Mr. Dahlberg:
I have not fished in the fall much after the early October in Minnesota, but am starting to do that. I was surprised this weekend to see what a dramatic difference there was in the underwater landscape at a lake that I thought would make a good fall lake because of the variety of structure on that lake.
A few weeks ago I was fishing a weed bed near a drop off and catching bluegills, northerns, bass, sheepshead and walleye. I went back there yesterday and the weeds were mostly gone, the lake was 51 degree surface temp, and I caught a few perch that were biting very lightly on a light Carolina rig. Man, what a change!!!
I tried some slow trolling for northerns but realized I didn't have any idea of where I should be trolling because I didn't know what the temperature was like at various depths.
This experience got me interested in figuring out how to fish this lake at this time of year.
What I realized when I got home is that I had no idea whether the lake had turned over, but I suspect it had. I also realized that my trolling was more or less aimless because I did not know where to troll. I was basically just trolling a reasonable spring an summer pattern.
Do you have any pointers for fishing in a situation like this to help me get up to speed with fishing this time of dramatic change?
Also, does it make sense to own a bottom thermometer? I really should have taken the temperature down there. How important do you think that knowing the temperature in potential trolling zones is?
Is there a quick test for determining whether the lake has recently turned over and is, consequently, a waste of time to fish?
Finally, does it make more sense to fish lakes that keep their weed beds later into the fall?
As you can tell, I'm quite disoriented. My books don't help much, and although I have a pretty decent library, little is written about this time of year.
Thanks!