Fourteen members and guests fished our February tournament at West Point last Sunday. After fishing from 7:30 AM to 3:30 PM we brought 42 keeper bass weighing about 68 pounds to the scales. There was one zero and four people had five bass limits.
Lee Hancock won with five weighing 11.33 pounds and had a 4.46 pound largemouth for big fish. My five weighing 8.32 pounds was second and Jay Gerson had five weighing a close 8.23 pounds for third. Doug Acree came in fourth with five weighing 6.65 pound and my partner Will Mclean was fifth with four at 6.56 pounds.
I started out pretty good. Will and I stopped on a steep bank with blowdowns on it where I caught a good keeper last Saturday and started casting to the trees in the water. I looked down at my Panoptix and saw what looked like several fish on a small brush top ahead of the boat in 2 feet of water.
I cast a Carolina rigged Baby Brush Hog and watched the weight sink with the bait following it. When the lead hit bottom one of the fish went to the bait. When I tightened up my line a little I felt weight, set the hook and landed a two pound largemouth, my biggest fish of the day. I would not have made that cast and caught that fish without the Garmin Panoptix.
At our next stop on a long shallow point where I caught my biggest fish last Saturday a good keeper spot hit the same crankbait and I landed it. For the next few hours the only thing we caught was a largemouth that was not big enough to meet the 14 inch size limit.
At 11:00 I caught a barely legal 12-inch spot on my Carolina rig on one side of a rocky point then Will got his first keeper on a spinnerbait on the other side of the point. On our next stop Will got another keeper on his spinnerbait. Then he caught two more on his spinnerbait in the next two stops, giving him four to my three at 1:00! Made me wonder what I was doing wrong!
I caught one more keeper, this one on a shaky head worm, on our next stop. At 2:45 with just 45 minutes left to fish we went into a small creek with three rocky areas on one bank. I told Will we would finish up here since we were across from the ramp.
As we fished the first rocky spot a bass boat with two fishermen idled past me and started fishing a short distance ahead of me on the next rocky area. That made me mad but I learned long ago to just accept inconsiderate people and do something else.
Will and I ran to the bank where I caught my first keeper but Kwong was fishing it, so we stopped on a rocky point behind him. My first cast with a shaky head produced my fifth keeper. A short way down the bank I saw a brush pile in front of a dock, cast my shaky head to it and landed my sixth keeper, culling my smallest bass.
Time ran out before Will caught his fifth keeper. I really wish he had caught the little one I culled, but that would have given him a limit when I had only two. That might have messed up my mind even more!
Last Sunday 11 members of the Spalding County Sportsman Club fished our January tournament at Lake Sinclair. After eight hours we brought 21 keeper bass to the scales weighing about 27 pounds. There was one five-bass limit and two people didn’t have a keeper.
Jay Gerson had the limit and it weighed 7.11 pounds for first place and his 2.94 pound largemouth was big fish. Raymond English had four weighing 4.77 pounds for second and third was Robert Proctor with three weighing 3.28 pounds. Kwong Yu’s two weighing 2.86 pounds was fourth, beating my one at 2.52 pounds that gave me fifth place.
After catching four keepers the week before in the Potato Creek tournament I had some hope, but those four were on no pattern, just one here and there. Will Mcclean fished with me, joining this club as well as the Flint River club, and we started trying to hook a fish after a very cold run first thing that morning.
At 10:00 neither of use had a bite after fishing four or five different kinds of places trying to find some kind of pattern. We then made a cold ride to near the dam where I had caught my fish the week before.
After about 30 minutes the keeper I weighed in hit my spinnerbait near a grassbed in front of some rocks. I told Will I felt like you needed to catch at least three bass to establish any kind of pattern, but that one was all we had to go on.
For the rest of the day we fished similar places, making hundreds of casts around grass beds near rocks, but neither of us ever had another bite!
PARK FALLS, Wisc. – Any discussion of pre-spawn bass is bound to include the topic of crankbaits. Why? Put simply, of all the baits in the boat, cranks offer distinct advantages over most other lure types, especially in the springtime.
“Bass feed up in the early season before they spawn,” says Addison, Alabama MLF tournament competitor and St. Croix pro, Jesse Wiggins. “As water temps start to rise and baitfish get livelier, bass get used to chasing them.” That makes active presentations like crankbaits a favored springtime option in any angler’s arsenal.
Jesse’s brother, Jordan (aka Jordy) Wiggins, resides just 30-miles east of Jesse’s stomping grounds. The other half of the Wiggins Dynasty, Jordy – a BFL and Toyota Trail angler, St. Croix pro and 2021 Bassmaster Classic qualifier – agrees with his sibling rival’s assessment on spring bait choice. “I like cranks in the spring because they cover water and fish dingy water better than about anything else,” he says. Given spring conditions often involve rainy days and resulting runoff that creates the cloudy water Jordy refers to, cranks become a critical pre-spawn consideration.
