Fishing Report 7/1/2019

Happy July! For many folks, July is viewed as a time that fishing really slows down. Well that hasn’t really been the case lately. Today we’ll recap the South Dakota Elite Walleye Series tournament at Platte and also talk fishing across the area.

Lake Francis Case

We had a very successful tournament on Francis Case fishing out of Platte Creek. Three trends really emerged throughout this tournament, so let’s talk about all three and how they played out.

The first trend was the bite was difficult regardless what presentation you used. Fortunately for us, we had Bob Propst Jr in our corner and he was a tremendous help in getting us on the fish from the start of the day. With Mason Propst and I both at work, Bob fished throughout the week for us and really reported a tough bite! We knew it was going to be a tournament all about boxing keepers and sure enough that is what it panned out to be.

The second trend was each presentation had their pros and cons. The boats using live bait reported dozens upon dozens of short fish. The boats pulling cranks caught few fish, but the fish they caught were often keepers. The boats vertical jigging could get fish, but they had to be in the right place at the right time.

The third trend was the weather beat up on all the competitors. Temperatures in the 100s with winds reaching into the 20mph bracket in the afternoon and a bright sun really was tough on all the boats. This was a long tournament, 7am-4pm and it was both physically and mentally a battle.

So what’d we do to get fish? We made a fairly decent run out of Platte Creek and started fishing the points adjacent to deep water and stayed right on the shelf in that 15-20ft range. The south wind pushing up on these bluff points made a good mudline and the fish seemed to be concentrated right on that shelf.

We put down bottom bouncers with small, .8″ Mack’s Lure Smile Blades (pink and chartreuse were our best colors) and plain slow death hooks. Leeches proved to actually be the most effective bait for putting keepers in the boat, but the shorts didn’t care one little bit. They took Smile Blades, crawlers, plain hooks and even when I put down a #5 Colorado blade in hopes of enticing bigger fish they still took it.

Mason really focused on keeping the boat slow, we kept our speeds in that .5-.9mph bracket as once we got about that 1mph mark the bites really slowed down. We decided to box every keeper (over 15 inches) we could for the first five fish and at about 10:30am we had a 18.5, 17.5, 2 16s and a 15 incher. We’d put back easily 50-75 fish too.

We then switched to rip jigging our Phantom Lures Tillys in hopes of pulling out two nicer fish. Well after I hit about an 8 incher (yes it actually bit I didn’t snag it) in the first 30 seconds and Mason put a couple 13-14s in the boat we realized we weren’t really discriminating and went back to bouncing.

A shallow pass put another 17.5 incher in the boat and we were sitting happy having replaced our 15 incher. By now it was about noon and we decided we had to hold out for a big one. We’d also boated about another 25-50 fish in this process.

We bounced around and as the bite went slow we started looking around. After unsuccessful attempts to put a nice fish in the box, it was about 3:15 and we decided to give some of the points and rock piles a last second attempt with the Tillys.

The first couple spots did not pan out, but after finding a pod of nice fish Mason hooked into but slipped off a decent fish at about 3:30. Within two minutes he hooked up with a 16 3/4 that while it was smaller than the one we lost, acted as a nice 7th fish to replace one of our smaller 16s and hopefully propel us higher in the points.

Sure enough, this proved to be a huge move. We brought 6.49lbs to the scale, good enough for 6th place. The boats between 12th and 6th all were within a half pound of eachother, some just tenths of a pound apart. The winning weight proved to be 11.73lbs caught trolling leadcore along the breaklines, but the leadcore bite was not consistent as many boats struggled to put fish in the boat, let alone a 5 fish limit.

Boats jigging and snap jigging the bridge pilings and points also put out solid finishes. This was true for us too, as that last fish on the Tilly ultimately jumped us up several spots. This really shows the importance of knowing your locations of rock piles, points and other structures that can concentrate fish. If you’re looking for a quick way to find these features, a Mike’s Map really goes a long ways in getting you on them with minimal time wasted on the water.

Huge thank you to Bob Propst Jr for the awesome notes from prefish and everyone else who helped us along the way!

Lake Oahe

Oahe fishing continues to be good. Fishing out of Sutton’s, Bush’s and Spring/Cow Creek has been good for many anglers. Fishing those 15-20ft with Mack’s Lure Smile Blades and plain hooks has been effective. Minnows are still the hot bite for this stretch of river. Pink and purple also are very good colors.

Lake Sharpe

We took a relaxation day on Sunday and proved there are some fish to be caught from shore around Pierre. Farm Island produced some nice catfishing and also some smallmouth as well. The main takeaway was slipbobbers right up on the rocks with crawlers proved to be most effective. If you’re in the Pierre area looking to do some quick fishing, I highly recommend this area. I do not however, recommend my farmer’s tan. Yikes!

Waubay Lake

Mason and I will turn our attention to Waubay Lake and we’ll be in action with South Dakota Elite Series on July 13. There’s no better time for this to happen as the fishing has been red hot!

Anglers have been having great success with some very solid walleyes. There are lots of fish to be caught and many of them are 15-18 inches. Bonus smallies have been finding their way into the bags too! We can’t wait for this challenge and are looking to build off the momentum from Platte to propel ourselves to another strong finish.

Northwest Iowa

Chris Seylar has our Iowa Great Lakes fishing report once again this week! The warmer weather has struck Iowa as well and that is making fish head to their summer homes.

The walleyes are moving out to the mud and basin in Spirit Lake. Here they’re enjoying their summer vacation chasing perch and other bait fish. Fortunately for anglers, fish can still be caught shallow at the right time.

The perch fishing on Spirit Lake is also on the rise with the water temperates as well. Fishing has been getting better and better out in that deeper water.

The bluegills and bass are also still producing some good fishing on Spirit, East and West Okoboji.

Overall, the fishing for this time of year is great with good numbers of nice sized fishing coming across the board!!

Walleye Warrior Report

Walleye Warrior crowned their big fish of the month winner for June this week. Zane Hiller landed a gorgeous 28 5/8″ inch to claim the honors. He beat out Regina Hiller, who had caught a 28 1/4″ fish a week before him on June 2.

Overall throughout the month of June many anglers experienced terrific success. There were numerous 25-28 inch fish caught and some great numbers as well. From shore and from the boat June was a great time to be an angler!

News and Notes

It’s important for anglers to be aware the 15 inch minimum for Lake Francis Case and Lake Sharpe is removed starting today, July 1. This minimum is removed for the months of July and August and will be back in place in September.

July 1 also marks the beginning of anglers being allowed to use bluegill and other sunfish for bait in South Dakota. If you’re looking to stick a trophy in Cat Rush 2019 bluegill make an excellent bait!!

Coming Up

I want to wish everyone a happy and safe 4th of July! I hope you can get out and enjoy the water, grill outs and family and friends! Stay safe and have fun!

I find myself heading to Georgia for a conference this weekend and into next week so we will not be having a fishing report next Monday. You’ll find us back in action July 13 with the SD Elite series on Waubay with a fishing report resuming the following Monday recapping the action.