We were hit with record high temperatures and calm winds during most of our time here, but we still managed to catch 3 over 5 pounds and enough smaller fish to keep it interesting. Caught them on a variety of lures, the 3 big ones came on a swimjig, spinnerbait and flipping a craw. We also caught them on dragging around a worm, a jerkbait, and a chatterbait.
Crazy Insect Hatch
Almost every piece a emergent vegetation was covered with midges, all this life at the bottom of the food chain is probably why the bass were so fat and healthy
We always start are trips with a day of fishing from shore after an all night flight from Seattle to Fort Lauderdale, after a 2 hour flight from Ketchikan to Seattle. Sometimes we actually fight through the sleep deprivation enough to catch something, this time we did better than normal.
10 Days on Lake Okeechobee
Though they area we fished on this giant lake was pretty small fishing was really good and we caught 21 over 5 pounds including a couple 7s and a handful of 6s, plus countless others smaller than those, it was a blast. Most of the fish we caught were on crankbaits but we also caught them on spinnerbaits, buzzbaits, propbaits, worms, spooks, swimjigs and chatterbaits.
Stuffing the semi stray marina cat named Cat with treats twice a day was probably responsible for our good luck
I also picked up the 7 cameras I set on our first trip, they did really well. Here is some of the footage from the 4 I had set to record videos.
We finished the trip with 3 days on Lake Istokpoga, caught some nice ones there too, will be posting more about that next.
After flying all night from Ketchikan Alaska to Fort Lauderdale Florida we hit a few shore fishing spots before checking into the resort but only managed to catch a few bowfin. The next 2 days were real windy but we had pretty good fishing in one of Lake Okeechobee’s canals until the wind blew in a bunch of muddy water from the main lake.
The next few days were too nice, record heat and no wind which made for tough fishing but good for photography, I will be posting a bunch of scenic and wildlife photos next after I sort through them.
Our last few days were almost perfect, for fishing, the wind finally picked up and so did the action. We caught a bunch of fish throwing shallow running crankbaits and a few on spinnerbaits and swimjigs.
This year I set 7 trailcams along the banks of the canal we fished the first few days and will pick them up in March when we go back for another 2 weeks of abusing bass in the Big O. I forgot to take a photographic waypoint of one of the locations but that camera is behind the bushes in the first photo. I expect to get pictures and videos of rutting raccoons, possums, armadillos, marsh rabbits, wild pigs, whitetail deer, and bobcats if all goes well.
Joe's Trailcams 