Strawberry Still Rules 09/28

[piscispursuit]

I and two friends ignored the full moon and bad reports and hit Strawberry this morning anyway. It was a balmy 31 degrees just before first light as we got on the water. We hit the south end and after about 5 casts had our first fat Berry cutthroat in the boat. Fishing wasn't super hot at any one time but very consistent until we quit around 11 because of the W, though we did have a triple and a few doubles. We ended up boating 56 cuts, all were caught using our normal fall formula -- pointer minnows tossed into 10 feet deep water or shallower right on the weed lines. We caught about 40 on pointers and then switched to white 4.5 inch jigs for the remainder. There are few or no fish deep, nearly every fish we jigged up was in total water depth of 15-20 feet or less. We caught several on jigs by casting to them while they were rising.

One other interesting thing, the attached picture shows a fish with a line hanging out of its mouth. I could see a cheese hook in its throat. Apparently someone caught it with bait, cut the line instead of ripping it out of its throat, and it lived to be caught again later. The old line was pretty slimy so I assume it had been awhile. I had it out of the water 20 seconds max to get a pic and it took off again fast so I assume it's still swimming.

Strawberry vitals read - 53.1 water temperature, no algae bloom or turn over yet. Tomorrow looks ugly, but after that it should be good.
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