Water Temperature Changes

[Gone Fishin]

So fishing out at silver lake for the past couple weeks I have seen a series of water temp changes. From 63 up to 74 in a short time and then the reverse back to 63 in the last few days. Before the latest cold weather I was having success in at least finding the muskies. Yesterday and this morning not even one sighting. It really made me wonder how these water temperature changes affect the muskies and where they are in the lake. Anyone who has any input on this it would be much appreciated.

[Don Wittenberger]

The people with the most experience in answering this type of question are the veteran anglers of the upper midwest in the muskies' native range -- Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. All season long, they get thunderstorms moving through which typically are accompanied by cold fronts and sudden temperature drops. For many decades, the conventional wisdom in that part of the country is that muskies bite like crazy ahead of the cold front (but watch out for lightning!), then the temperature drop kills the fishing and you may as well spend the next three days sitting on a bar stool.

How this translates to Washington is a little tricky, because our weather patterns are somewhat different, and so is the environment the fish live in. Water is a heat sink, so as a general rule, deeper lakes experience less temperature fluctuation, and a shallower lake logically should be more prone to this phenomenon.

Whatever the cause of Silver Lake's current temperature variations, my best guess is that the muskies don't like the abrupt temperature changes and it's putting them off their feed. If you're not seeing them in their usual shallow water haunts, that tells me they're sliding down the dropoffs into deeper water. They may not be far away, just farther down the dropoff. So, in this situation, I would recommend moving the boat out farther, fishing deeper, and slowing down your retrieves. A good lure for searching dropoffs for tiger muskies in a depth range of 15 to 25 feet is a weighted bucktail with a willowleaf blade, such as the Windel's Harasser.

[Deadeyemark]

I agree with Don on the fish backing off. A deep crankbait like a baby depthraider or similar will get down to about 10' pretty quickly. An erractic retrieve will sometimes trigger those turned off skis. A suspending bait like a Triple D is another good choice. It's also hard to beat a big jig crawled or hopped down the drop offs.
Another thing I see often is skis suspending out away form the structure and down about 10-12'. Back out and try working this area and this depth untill they go back on the feed. Last year my favorite lure for these fish was a 6" Bikini Bait Co Turmoil. I know, I know but it really was. I worked it over 25-35' of water and it was only running about 3-4' down but they'd come up and hammer it. Walk the Dog.
Good luck,
Mark

[muskie guy]

Absolutely, move out past the first drop into deeper water, use baits that will work the depth your fishing efficiently. I like to count down swimbaits and retrieve them slow and steady, or with a short tip raise and pause on Silver after a cold front rolls through. Deep diving Husky Jerks, Baby Depth Raiders and Jakes work for me too. I am really starting to like bulldawgs, been experimenting and am very pleased.