After my miserable time freezing my butt off and not getting a bite at Beaver Lake this morning, I went to my favorite bakery in Capitol Hill. Feeling much better, I went to visit a friend, and then stopped at Greenlake to fix my skunky smell.

There were 3 guys at the 65th dock I think with powerbait on the bottom, and two of them were throwing lures a bit also. I deployed my go to fish slayer, 3/8ths castmaster, and .... nothing. Not even a nibble. One of the guys mentioned that the algae was blooming, and I agreed that was weird for November, but with the heavy rains washing crap in the lake, and now sunshine, it made sense.

Suddenly I realized that despite the brilliant sunshine, he was right. The water was fairly murky. Recalling my last visit where success required the most flamboyant, obnoxious lure in my tackle box, I knew a change had to be made. The lure which saved the day last time is now stuck to a log in Lake Julia, but I had purchased a horrific orange version of it since we've had fairly good luck with orange blade wedding rings. I tied it on, pitched it out, and shortly thereafter ... fish on.

I only had perhaps 90 minutes of light, and I wasted a lot of that with the castmaster. But I finished with 3 stockers on 4 hits in the, let's say ... 45 minutes I threw the gawdawful thing. Not sure how they were successfully biting it, but far be it from me to question their judgment. I wasn't really intending to keep stockers, but they tore themselves up well enough on the treble that I felt it was the appropriate choice.

The morale to this story is - you can go in with a plan. Even a plan that was successful elsewhere, or before. But dont hesitate to observe your conditions and call an audible. Even if it's something you think is ridiculous, remember - the fish dont care what you think. Especially in Greenlake right now, the fish ARE there. They are everywhere. All the time. If you haven't gotten a bite in half an hour throwing a lure, the problem isn't that they're elsewhere. The problem is your lure.

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