Jim K: Rufus Woods/Banks Lake - 4/22

I arrived at Rufus Woods with my friend Tim this AM after listening to recent reports of good fishing from fellow SWC members.  Professional fisherman Allan W. who’s had this place pegged the last few weeks commented from the ramp that current was noticeably less than his recent trips.  Still was enough flow to warrant hunting the eddies as main river features were still blown out.  We also had a bit of a weather change from recent days as today was starting bright and sunny.  Precise boat and line control was key to fishing eddies along the banks.  Some eddies were not much larger than our boat with the rocky shoreline less than a rod length from one side of the boat and full rushing current just off the other side of the boat.  Perhaps hunting such smaller eddies along with larger ones was a possible explanation to our success on the trout.  Six trout were caught averaging about 20”.  Our lone walleye was caught right next to shore in a bit of a bigger eddy that had more of a flat to it.  It was 21” and fought like a strong river fish should.  We were fishing jigs tipped with a variety of plastics.  After cleaning them back at the ramp the trout were all gorged on small crayfish, and the walleye had a dozen sculpins about 3” long in it’s stomach.  When vertical fishing in such current it was imperative to not let our jigs drag at all by the current.  If we did, our jigs would quickly get hung up.  One needs to slow down their drop as you anticipate your jig reaching bottom then drop your jig foot by foot until you feel bottom.  It is surprising how quickly a large bow in your line can develop after your jig hits bottom without noticing it if dropping your lure too fast when in strong current… even while trying to fish the “slack water” in the exact current seam your line would do crazy things on Rufus.  I was using 1/2 to 5/8 oz jigs.

About mid day we talked with Allan and he was still struggling to find any walleye, so we made the decision to move to Banks lake, partially because my fishing partner Tim had never been on the lake before.  We put in at Steamboat, and scouted / fished Kruk’s, Devil’s Punchbowl, Barkers, Poplar and south end of Steamboat.  We rarely found any fish on electronics and where we did failed to trigger any response with a variety of spinners pulled behind bottom bouncers.  Hunted at a variety of depths.