Green Bay Bonanza

It wasn't supposed to be a great fishing day, but . . . .

It wasn't supposed to be a good day of fishing on July 25, 2001. The twenty-fourth had been a hot steamy day in the upper peninsula of Michigan and late that evening a cold front came in.

I was up at four thirty; one of those going-to-a-new-river-and-I-couldn't-sleep nights. A cool fifty-degree sunrise greeted me as I went out to uncover the boat. It wouldn't be long before a windbreaker was on and my partner, Smitty, and I were headed 20 miles up the Green Bay coast to a fishing trip of a lifetime. But we were looking at high blue skies and puffy white clouds. It wasn't supposed to be a great fishing day.

The day before we had been given advice on the river we were headed for. It was shallow and we could fish from the ramp down to the big pond (Lake Michigan) but it was too shallow to fish north upstream.

When we launched that morning we had no intention of heading south towards the mouth of the river and Green Bay waters. We saw an island a half a mile north of the bridge near the ramp and headed for it. Only two feet deep on the depth finder we found a small channel hugging the shoreline, trimmed up the big motor and lowered the trolling motor.

The channel was narrow and the first island we came to was small and close to the shoreline. It appeared that there was barely room for the width of my Champion to fit between the two. As we approached the island I picked up a rod rigged with a 1/4-ounce Secret Weapon, double willow gold-bladed spinnerbait with a white skirt. I threw to the eddy swirling around the downside of the island and took no more than two turns of the reel handle when I got hit with a strike that nearly tore the rod out of my hand . . . it was a 3.5 lb. smallie. Second cast . . . pow! Another 3 lb. smallie! Third cast . . . broke off . . . and so began one amazing day.

Shortly thereafter my partner began hitting the smallies. We both used Secret Weapons most all morning, and in one stretch I had eight three-pound and three-pound-plus smallies in a row.

That day Smitty and I boated 97 bass. I had 57 and Smitty had 40. We lost several bass (in the area of 40) because many strikes were from more than one fish at a time. The Secret Weapons held up with no damage or bending until we lost four of them to occasional northern pikes.


Smitty and I fished that day from 8:30 a.m. until 6 p.m. with only an hour break for lunch . . . we never went more than three cast between us without a strike or a fish. A great Spinnerbait contributed to a great day. A real fishing trip of a lifetime . . . that wasn't supposed to happen.

Thanks for a great lure, Bob and Secret Weapon spinnerbaits!

Michael J. Vines
New Lenox, Illinois
12 August 2001