Ashtabula - 7/26 & 7/27

[SteelEyes]

Got into town Friday afternoon and took the boat out myself to see if I could locate the fish. Went out of Ashtabula Lakeshore Park. Headed North-Northeast out of the harbor. Started at the 4 line and trolled NW to just beyond the 7 line. Got a lot of white bass, then got into the walleye at the 7 line. Was running 1 dipsey and 1 rigger. Got the walleye on the rigger at 50' down, 50' behind the ball on a Dreamweaver SuperSlim Spoon, Blue Monkey Puke.

Dad and I got out Saturday morning and headed back to the same area, started between the 6 and 7 line, trolling NE with the waves the whole time. Trolled out to beyond the 11 line, so from 10-17 miles out in ~75' of water. Speed was around 1.8, but would be faster or slower depending on the wave surge. Ran 4 lines: 1 rigger, 1 wire line, and 2 dipsies.

The rigger was 50'-55' down, running the bait 50' behind the ball, the same DW SS Blue Monkey Puke spoon. It got 2 small (~12") steelhead which we released, two 28"+ walleye, & one 22" walleye. Never changed the bait on this since it consistently produced.

The wire line was probably 250-275' back, and started producing once we put the purple & white reefrunner on it (I think eriedescent). Got one ~28" and one ~22" walleye on it, and 1 big steelhead which shook off right by the boat. (Old man wasn't happy reeling in all that line only to lose it before the net even got in the water )

Only got one walleye on a dipsey, not even many junk fish on them. Tried a variety of baits on them, spoons, stickbaits, wiggle warts, etc. The one we got, ~28", was our last fish and we were then at the 11 line, was on a 1 setting 125' back, had brought it in and changed to a longer leader length of 9', and put on a Luhr Jensen 3.5" Coyote spoon, color Hot Dot. Not sure if it was the longer leader length, the spoon color, or pure luck that finally got us a dipsey strike.

Note the spoon colors, both are silver backed, with darker colored fronts.

Around 1:00 we started to try to troll back through the same area heading SW, but the lake was getting rougher and was hard to control the boat. Decided to head in before it got to rough. But think we could of had our limit if we had made another pass through. Just didn't want to take any chances for the long ride back since there was a Small Craft Advisory coming for late afternoon.

[Priority1]

GJ Robert.