Pacemaker Fishing Forum

I was asked by a friend to accompany him on an excursion to a private lake down near Lake Anna. The avowed purpose of the trip was to eliminate as many of the pickerel in the lake as possible, "before they take over the lake"!  Since I absolutely love to catch pickerel, I jumped at the chance.

We drove down without incident and launched the boat at the very nice concrete ramp, dropped the trolling motor and started fishing. The lake is 25-30 acres, ranging in depth from 8-9' at the dam to 4' at the upper end. The perimeter is ringed with grass, reeds, cattails and a few overhanging shrubs. The shoreline drops gradually with submerged grass in the first 1-3 feet of water.

Since we had arrived at first light, I naturally figured that a topwater bite would be on. Accordingly, I put on a Jitterbug while my partner started casting a buzzbait. NO TAKERS. I also know that pickerel dearly love white spinnerbaits, so I switched to a white spinnerbait and started slow rolling it down the drop. Lots of swats, but no takes. Floating worms, Senkos, Plastic worms, Creature baits, NOTHING!!

Switched to a suspending Rattling Rogue and SUCCESS!! Partner switched to a Firetiger Bomber crankbait and he hooked up as well. The balance of the day was spent fishing crankbaits and catching fish non-stop. We had an unusually large number of fish get off our lures after pulling out lots of line against the drag. Even so, during the day, the two of us caught 50-60 bass from 6"- 4+ pounds, 30-40 pickerel from "hammer handles" to 4+ pounds, 15 bluegill in the 1/2 -3/4 pound range, 2 crappie about 3/4 pound and a 7-8 pound bowfin.

My hands are cut to ribbons from the pickerel. But they will heal in a short time. The memory will last quite a while. I will be ready again when he calls......

We would have taken pictures, but we were too busy catching fish.