6/6/09 Madison Chain Fishing Report

Lake Monona
Saturday Morning Conditions: Winds N 10-15 mph, Cloudy, 62-63 deg water temp.

This morning I decided to chase some Lake Monona post-spawn smallmouth. Usually around the beginning of June, some decent-sized smallmouth will move out from the shallows and station along the outer weed edges until they move into their more permanent summer locations. Because there was also a strong northeasterly wind and heavy cloud cover, I would also be unable to do any effective searching for the last wave of spawning smallmouth.

I started the day probing some of the steeper weed line drops with my Rogue Rods drop shot rod. Within the first 10 minutes, I connected with a healthy 19-inch smallmouth pictured below. The smallmouth was not tight to the 10-foot deep weed line, rather it was about 10 yards from the edge in 13-feet of water. The fish I actually first noticed on my bow-mounted Humminbird 957 graph, and was caught by dropping the drop shot directly over the edge of the boat. I thought that fish was cluing me in on the location of other smallmouth in the area, however, I was unable to find any others willing to cooperate.

After a little over an hour of fishing off-shore, I headed shallow to try and find additional fish. There were plenty of largemouth willing to cooperate, but few topped the 14-inch mark. Gambler Aces (similar to a Senko) and Brutus Swimbaits tossed to and around docks kept fish coming to the boat.

I headed off the water just before rain started at 9:00AM.



Drop Shot Rig: Rogue Rods Drop Shot DS 639S with 6 lb Suffix Elite and Green Pumpkin Icesickle Worm (trimmed to 4”).

Ace Rig: Rogue Rods Magnum Bass MB664C with 14 lb Suffix Siege line. Green Pumpkin Gambler Ace.