Was a bit tough waking up to my first alarm this morning being Spring Forward, so got a little later start than anticipated. WOT out the harbor about 0800. Brought shrimp as today's cut bait for a real college try at sheephead. Had some hope for the day with a good tide and great weather.
Stopped on my first spot and was marking plenty of fish but no bites, not even bait stealers. Looked like the usual layers of bass, whitefish, and blacksmith, so very surprised I didn't get a nip. Moved to my intended AO for the day and there were two party boats working the area, hadn't seen them before in that zone.
There was soooooooooo much bait past the 100' contour on the flat. 20 yard wide balls every 50 yards at times.
And not nearly as many whitefish marks as usual in my AO. Thought that was weird. Had bait stealers but they were very subtle, unlike the usual absurdly aggressive baby skrillas. Got 2 small reds but no whitefish or sheephead. Bites and marks were very few and far between.
Started back shallower. Wondered if the party boats had been hitting that area all winter draining it dry of the whitefish. Got over to Izor's where there were 4 other boats and started trolling my 3 way rig to maybe pick off some bass.
TONS of fish in the area, and zero bites.
Got hung up a lot on those those relief points for no payoff, moved shallower. More marks than I'd ever seen in shallow but once again zero bites.
Normally I see 2 marks tight to the bottom and 10 seconds later I'm bit. So I'm amazed that I probably put my presentation in front of hundreds more fish today and got not a tap. Maybe they're all full on all that bait in the area.
Frustrating. But nice day. Not skunked, though kinda felt like it.