Pacemaker Fishing Forum

hit the new river saturday morning to a cool 35 degrees but a promise of sun.
we tossed tubes and jigs for a bit looking for smallies, but no dice.  we drift on down the river a bit and sam says, "we're in musky water now"
so we both grab heavy rods and big lures and go to town.  about 3 casts in, I'm twitching my lure next to the boat making sure its working right.  i turn away for a moment and turn back just in time to see one slash my plug just feet from the boat.   That'll get your heart pumping for sure!
we were ready now, there was atleast one active musky in the river and we were gonna latch onto him.
a while later, with no luck, we decided to head downriver some and try out luck.  as we motored along i tossed my plug over the side and jerked it periodically as we trolled along. as we neared our destination, my rod is nearly jerked out of my hands as it doubles over with the heft of a fish. I few moments later, and we've got em in the boat.



beautiful markings, low 30s" and a little under 10 lbs

we had one other musky follow a jig in for a bit, and saw a few more cruising around

ended up with a 14" smallie late in the day and pulled off the river a bit before dark.

hit the James river on saturday, and results were similarly slow. Not a tick for the longest time.
a short bit after lunch,  i switched over to a suspending jerkbait and got my first rub, followed by a full strike and landed a chunky 16" at 2.5 lbs.

over the next couple hours, we followed up with another 12 fish between 12 and 15" before we had to motor on down the river to get out before dark, all on suspending jerkbaits pulled form shallow water into a deep dropoff