Fishing Reports
Well the summer of 2008 is fast coming to a close. I thought it was a pretty nice summer (after a rather cold spring!!). Following the winter fish report where I said there was no ice on the lake in late January -- the cold moved in and we soon had an ice cover of about 10 inches or so which persisted until early April. (Crazy weather or what??)
I noticed several dead fish at the main park right after the ice melted. Upon close inspection, I also noticed they were very large panfish! I went back and got my tape measure -- all were between 11 and 12 inches long. They were pure bred redear sunfish, probably from our original stocking in 2002. I spoke with the redear expert at the DNR and discussed this with him. As I suspected -- redears usually only live until about 5-6 years and then usually die from winter stress (they are native to the south). I sent him some pictures -- he said they were very large redears for Michigan! So, maybe our redear stocking was pretty successful!
More on the redears. This summer I caught many pretty good sized redears. Some were "pure redears" and many were redear/pumpkinseed sunfish hybrids. None-the-less, most of these fish were between 8-9+ inches long. As I have said before, during July and early August, I fish on the bottom in 15-20 feet of water using waxworms as bait. Very rarely do I fail to get a 25 fish limit of bluegill/sunfish in a couple of hours. The nice thing about this fishing is -- it does not matter what time of day it is. Many of my best (and quickest) catches were from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Just remember -- you need to be patient as these fish swim around in schools and once they realize that food is in the area they tend to hang around! Most of the bluegills run between 7.5 and 8.5 inches long and are by far the tastiest fish in the lake. I also took a look at some of the scales from these fish -- and they appear to be about 5 yrs old. This is a very good growth rate for bluegills. The strange thing is, not very many Lake Somerset fishermen target these fish during the summer -- but those I've spoke to, all say the bluegill fishery is the best they've seen in the area. Many have told me about catching large redears this spring and summer.
Crappie fishing was off and on this spring. I suspect the spawning was off some because of the cooler weather. But crappies were still being caught in large numbers by those who target the species. I just came in from fishing and noticed large schools of suspended fish over the deeper water. I tried a jig over the fish -- sure enough, they were all crappie.
From my observations, bass are probably the most fished for species in the lake -- almost all fishermen are fishing for bass. The bass fishing certainly is topnotch -- but I've thought the fish have been a little on the small sized the past couple of years. Just remember a nice largemouth bass of 20 inches is over 10 years old -- not the best eating -- and probably should be released to grow larger. I still haven't heard any reports on anybody catching any smallmouth -- I'd like to hear if anybody catches one (and its size).
Walleye -- I've spoken with several people who (because of the clearer water) have seen many good schools of walleyes -- including several very large fish -- but most of these fish refused to bite. Leland Spangler told me yesterday that he caught and released a nice 25-inch walleye. Walleyes are out there -- fishermen just need to figure out how to get them to bite! Also of interest on the walleye front -- I did manage to rake up a small walleye fingerling this spring. Must be we have some reproductions of walleyes in the lake?
Pike -- many pike have been caught this summer in the 25-36 inch range. These fish are often taken on "strange baits". A friend and I were fishing for bluegills a couple of weeks ago and had two large pike (32 inch plus) that bit on waxworms in 20 ft of water, and I caught a 28 inch fish off my dock on a "hot-dog", while fishing for catfish!!
I often get some complaints that there are too many pike and catfish in the lake -- but remember these fish (and walleyes) are our main predators and keep stunted panfish from overtaking the lake's fishery!
Regarding this year's stocking program -- a long story, that I'll try to tell briefly. We planned to stock some pike this spring -- got the fish, the permit, and fish health certificates approved, but the hatchery in Wisconsin had one flood that partially washed many of the fish out of the ponds -- followed by an even bigger flood which took out the dam and all of the fish (except 5-10 fingerlings) went on down the river! The poor fish farm lost all the $$ they invested in the fish and we lost our pike! So backup plan two is to stock lots of walleyes this fall.
Remember if anyone has any comments, pictures, strange fish that need to be identified, or pictures of the big one -- please give me a call at 688-3384 or email at grausch@comcast.net.
Good luck fishing!
George Rausch
Click on the link below for a previous fishing report.
A map furnished by George Rausch showing Lake Somerset with depths indicated.
A chart furnished by George Rausch showing the history of fish stocking in Lake Somerset since 1984 is available as an Adobe PDF.