Bass opener and the week that followed...(lots of pics)

[WatterBoy]

Well, it finally arrived...bass opener here in MN was a week ago Saturday, May 26. My wife, Kaye, and I were fortunate enough to be able to spend 8+ days up at our cabin on the lake, and we did a fair amount of fishing. The first few days were almost exclusively "kid fishing" since we were hosting my brother and his family, along with my sister and her family, through the Memorial Day holiday. After that we were able to do some more serious adult fishing for the rest of the week. The weather was PERFECT for almost the entire week, with just one morning being a rainout.

Alex (11) - He caught the first bass of his life on the morning of bass opener. He and I went out together in the boat at 6:00 a.m. He kept me so busy taking fish off his hook, taking his picture with them, re-rigging his zoomie, etc. (and trying to teach him as much of that stuff as I could) that he caught 13 fish to my 4!


Ryan (8) - Alex's younger brother...he also caught his first bass ever when I took him out with me on Saturday evening. I didn't fish at all, just tried to teach him the ropes. I did most of the casting for him, and after helping him with the first couple of hook sets, he did everything else after that and was very pleased to catch 8 fish altogether.


Their sister, Christine (14), continued her Smallmouth-slaying from last year...


My brother (dad of the above 3), Lyle, with the first bass of his life. He hadn't fished since high school, and didn't do much of it way back then, but when they arrived on Friday night, he announced he was going to buy a license if I would teach him how to bass fish...COOL!


My sister's oldest son, Adam (13), outfished me 3 to 1 during a brief outing he and I made on Sunday. He was pleased to catch the first Northern Pike of his life, and also his first Smallmouth on this particular lake.


My sister's daughter, Julia (8), caught a couple fish during a "girls outing" that I was the boat captain for...


I didn't fish much during the aforementioned girls' outing, but one of my casts during that trip yielded this super-chunky 3lb 3oz, 16.25" LM while using a wacky-rigged 5" senko.


My biggest fish of the week was a 3lb 15oz, 18.0" Smallie, caught on "opener" morning by a dock right across from our property in the no wake channel that we're on...less than 100 yards from our dock!


Kaye and I landed identical 3lb 4oz LM during one of our evening outings during the week after our guests had left. Hers was on a 5" wacky-rigged senko using a dropshot and mine was on a zoomie.



My biggest LM of the week came on a trip with my fishing buddy, Jeff. Mine, which came on a jig 'n pig (thanks, Kory!), is 3lb 6oz, Jeff's is 2lb 13oz:


Here is the first hint of sunrise (taken at 4:30 a.m.!) on my last fishing outing of the week, the SECOND Saturday that we were up there...


Shortly after sunrise that morning, I landed my best fish of the morning, a 3lb 2oz LM...shown here with a 2lb 8oz LM that I caught later, plus Jeff with two that went 2lb 12oz and 2lb 7oz.


All told, we caught and released 186 fish (kept none), including 98 Largemouth and 19 Smallmouth, with 6 of the bass being over 3 pounds. That gets us off to a good start for the season considering last year's numbers for opener week were 105 fish, 70 LM, 2 SM, and only 1 bass over 3 pounds.

Oh, and just to make this an even longer post, here are a couple of loon shots. Some of them were still on their nests, while others already had little loon chicks bobbing alongside them in the water...