the “TR”, so it could actually be fished belly hookless overtop thick weed slop.
Sure enough, I had no trouble working that lure through the thickest slop now. After a few successful retrievals over thick weed clumps, I found myself reaching out with gutsy casts that made the TR travel through some sections of weed slop I’d never fished before. That TR was now traveling across everything, and still sounding great and tracking like an arrow. Behind me, Tim was following up with a variety of other lures including bucktails, spinnerbaits and a prototype Super TopRaider.
About ten casts later, the belly hookless TR was just clearing past one of the thickest inside weed clumps when a huge bulge appeared from about 10 feet to the right of the lure. As if it were a launched torpedo, the bulge closed the distance in seconds, exploding on impact. The water eruption triggered an almost involuntary reactionary hookset from me as well. Unfortunately, my lure went flying through the air, hookless and fishless.
Tim ceased the opportunity firing a cast toward the explosion with a Super TopRaider prototype. As I fumbled with my tackle, desperately trying to regain composure, a second eruption occurred as the fish made a short swipe at the twin-prop model. Moments later, the fish followed up with a third attempt that connected solidly, engulfing the entire lure, and the battle was on!
The fish sounded with the classic power and authority of a big musky pulling line from a snug drag, and doubling Tim’s stiff action 6 ½ foot St. Croix. The tussle tore up loads of weeds as Tim’s taut braided line lawn-mowed while the big fish carried the battle through the weed slop. When the fish finally neared, I could clearly see a musky in the 50 inch class as it passed under the boat. All at once, the fish suddenly tired, surfaced for a few seconds in that all to familiar possum pause, before bolting down on yet another power run. On the third “possum pause”, I quickly encased the fish in a giant Frabill PowerCatch Net and the battle was over.
Even though I didn’t personally catch this fish, I must admit this was one of the most exciting encounters with a big musky that I’d ever experienced. For one, this was a rare “hot fish” that struck multiple times before connecting. Rarely do any of us get more than one opportunity, when a big fish decides to strike. It appeared that this particular fish was obsessed with striking until it was successful at pouncing on what ever the prey was. Secondly, the belly hookless TR was not initially successful, but it did indeed draw out the big fish from extra heavy emergent cover. I sincerely doubt that we would have even put a cast over this fish with a more conventional approach. It was only because I fired a cast way back into the thickest weed slop that we were able to draw this fish out into the open. We actually cranked this fish up by buzzing these lures over top.
Thirdly, we had finally scored from a spot that I had hunched was good, but was never able to actually confirm until this incident. From this point on, this spot is no longer an “unproven”. It will now be fished with an entirely different attitude going in. This factor, is precisely what I’m trying to point out in this article. You have to be willing to try good looking areas again and again. If you have a strong vibe about a spot, keep checking it under all kinds of conditions. In the end, it just might take something a bit unusual, like a belly hookless TR to do the job.
In this instance, we found out that the fish prefer to hang way back inside the slop in this particular spot. We had never fished this spot in this manner before, and therefore never uncovered the secret of the spot. As you learn any body of water more intimately, you eventually discover such nuances. Some like to call this discovering the “spot on the spot”. While I don’t disagree with this terminology, I think it goes a step further.
You end up learning what lures are most productive on this spot. Heck, we still might not have taken a musky from this good looking spot if I hadn’t fired a few bomb casts way back into the backside of the slop. That belly hookless TopRaider exposed the secret of this spot, and what lure was most apt to trigger a response. In this case, the response was incredibly aggressive. Only time will tell if we can duplicate these results, but I can tell you from experience that this is how it starts, and I’ll bet that we do duplicate it down the road.
Such successful encounters also reveal what sections on this spot the fish prefer. This is the “spot on the spot” part of the equation. What you’re going to find in many instances is that various sections of a good spot turn on under different circumstances. For example, if the spot is exposed to wind and wave action, it might take a certain wind direction to trigger action on that spot. I have seen this occur more than any other factor. As many of you that have read any of my material over the years know already, I firmly believe that muskies are very sensitive to wind direction and the sometimes subtle current advantages that are created.