Yet there’s more to spring cranking than ripping down the bank with big-billed wobble baits. The brothers Wiggins have some differing thoughts when it comes to the best approaches and effective details that contribute to a great springtime day in the boat. Much of the method to their madness is dictated by water bodies, clarity as already mentioned, but also cover and structure. They agree, however, that no matter the variables, anytime you’re throwing a crankbait come spring, you’re increasing your odds of contacting active fish.
The Approach
To be clear, the Wiggins boys don’t just huck hard baits with trebles because it’s an effective tournament tactic; they also do it because it’s fun. True, both anglers’ tournament successes have been heavily crankbait-centric; it’s a technique their dad – tournament angler, Craig Wiggins – taught them in their earliest days of fishing. “I just like actively cranking and feeling what the bait is doing the whole time,” says Jesse. “You feel exactly what that bottom or piece of structure is, and there’s no mistaking when the fish actually eats the bait. It’s a great way to get bit.” Jordy confirms, “If it’s spring, you’ll usually catch my brother Jesse throwing a square-bill whether close to shore or fishing off the bank a ways.”
Jordy continues, “I like to look for rocks and clay. As that water warms up faster, the crawfish are up in that clay especially.” Fishing near the bank then, becomes a matter of looking upslope and identifying likely lakeshore where clay and rock areas extend well underwater. “Bluff and sandy points aren’t as much in play for the lakes I fish,” Jordy adds. “It’s just not as productive as that clay is. The fish are where the forage are.”
Jesse takes a slightly different approach, biding his time away from the bank, at least at first. “I like outside channel swings,” he says. “Fish stop and concentrate here before they move up onto adjacent flats to spawn. If you think about it, it’s just another bank – but this one starts its break in a few feet of water and continues down to the bottom of the channel. I use the chart on my electronics and imagine a wall where that channel is. I fish down that wall on the deep side earlier in the spring, then focus on adjacent flats with stump fields as we get closer and closer to spawn.”
Both brothers feel strongly that there’s less chance to get bit in clean water; “clean” in terms of both turbidity and the amount of cover and structure present. “I need that lure to be banging into something. You simply have to come into contact with cover,” says Jesse. Jordan supports that statement, saying, “It just has to be hitting stumps, hard clay, rocks, laydowns, really anything.”
That contact and deflection off of cover is what makes squarebill crankbaits such an obvious choice in the spring, whether operating out from the bank, or nearly on it. “Squarebills just deflect so well,” says Jesse. “They’re pretty forgiving, and seem to ride through the thick stuff better, which is exactly when I expect to get hit.”
Jordy prefers running up and down the bank until he’s contacting the kinds of cover and structure he’s looking for or targeting main-lake points. “I’ll fish down the bank on that point, or across it, but some days I get more fish setting up on the point with a deeper diving bait,” Jordan says. “I’ll cast in deeper water out from the point, dragging it back up shallower and attacking the cover fish are in from different directions. Sometimes, the only way to extract more than one or two fish from a spot is to hit the same fish from a bunch of different angles.”
The Details
Both Wiggins brothers love squarebills during spring, with Jesse favoring a Jackyll Bling 55 for its distinctive deflective properties. “I just think it comes through cover better, and that’s all kinds of cover. Some baits work well in wood, but wedge in rocks, where this one seems to do well in a variety of cover types and has an erratic action that triggers strikes. Jordy throws the kitchen sink at spring fish, favoring a host of baits depending on the water body and depths he’s targeting. For deeper situations, a Rapala DT14, DT10, or Norman Little N gets the nod, where shallower waters call for a Strike King KVD Squarebill 1.5 in the bank-raider situations Jordy likes to target.
Color is a popular topic for any hardbait discussion, and the Wiggins both feel fish are highly selective based on the specific water body and its clarity. Crawfish in any hue is a big spring pattern which both brothers lean on heavily. “Fish definitely show a preference, and when they’re up shallow, it’s a lot of oranges and reds,” Jesse says. “Anything crawfish-looking and I’m throwing it.” But that changes as the water clears up, with Jesse opting for more natural colors at that point. “With clearer water I’m trying to imitate a shad,” says Jesse. “I just don’t go as bright or flashy and tend to stick to more whites and grays.”
Jordan notes a few exceptions, like Guntersville, where red craw patterns are in play even in clear water. “You get fish in grass systems and clear water and think that those bright colors may not work as well, but down there and a few other places they’re still the ticket,” says Jordy. “That tells you how important it is anywhere that bass are eating crawfish.” Whether fishing in heavy cover, or just near the bottom of the bank, both anglers agree that craw-patterned cranks are about as perfect as it gets come spring.
