Saturday, Jully 13, 24 Potato Creek Bassmasters members fished West Point from 5:30 AM to 2:00 PM in our July tournament. We started out wrong, arriving at Pyne
Park to find the boat ramp blocked for Dragon Boat races that afternoon. We quickly moved everyone to another nearby ramp.

In 8.5 hours of fishing, we landed 24 keeper bass weighing about 47 pounds. There were two five-bass limits, but 14 people did not have keeper.

Michael Cox won with four weighing 10.82 pounds and his 5.91 pound largemouth was big fish. It was very skinny and would have weighed over seven pounds in the spring, based on its head size.

Mitchell Cardell had four weighing 9.31 pounds for second, Lee Hancock placed third with five at 7.19 pounds and my five weighing 5.46 pounds was fourth. Trent Grainger had one weighing 4.62 pounds for fifth. It was another big headed skinny largemouth.

Again, I had a feeling I could catch some fish early in a certain place, but after fishing two places where I though they would feed shallow before the sun came up I had not gotten a bite. So, I started fishing deep brush, changing patterns completely.

I was on a 20-foot-deep brush pile at 9:00 and quickly caught three keeper spotted bass. I had fished it with a big crankbait and big worm, hoping for a good size largemouth since I had heard that was a good pattern, but got no bites.

My first cast to the brush with a smaller bait, a shaky head worm, produced a short spot then my next cast got my biggest of the day, a spot weighing a little over a pound. I landed several more short spots there, too, so I went to more deep brush.

At 11:00 I had not gotten another keeper, although I stuck with a shaky head and drop shot worm, small baits spots like. Then while looking for an old brush pile I saw a new one nearby on my depthfinder and caught my fourth keeper from it.

I kept trying deep brush without a bite. On some of them I could see fish suspended over them, the perfect set-up for a drop shot but could not get a bite on it. Then, with less that 30 minutes to fish, I caught my fifth keeper on the dropshot, my first bite on it all day.

Persistence pays off sometimes.

The Sportsman Club is fishing legendary Lake Guntersville this weekend. Although you hear about the fantastic catches there, based on the Alabama Bass Information Trail creel census reports from bass clubs, it is the most difficult lake in Alabama to catch a keeper bass in a club tournament.

Fishing at Guntersville is “combat fishing” in my experience. It seems folks go there based on its reputation, get frustrated by not catching fish, and lose all respect for others.

If you catch a bass there you can expect several more boats, anyone seeing you catch the fish, join you immediately. There is no consideration for others. A couple years ago I saw 17 boats fishing a small area. They were so close together some boats were bumping each other, and every one of them could have cast into every other boat.

I do not enjoy fishing like that and will be looking for a secluded area to fish. It may not produce a good catch, but I will enjoy it a lot more.