The wife also reminded me of something else we saw. I've seen bait balls on TV where tuna tear through the bait ball while feeding. We didn't see any fish feeding; but I got to see my first big bait ball. No wonder it comes across as a cloud on the fish finder. Because the water was so clean; we could see a big bait ball (about six ft wide and four ft deep) moving across the top of the water. Usually; I just see the top of the bait, but today I could see the bottom of the bait ball. At times it was a true ball, tightly wrapped like a ball of string. Other times it would seperate into two balls and then unify again. It was fun to watch. It appears the smaller fish were at the edges and the larger (smarter) fish were in the center. Whenever the ball would seem to difuse, it was those damn small fish on the edge that wandered off. Soon, they would notice their mistake and come back to the pack and reform the ball.
I could have watched them for an hour, but the lure of more to see enticed us to move on and explore. The bait was larger than minnows; but I don't know exactly what they were. They appeared to have a single stripe on them (almost like tetra's in a fish tank, but this may just have been because of the angle we were watching). I would guess they were about four or five inches long. I know they weren't minnows, certainly not glass minnows, they could have been small peanut bunker.
I kept imagining them in 50 ft of water, about 25 ft down, and large marks around them on the lowrance. Next time I see a cloud of bait come across the screen, I'll think back to this day.
5th (Marty)
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