a snowy Easter
April is pretty much up and down with the weather. 20 cm of snow and much colder temperatures changed the situation dramatically. There won`t be any Easter fishing in Värmland this year. Now it`s time for heading south. Skåne is always good for a surprise...
spin fishing
The ice on the smaller waters should be gone by next week. In the archipelago of lake Vänern temperature is around 5 degrees and catches of post-spawned fish are reported. The 100+ on the picture took a spin fished McRubber Tail at a drop-off with lots of prey fish around. The smelt started migrating up local rivers 2 weeks ago. When the smelt are gone and the spawning is over pike might hopefully be hungry again.
pike mayhem
Zero fish from our autumn spot to make a long story short. The next day I tried 30 km further south and what I experienced was a total pike mayhem.23 pike within 10 hours of fishing! A real monster was missing though the biggest was at 8.7 kilo and 107cm. Two more fish of 99 respectively 98 cm and a couple of fish between 80 and 90 cm. I caught the first one after only 15 minutes of dead bait trolling. Later in the afternoon I switched from trolling dead roach and herring to Bulldawgs. I increased the trolling speed a little and the catching rate remained constant. But in the end it seems that the Bulldawgs deliverd slightly smaller pike than dead baits. Water temp increased throughout the day from 3 to 5 degrees. The warm weather period (3 days of around 14 degrees) is over now. This should stop the pike from spawning and the chance for a big one is still realistic.
