The trip started out with bad fishing reports that I found to be true, I didn't catch much that first day after fishing all around North Bass Island. On my way back to the cabin to take a break I found some fish biting in 24' near the east point of middle bass. They were Sheephead and White Bass, but it was something to key on.

Back at the cabin I heard talk that some guys were catching Walleye across the bay near Ballast Island. I went over there but with the great varying of depth, from 4-40 feet, and it being a narrow shipping lane that all big boats passed through, and with so many boats trolling, it didn't take me long to get tired of that so I headed back to the point where I found some fish earlier.

It was windy and the wind blew me off the point so I had to use the kicker motor to get some control on where I trolled, and since it blew me off the point so fast I had to troll into the wind. Then the depth went from 30 to 18', just like 1997 when I caught an 11 pounder, and just like that day I was snagged with all three rods.

The first one I reeled in as I let the wind blow me back over top of the snag and just like 97 it was a fish, a huge fish that wouldn't come up off the bottom. Nothing went right, I kept going in circles and all three rod lines were tangled, but I just concentrated on the one that had the big fish. I thought there was no way I would win this battle, but I did my best to try to keep the line snug as I was blown all around and used the kicker motor to stay near the fish and the snagged rods. I figured I would break a rule I have about netting fish the first time they show themselves and so I grabbed the net first time the fish came up and slid the net under it as the fish broke my line.

In the boat it went and it was another 11.4 pound Walleye, 33.5"! It was the exact same size as the 97 11 pounder, same length, same type of conditions, with wind and weather, same moon, same depth, same lure rig but green, and same moon, same time of year, same time of day, same everything! It was freaky. I caught that fish while testing out my new clip-on sinker invention that was performing much better than I expected, and I couldn't have been happier. I took the photos below, dropped it into the livewell, reeled in my other two rods and then took some photos all around.