I got back Monday from the S.D#37 maintenance department fishing derby on Roche lake and I know I should of started a new thread,but thanks to searun17 and a few others I had plenty of information to go with.
I went up Thursday after having breakfast in Bridal Falls with the plumber and groundskeeper we arrived at the lake about noon.There were several campers set up in the forestry site but there was ample room to set up near the lakeshore,after chatting with the neighbors and waiting for the wind to die down a bit I finally got on the water and headed for the other end of the lake.I only managed a couple fish Thursday night on a olive green black bead head chronie,and only seen a few others caught in the 2 pound range.
Friday was a write off, at least for me anyway,I went to chronimid alley at the crack of 9:30 am to see allready a dozen or more boats allready parked.I set my 2 anchors and cast my line and watched and waited and listened and waited and learned.[apparently I don't know as much about chronie fishing as I thought I did].I got skunked,but I did learn what I was doing wrong.I went back to camp and cut off my 14 feet of 7 lb leader and retied on 24 feet of 5 lb.the fish were being caught in 18 to 22 feet of water.
Saturday was the start of the derby and I headed out at 10 am to the other end of the lake to see about 30 boats allready parked I set my 2 anchors and cast out my chronie down to the 20 foot mark.It didn't take long and by 11 am I already had released 2 fish in the 3 pound range.Several people released much larger ones and more frequently too.At about 11:30 I hooked into a decent fish in the 4 pound range it took several minutes to land and didn't really fit in the net , figured I better dispatch her,after all I was in a fishing derby.I took her back to weigh her in ,she scaled at 4.4 pounds ,no monster but large enough to win first place.