Pecks LSC Pattern

I finally talked to Randy Peck and got the details on his win July 18th on St. Clair. Most people think of the mile roads, the rivers or the channels when it comes to summer fishing on LSC but Randy decided to go against the grain a little and fish some new water. He had only been on the big lake three times previous and found a weedbed marked on his hotspots fishing map that looked intriguing. Randy decided to spend Saturday looking for this weedbed and others like it up in the northeast corner of the lake known as Anchor Bay. This section is know for muskie and perch but doesn't get a lot of publicity for smallmouth this time of year.

Practice: Randy went looking for his weedbed but located a different patch of vegetation and decided to fish it. He caught a few fish but nothing decent and decided to call it a day early due to the high winds that were building. He figured he'd come back to this weedbed the next day and start there and try and get a few decent keepers before looking for new water.

Tourney Day: Randy returned to his practice spot and did catch a few decent fish early throwing 4" cinnamon grub teamed with a 1/4 oz jighead. Peck would slowly reel the plastic in and when it hung he would snap it free to trigger strikes. All was going well until a boat with two tournament anglers from another organization approached his buoy and started fishing it. Randy became very upset and said he lost his cool and let the two guys in the boat have it.

Instead of staying and fighting for the spot, Randy decided to take off and look for the original weedbed he had intended on fishing the day before. The spot was isolated weeds in 6-7 foot of water and when he found it, it didn't take long for him to start catching fish. "I think the key other that being an isolated bed is that the water was only 72 degrees up there" stated Peck as he culled about 20 keepers enroute to his 22 pound sack.

Randy also caught the big bass of the event and probably had second big bass as well but club rules only allow one per angler. Most fish fell prey to the grub fished on spinning tackle which was paired with 10 pound mono. Randy also stated that he found a second weedbed close to his hot spot and he rotated between the two to post his big weight. He returned to the launch ramp early, Tim Horton style and made sure his fish stayed alive for the weigh-in. It was an impressive a win as I've seen in the club for some time and hopefully Randy can keep making a serious run at the AOY title.

Muskegon Results

1 Jim Rice 10.84

2 Mark Dereadt 10.48

3 Jerry Smith 10.42

4 Nick Neves 9.92

5 Scott Rice 8.51

6 Mike Pritchard 7.66

7 Bill Maurer 6.80

8 Roy Albert 6.63

9 Leo Knox 6.48

10 Art Honsinger 5.69

11 Randy Peck 5.45

12 Matt Morgan 3.17

13 Patricia Rice 2.26

14 Scott Hartman 2.14

15 Matt Zielenka 2.00

16 Sam Caron 1.29

Tourney Director Bill Maurer on the scales

Big Bass #1: Roy Albert 3.37

Big Bass #2: Leo Knox 3.08

Muskegon Weather

I've gotten different info depending on which website I use but this I do know. Sunday will be mostly sunny with temps in the high 70's. Saturday will be very hot and storms are possible but that should clear out by tourney day.

The one thing that is unknown is the wind and more importantly the direction. Some club members will chose to head out into Lake Michigan and drive to one of the other lakes in the area and the wind speed and direction will greatly affect that. I've seen Northeast winds which would be ideal but another site this morning said light winds out of the West.

Lake Michigan behaves differently than St. Clair and Erie so I need to keep and eye on it. The run to Spring Lake and White Lake are both a little over ten miles while Mona lake seems to be closer to a five mile run. Most club members are already in Muskegon practicing so hopefully the weather is cooperating for the pre-fishing. Hope to see a good turnout.

Randy Peck wins LSC

It's not often that someone dominates at Lake St. Clair but while most of the big boys were weighing in their 14-15 pound bags, Randy Peck calmly brought 21 pounds of smallies to the scale and blew everyone away. I have not been able to contact Randy to get the details but I do know that he was way up in Anchor Bay which is better known for it's perch and musky fishing. Peck also had two giant sows, one of which went 5.34 to take big bass. I hope to post more info on his win as soon as I talk to him.

The rest of the pack was led by newcomer Nick Neves who weighed in 15.77 and caught most of his weight cranking down by the mouth of the Detroit River. I'm not sure about Jim Rice but he usually fishes down near the south shore as does Scott Rice. Scott and Mark Dereadt fished together but I heard they were spotted near the river mouth as well.

