Disappointing day

Got out today thinking the fish would be rolling on the surface with the incoming storm. WRONG! I don't think I've ever done more riding in one day as I did today. I went as far north as Wahoo and as far south as the Dam in search of fish breaking but all the gas I burned was in vain…

I hit the water around 11:00 and expected to find fish on top as we have a big low pressure system moving in over the next day. Cloud cover was dominant and the only thing missing was wind. I guess maybe that was a major factor because over the next 4 hours I didn't see much of anything up top. On the way up the lake, I bumped into the only surface fish I was to see. This happened right in front of Rivers Fork camp ground. I got off one cast with a fluke and hooked up. A few minutes a later a 7 lb Striper was landed. This happened around noon.

Soon after I was up in Sardis mulling around my bud DY who was seeing fish down low. He was holding his ground but the fish weren't biting. I idled around searching to see if there was anything worth waiting for but only graphed small fish so I boogied. From there I headed south and around 2:00 PM stumbled upon some fish deep in front of the dam. I dropped my DD and bam, fish on. Some 7-8 minutes later I had boated a summer sized Striper around 11-12 lbs which made the day.

Around 2:30 I threw in the towel and was calling the day a bust and headed back to dock. Before I did I had to look in front of Aqualand one more time. This is where I had all that action last week so I was hoping maybe there would be something up and about. Well, to my surprise, I spotted a small school of fish tracking northward. There were 4-6 fish swimming much like you see dolphins along the coast with their backs coming out of the water. Weird thing was these fish weren't feeding; they were just cruising up and down and they were BIG! I grabbed my giant trout plug, made a cast right on top of them and for a moment could "feel" a fish. It didn't seem like a bite but instead it felt like the bait was rubbing on one as it swam by. At that point my lure got "launched" out of the water and I'm not sure if they tail whacked it or if it was a miss hit. Regardless, there was no hookup and that splash seemed to initiate a deep dive. In other words, they were gone.

Overall a "bad" day everything considered.  After getting home, I checked the BP for the day and noted there was no major rise or peak; it essentially was a "flatline". This was in contrast to yesterday when it rose up and dropped which in turn initiated a strong bite DY witnessed. This time of year a flatline or low BP for a day will enable the fish to stay deep regardless of light. Yesterday, given the steep drop off from 11-3, the fish were up high so I guess I missed it. Oh well, such is the plight of winter fishing on Lanier.