Fishing with Friends and Family

The end of May brought a trip that I had been looking forward to for a while. The weather wasn't perfect, but the experience was pretty close to it.  We were camped with some family friends along the Whitemud River and my goal was to make sure the kids would catch some fish. Lucky for us the rain shower that had started when we arrived had passed and the freshwater drum were biting. I spent the next 2 hours or so running between our fishing party netting fish, baiting hooks and helping out wherever I could. Everyone was catching and having a blast with plenty of drum big and small eager to bite. The highlight fish of the first evening was a 27 inch drum caught and released by Ron, it put up one hell of a fight and he handled it like a pro.

Day two of the trip I had planned to fish with the Jay and Frodo at least all morning and I was awake long before they were to arrive. The fish were biting and I took advantage of it to kill the time, landing a few handfuls of drum while I waited. We were on the water shortly after 7 A.M. and it didn't take us long to find a stretch of the river with active fish. The fishing was phenomenal and I will leave it at that. We went back to camp around lunch and made a plan with everyone else for the afternoon on the river. The action wasn't quite as consistent but we were rewarded for our efforts with my wife landing the biggest drum of the trip at 28 inches.

After a fish fry of walleye and drum, we began fishing from shore. Emma was putting on a clinic and hammering drum as she had done the previous evening, meanwhile her brother Tom was a ways down river sitting patiently and couldn't buy a bite. This all changed after about 30 minutes as he began to hook up to fish after fish. A 20 inch carp gave him a run for his money, but the real kicker was a 27 inch drum that put him and his gear to the test. He had caught over 22 fish within 90 minutes or so and was clearly having a good time.

Day three I awoke at 5:30 A.M. to rain pelting the tent and the outlook on the day was grim. I grabbed a fishing rod and some bait and immediately got fishing. The action was consistent but I couldn't break the 24 inch mark with any of the drum I caught and once folks were awake and it was clear the weather wasn't going to improve we decided to get packing. The trip as a whole was a success with everyone having a great time. Tons of fish were caught and released with a few retained for meals, lots of different birds were heard and seen and excellent conversations and meals were shared. I don't think anyone left disappointed.