Outside of the top 5 were Matt Morgan and Mike Maske who also weighed in 14+ pound stringers but were doing it a little differently. Matt who also weighed in the second big bass at 4.9 pounds was targeting 15-17 fow clean spots in the weeds down by the mile roads. Mike is a model of consistency on LSC, weighing in 14+ pounds in three of the last four years (out of the back of my boat), targeting isolated weedclumps up by the Metro launch. He may be fishing out of his own boat next year.

Overall it was a good event and I noticed that alot of anglers who have struggles at St. Clair in the past are starting to figure it out and are weighing in decent stringers. I will have a lot more details on this event but with the short turnaround between LSC and Muskegon I'll have to do it in the coming weeks.

Muskegon Directions:
I-96 West to M-31 (about 105 Miles)
31 North at exit 1B towards Ludington (6mi)
Mergo onto 31 business route (Moses Jones Pkwy) at exit 116 on left towards N. Muskegon
Right onto Marquette
Left onto Western

You can exit 31 a little earlier at exit 114 and head north on M-31
Then exit left onto Giddings which will also take you to fishermans landing.

LSC Results

1 Randy Peck 21.3
2 Nick Neves 15.77
3 Jim Rice 15.67
4 Mark Dereadt 14.91
5 Scott Rice 14.59
6 Matt Morgan 14.3
7 Mike Maske 14.18
8 Scott Hartman 12.37
9 Sam Caron 12.08
10 Tim Chapman 11.58
11 Bill Maurer 11.19
12 Connie Honsinger 11.11
13 Art Honsinger 9.58
14 Patricia Rice 9.35
15 Jerry Smith 8.3
16 Mike Pritchard 7.78
17 Kathy Maurer 6.9
18 Leo Knox 6.88
19 Tom Curry 6.59
20 Craig Deck 6.24
21 Roy Albert 5.74
22 Matt Zelenka 4.38

Big Bass #1: Randy Peck 5.34
Big Bass #2: Matt Morgan 4.90

Official Practice Day

As much as I hated to do it, I took Friday off and spent most of the day pre-fishing lake St. Clair with fellow club member Scott Hartman. I had been there a few weeks ago and found the fishing to be tough but wanted to hit some old hotspots and do a little searching and ended up having a pretty decent day on the water. Here are some of my findings.

The water is pretty clear and that has been the case for most of the summer. The water temps are in the mid-70's but I think that is irrelevant at this time of year. Most fish are in their summer patterns and to me the lake is fishing like a few weeks later due to the hot weather recently.

I've heard guys tell me the've been catching them from 8 to 17 feet of water so I decided to let the fish tell me what was going on. I have a few coordinates shallow and decided to check them first and caught nothing. We eventually moved deeper, up to 15 foot and had zero bites there so they must be in between right?

Actually, I have several good waypoints in the 9-12 fow range and that is where we had the best action. I could not catch fish shallow or deep but this depth was a consistent producer today and finding isolated weedbeds in this zone proved to be most productive.

We didn't catch any huge fish, 3 1/2 was probably the biggest but the 2-3 pound fish were cooperative and we probably caught three limits worth total. Most fish were caught on smoke colored tubes fished on 3/8 oz jigheads with a couple coming on a dropshot rig with a gulp minnow on the business end.

If I were to make a plan for Sunday I think I would just look for these isolated "dark spots" that indicate small weedbeds in the 9-12 foot range and throw tubes and grubs and expect to catch about 10-13 pounds. I like to find bigger concentrations of fish and try and catch a limit and if a big fish appears then it's that much better. I don't think this is a pattern that will catch 15 pounds which is what it usually takes to win our club event but I believe it's a solid approach and has earned me a few checks over the years.

One other small note, there is construction on 696 near I-94 so leave yourselves extra time Sunday morning. The traffic shouldn't be bad at 6am but leave a little early to avoid being late. The weatherman is calling for temps around the mid-80's with plenty of sun, enough to see those weedbeds, so bring the sunscreen. Hope to see a good turnout.

Directions to LSC

For those who have not been to St. Clair, here's how I get to the Harley Ensign launch:

- I-94 to M-14

- M-14 to 275 North

- 275 to 696 East

- 696 to I-94 East

- Exit off 94 at Metropolitan Parkway and go East (right).

