The boat ride to Hauser was difficult. It was dark, and although we had LED headlamps, they didn't help much because it was so foggy and we could only see 10 ft ahead of us before everything was washed out. Kept them on for safety though.
We used Google Maps to determine our location in real time and eventually blind boated all the way to the middle of Hauser.
At 5:19am, I caught my first bass, a monster 2.5 pounder that absolutely smashed a popper. Had another bite a few casts later, and I thought we were onto a top water pattern, but after 30 minutes, nothing. Like the report from the 20th, we just couldn't seem to find a pattern. A few jerkbait fish, one on the lipless crankbait, a couple on dropshot. By 10am we only had 8 fish on the boat, but everything seemed a bit random. Sonar picked up HUGE schools beneath us in the middle of the lake, and I was able to pick off one of them with a lipless crank. Again. random.
That is, until 11am when we found a pattern and the bite picked up.
After my first crappie ever (1.51 on a lipless, yay!) we ended up toward the end of Hauser amongst some trees and bushes near the shoreline, and that's where we found the honey holes. From 11am and on, it was non-stop. Rick and I doubled up a few times, and we couldn't believe how even casting into the same bush, there seemed to be a half dozen fish we could pick out of there. After it died down, we just moved over 20ft to the next set of trees, and it was on again. Here's what the areas looked like just for reference:
Also caught a couple tagged fish, which was really cool. Teardrop weights were getting caught up less on the dropshot setup, and it was the Margherita Mutilator color that was rocking all afternoon. Left around 4:30, and it was definitely THE best fishing trip both Rick and I ever had. Thank you Barrett!
