Chicago Perch Fishing Report, Mid June

Well, we got what we asked for, west winds and warm weather. The sun came up today un-impeded by clouds. The weather was balmy and the air was still thick with moisture from the torrents we got over the last couple of days. I had high hopes as the sky got brighter and suddenly myself and the three fellows next to me hooked into perch. The bite was hot for 10 or 15 minutes, one after another for us all. I ended up tossing back some smaller ones along with the rest of the guys out there. Lots of perch in a short period of time, but smaller average today, a lot in the 9-10" range.

Perch are one of the more beautiful freshwater fish in my opinion.

I hooked another stray later in a small school that went through and produced a handfull of perch down the line, after putting him on the stringer I thought hard about why I kept that first one. It was only when I got home and realized my first one was 10" and that the second one was only a hair over 14"... I'm getting too used to these jumbos where the 9" keepers are looking like the smallest perch I've ever seen.

On the way out a guy fishing on the inside of the harbor had 2 perch in his bucket, they measured something like 5" and 7"... Come on it is jumbo season, forget filleting these things for a fingernail sized piece of meat.

The forecast for the 10 day remainder of the season... I'd say pretty good. Surface temps are dropping, as you'll see in the map above and we're looking at a couple of days of west winds and then a whole week of 80+ degree days. Since the season came in like the most timid of lambs, maybe she'll be a good sport and go out like a lion.