Been a couple of weeks since I last hit the lake and it wasn't looking good with high winds and rain forecast to move in this weekend. This morning a quick check of the WSDOT 520 bridge conditions showed winds under 10mph so headed to the south end of the lake around 11:00am. I started my troll around South Point and worked the shoreline northwest into the west channel. I picked up my first fish just as I passed the first buoy in the channel, which was holding a huge bait ball. It was a nice, feisty 17” fish that hit at 30' on the downrigger. I rebaited my hoochie rig, sent it back down and continued my troll north working over the shallows where I marked a couple of fish masses in the 45' range that I was sure were perch, on the GPS, to come back to later. With nothing going on in the shallows I made my way out into the main channel and picked up my second fish at 50' on the downrigger. This time it was a 15” fish that barely registered any movement on my rod tip. After I released my line from the clip it came alive and put up a good fight all the way to the net.

I decided to give the perch a go and rigged up with a 1 ounce Cabelas brand jigging spoon tipped with some pike minnow meat. Motored back to the spots I marked earlier on the GPS and was into fish right away. The perch ranged in size from 6 “ up to 11” and I brought up a dozen and then some before calling it a day. The larger perch were spitting up 3” scuplins which makes it easy to see why the jigging spoons work so well.

The surface temps have dropped rapidly and the lake is in the process of turning over. With the water in the mid 50's all the way to the thermocline, which is sitting around 90' to 100', the fish are scattered throughout the water column. Find the bait and you'll find the fish.