Jordy likes working the bank heavily, covering water as a matter of principle. “I like my trolling motor on 5 or 6, meaning I’m working harder to throw more baits to more water, while reeling faster to cover it,” he says. Older than Jesse by 18 months, Jordan utilizes a few extra weeks’ worth of wisdom to slow down once he does find pods of fish. Jesse likes covering water, too, albeit somewhat more methodically, and usually farther from the bank. “Those channel walls hold fish, and in deeper water you can usually see them well on the electronics. It’s just up to me to make the right choices that will get them to bite,” says Jesse.
Rigging Up Rods
With both brothers living so near one another, fishing the same lakes, and growing up fishing quite a bit in the same boat, it should come as no surprise that they rig up nearly the same. Each prefers baitcasting reels in the mid-to-upper speed ranges – somewhere between 6:1:1 and 6:8:1 – mostly on account of the speed required to keep up with a moving boat looking to cover water. Jesse feels he can more easily figure out a cadence with a faster reel, rather than fighting to keep the bait moving while on the hunt. “Sometimes, a small pause or faster pattern of reeling is what they want, and with a quicker retrieve I can still fish it slow, but I also have the option for quick burst,” he says.
The Wiggins boys are carbon copies when it comes to line choice also, opting to wind Seaguar AbrasX fluorocarbon in 12-pound test. Jordan offers, “I run fluoro because of less stretch and more sensitivity like other guys, but I also like how it keeps my baits at the deeper end of the dive chart.” Jesse adds that it’s important to re-tie often. “Because we’re throwing in cover and know to get bit we have to hit something most of the time, I’m a big fan of constantly retying knots. That, and pre-spawn fish get spunky as water temps climb, so you’re always rubbing rocks, stumps, and sticks when fighting fish. It’s a good habit to get into.” Both brothers tie fluorocarbon directly to the split ring of the crankbait. “I’ve gotten so quick at clipping line and retying that I think it’s as fast or faster than a snap,” Jesse says.
Of course, rod choice is important for a technique such as cranking, with Jesse outlining the basics. “All I’m looking for is sensitivity with forgiveness – the sensitivity to be able to feel what the bait is doing and what it’s coming into contact with down there and the forgiveness that’s needed to cushion the strike and keep the hooks in the fish’s mouth during the fight.” A demanding tournament angler like Jesse Wiggins knows what feels right, and in most cases that’s St. Croix’s 6’10” Legend Glass moderate action casting rod in medium-heavy power (LGC610MHM). While he appreciates the 7’2” and 7’4” Legend Glass models in certain situations, he prefers the nimbler 6’10” rod when beating the banks while traveling close and parallel to shore. “I’m casting under limbs and at targets with my rod right up against the bank,” says Jesse. “For back arm casts, and small flips, I can be more efficient and ultimately more productive with that slightly shorter rod.”
Brother Jordan prefers to wield the big stick, opting for the 7’4” (LGC74MHM) Legend Glass casting rod, noting the increased casting distance he can attain when out in the open. He concedes that the 6’10” (LGC610MHM) is about perfect for squarebills and other near-bank baits, while agreeing with Jesse on the power and action aspects of each of the Legend Glass rods. “I just love the extra power when fighting fish to lift them above stumps and laydowns,” says Jordy. “It’s tough to find that perfect balance of strength and sensitivity, feel and forgiveness, and these linear S-glass crankin’ rods deliver like no others.”
Honorable mention goes to the corresponding models in St. Croix’s Mojo Bass Glass series, as both brothers sing their praises. “You need a rod that won’t pull hooks, and all of the St. Croix Legend Glass and Mojo Bass Glass bass rods bow to the fish a bit with a parabolic, moderate action,” says Jordy. “Without that forgiveness you lose opportunities. Fish coming unbuttoned near the boat just can’t happen in a tournament situation, and we lose very few crankbait fish with these glass rods. Even skin-hooked fish we’ve got a good chance of landing with these rods.”
Jesse continues, “Once you use one of these rods – either the top-of-the-line Legend Glass or the more affordable but incredibly capable Mojo Bass Glass rods – you finally understand what a good crankbait rod is. Medium-heavy power to extract fish from cover, and truly moderate actions that don’t let fish throw hooks. Linear S-glass and continuous tapers from IPC construction deliver that ever-important feel that crankbait anglers need, too, while forming glass rods that feel surprisingly light, crisp and balanced in the hand. It’s so important with these smaller squarebills and tight-wobbling baits that you feel exactly what’s going on,” Jesse continues. “Not only to feel cover and strikes, but to make sure the bait is free and clear of debris, too. If that lure hangs on one tiny leaf, it’s not doing its job and that costs you bites that can be critical to winning a tournament. You just don’t get that sensitivity with other duller-feeling glass rods.”