- Metro Parkway dead ends at Metro Park and then go North (left) on Jefferson

- Jefferson ends at South River, go East again (right) and South River ends at Harley

Once on Metro Parkway, follow the signs to Harley which is a DNR access site. Daily rates are $6 and a yearly pass is $24. The launch at Devils Lake is also a DNR access ramp so a yearly pass might be a good idea. Some guys just take I-94 all the way to Metro Parkway for a simpler route but I think it is a little longer. Going my route will take you anywhere from an hour and a half to two hours, depending on traffic and construction. I'm not sure about delays right now but will pass them along as soon as I can.

LSC weekend report

Although I was not on the water this weekend, fellow club member Matt Morgan began his practice on St. Clair and had some interesting things to share after his fishing day. Matt was joined by his dad Charlie who is a very good fisherman as well and the two reported an improving bite which is good news for the upcoming club event.

Matt stated that most of his fish came from deep water, 14-15 feet and they were concentrating on open patches in the grass that has started to thicken up with the hot weather. They would basically drift and rip the tubes out of the weeds but occasionally they would stumble onto an open spot in the vegetation and that's where the bites occurred.

Matt said the weeds they were fishing were not real heavy and felt like mossy bottom cover but they were enough to render a dragging retrieve useless. As they headed south towards the mile roads area, the weeds thickened and you could actually see them below the waters surface in their thickest areas.

Tubes were the hot bait as usual and green shades were the best but Scott Hartman and I had our best action with smoke colors over the holiday weekend. Matt will be out later this week as will I and hopefully the bite continues to improve. I have not heard of anyone getting them in the channels yet or at least they aren't saying they are so I believe the main lake is still the best option for decent limits. I'm not used to fishing that deep and only have a few waypoints that meet the criteria so I might be starting from scratch but sometimes that works out better anyway. I'll keep the info coming as I get it.

Tough Fishing

The summer dog days are here and the season is only half over. With the recent hot spell we've had, most of the fish are heading for deep water haunts and under thick cover. St. Clair has become tough as I found out last weekend and tonight I hit Devils for a little early pre-fishing and it was a grind as well.

The club had it's July meeting tonight and I have not heard how that went but I know we were supposed to have a guest speaker who is well versed on LSC. I hated to miss it but I only get a fishing pass every so often so I had to take advantage of it. I will pass along meeting notes as they become available to me.

As for St. Clair, I heard the 20 pound stringers are beginning to come in so hopefully the fish have started to settle into summer patterns. I will not be able to fish LSC as planned this week but Matt Morgan will be there tomorrow and I'll pass along any useful info. I am going to be in Chicago for a few days but hope to get heavy into Lake St. Clair starting next Monday.

LSC Report

I know it's two weeks away from the club tourney on Lake St. Clair but I haven't been there yet this year and couldn't wait any longer. Fellow club member Scott Hartman joined me Saturday for a little practice session and it was also his first trip to the big lake ever. I wouldn't say I was a great guide but we did manage to catch a few and I'll pass along what we discovered.

First of all, the lake seems to be several weeks ahead of where it was at this point last season. The spawn is over, the mayflies have already had a big hatch and the weeds are quite dense all the way out into deep water. I've heard most of the good limits on the American side have come in 12-15 foot of water which I thought was pretty deep for July 3rd but we found that to be the case.

Scott and I started down by the 11 mile area and fished the shallower 6-8 fow rocky flats. After only minimal success we headed out to the 12-14 ft area and found the weeds to be fairly heavy even that far out. Dragging tubes was virtually impossible in the dense vegetation so we started just hopping and ripping the baits out of the grass. We periodically ventured back in shallower to the 10-11 ft depths where the weeds were more scattered but never got a bite in anything less than 12 foot of water.

One other interesting tidbit is that we caught mostly largemouth, even out to 14 foot and of the 15 fish caught, most were green. We observed lots of small fry swimming around but never saw fish around them. Later in the day we locked into the deeper water and had a pretty good flurry right before we left at noon.

Scott ended up catching 4 keepers and the big fish of the day which was a 3+ pound smallmouth and lost one that was probably bigger. I caught a small limit of 2 pound largemouth and eliminated a lot of water. The fish seem to be quite deep and I have a feeling may start to relate to current areas like the channels which are typical late summer patterns. I'll be out hopefully later this week and will post any findings.