I have always contented that active muskies, like all big fish predators, face into the current; no matter how subtle. When there’s wave action pounding into a spot, I’ve witnessed more often than not, an active musky moving up current to the head of that particular cover area. It matters little whether this is a weed bed, a rock, or a fallen tree. When the fish becomes active, it faces into the wind and positions itself on the frontside. This is important to note when deciphering a large area. It virtually eliminates the rest of the area. In other words, if you don’t encounter a fish on the upwind side of a spot, odds are that the rest of the spot is less likely to produce anything, as well.
Experience has also shown that calm spots provide a far more unpredictable scenario. Current is no longer a factor, and quite often muskies will position themselves up inside the cover more, and can be facing in almost any direction. This is precisely what Tim and I ran into with our opening story fish. A lack of wave action and wind induced current resulted in this being a non-factor. Consequently, true to form, the musky was up inside the slop more. In this case, however, it was way up inside the slop.
Mike Novak, better known as The Sasquatch in musky circles, and I found such a spot idiosyncracies secret a few years back that was very similar. Since I was running the trolling motor and trying to place casts that consistently fell inside the camera vector of our stationary video unit, I opted to fish somewhat parallel from 10 to 12 o’clock with all my casts. This gave me the weed edge, but did not allow me to make any throws up into the slop. Sasquatch agreed to do just the opposite – making more perpendicular casts overtop the slop working the pockets and thick stuff that I couldn’t reach.
In one particular dead calm evening instance, ‘Squatch (the shortened nickname version of Sasquatch) fired a long bomb way back into the “goober”, and began buzzin’ his TR through a small open water pocket when a monster boil inhaled his bait. ‘Squatch shook the boat with a weight lifter hookset that sent weeds flying everywhere. I grabbed the camera and started recording the action. It took quite a while, but over time he worked the behemoth out of the slop and into the clear. Again, thankfully the fish was hooked well, which made this all possible. Eventually, he netted a fish so big it barely fit into my big Frabill PowerCatch.
However, as many of you now know, this scene took a very unexpected turn and became one of my most famous TV episodes of all time. After unhooking the fish in the net, ‘Squatch decided to lift the monster out of the net for the TV camera and some photos before releasing it, only he got a bit premature on the release ---- As Mike began lifting the fish up, it made an unexpected violent twist breaking free of The Squatch Grip, falling overboard, and swimming away. Helpless, Sasquatch stood there in utter shock over the sudden disappearance of his trophy. No photos, no victory pose, but now a famous episode we have since titled – “Drop Squatch”.
One of the big positives from this incident was the discover of how often big muskies go way back inside the slop during calm conditions. Since then, this has become one of our best spot idiosyncracies secrets. Whenever we see calm winds, we know that a big one could be anywhere in that weed bed including way back in the “goober”.
I’ve spent probably too much time talking about slop muskies in particular, in order to illustrate the point, but I think you get the idea. The same kind of general observations should be made about a spot no matter what the depth or cover present. The same holds true for areas with out cover; most notably suspended fish. There will be locational preferences, even in open water, according to conditions. The might also occur vertically more than horizontally depending upon the season.
For example, in the later fall, I have seen hard bottom oriented muskies suddenly move up, vertically, when a burst of Indian Summer arrives. Bottom bouncing presentations such as crankbait trolling, jigging or sucker trailing suddenly go dead. Open water trolling with high riding crankbaits suddenly turns on. The exact opposite quite often occurs when an Arctic Clipper moves through plummeting both air and water temps. The vertical movement again occurs, but it does down instead of up. High riding cranks now draw a blank, and sucker fishermen start to score again.
This same vertical movement can often occur before and after cold fronts on any given spot no matter what the season. Less active fish will generally be bottom tight and hunkered tighter to cover. When these fish become more active as conditions improve, they often simply go vertical – moving upwards in that same cover. That’s why it is important to keep checking good spots at multiple times of the day, and as conditions change. Also, these spots need to be checked with various lures depending upon the conditions. High riding active fish are much more apt to tackle a topwater plug, twitched minnow bait, or bucktail. Low-riders need a deep diving crankbait, a jig, or weighted livebait.
The main thing to remember, on any trip, is to play out your hunches. Of course, you want to always rely on proven spots with proven baits when the chips are down. This provides the confidence fish you need to keep going. But, don’t neglect trying those other spots that look good, but have yet to produce. Sometimes it takes a weird set of circumstances in order for it all to come together, but as you can see by a few of the stories you just read, strange things can happen that lead to successful outings. Just remember to hold on to a musky with both hands if you’re going to pose for a photograph with it!