Agree to Disagree
With both anglers putting down roots and spreading canopy over similar areas and disciplines, it might come as a surprise that they differ on certain important stuff. They actually disagree on the number-one presentation in the springtime. While both love crankin’ and say it’s a top-three springtime pattern, Jesse is all in on crankbaits, but Jordy is obsessed with chatterbaits. “If we’re in a boat together come spring, I’m almost always throwing a crank, and he’s probably throwing a chatterbait,” says Jesse. “That makes us fish well together when we do get out, each giving the fish a slightly different look.”
Jordy’s chatterbait fascination is the result of the distinctive lakes he fishes. “If I’m in eelgrass especially, I prefer a chatterbait over anything else,” he says. “Crankbaits can be good if you dial in the depth of dive perfectly, but I have more options to fish chatterbaits at varying depths in these waters, and they fish great in other systems too,” Jordy adds. Even Jesse concedes that chatterbaits and vegetation go together. “I throw them in some of the systems where weeds are the primary cover we’re fishing, for sure,” he says. It’s a keen observation for a technique that often involves letting that bait drop into grass before ripping it out, knowing that a strike can happen at any time.
Jordy says St. Croix makes his ideal chatterbait rod in both the Mojo Bass Glass (MGC72HM) and Legend Glass (LGC72HM) Series, the 7’2” heavy power, moderate action Rip-N-Chatter models. “That thing is a home run for throwing chatterbaits in grass,” says Jordy. “It’s got the heavy power I need to rip bladed jigs through the grass, but when a fish eats – just like with the crankbait models – that rod bows to it. I can put great hooks in fish without pulling them, yet still have the power to force them out of the grass. That’s hard to do in a single rod blank, but St. Croix got it done for me and every other chatterbait angler with these rods.”
Wrap-Up
For the Wiggins Dynasty, brotherly love often comes in the form of busting big bass on banks, together with crankbaits and chatterbaits, squarebills up against shore, or deeper diving cranks that hit those channel-swing walls. Remember, as springtime water temperatures climb, so does a fish’s ability and willingness to chase. That makes active presentations like crankbaits, chatterbaits and spinnerbaits key weapons in a bass angler’s arsenal. As fish draw nearer and nearer to the spawn, anglers find themselves adjacent to stump flats and spawning shelves, slinging squarebills and the like to hungry pre-spawn bass looking to eat as many crawfish as it takes to fill the tanks.
Specialized equipment is the salve for a technique-specific bite like crankin’, where a rod and its rigging need to master certain specialized tasks. The forgiveness of a moderate action will keep help keep fish hooked and is a good start, provided you can get them to strike. That requires sensitivity, not to feel the strike itself, but to provide the angler with feedback on how the bait is running and what it’s coming in contact with. Without the sensitivity portion of the equation, it’s impossible to feel if your lure is fouled, or more importantly, if you’re even contacting the cover necessary to trigger the bite to begin with.
Pairing a lightweight blank with heavyweight glass performance solves the equation. Strength meets sensitivity; forgiveness is served, but with responsiveness and power. Fast reels, fluorocarbon, and color-specific cranks that feature crawfish anything are the other constants that will help earn success. So, take this information and hit the lake this spring, cover some water and find ‘em.
Last Sunday six members of the Flint River Bass Club braved the cold windy weather to fish our February tournament at Lake Lanier. After casting from 7:30 AM to 3:30 PM, we brought in five spotted bass that met the 14-inch size limit. There were no limits and two members did not weigh a fish.
I won and had big fish with one bass weighing 4.04 pounds. Alex Gober had two weighing 3.68 for second, my partner Will Mclean had one weighing 2.78 for third and fourth was Don Gober with one weighing 1.88 pounds.
Someday I will figure out the spots on Lake Lanier but it seems like not any time soon. Like last year I went up three days before the tournament and camped at Don Carter State Park, a great campground. At least it did not snow Saturday night like it did last year!
Last year I caught one bass in three days practice and zeroed the tournament as did everyone else except Brent Drake. He won with one keeper. This year I did not hook a fish in three days practice. I mostly rode with my electronics looking for bass and bait.
Saturday afternoon I found some concentrations of bait – 80 feet deep! Most of the local fishermen that know Lanier well say you have to be fishing around bait to catch winter spots, but I just cannot make myself fish that deep!
There are always some fish shallow and I told Will I felt like shallow fish were more likely to be eating. So we were going to fish relatively shallow. We went to a steep rocky bank and I kept the boat out in 25 feet of water. We cast up to a couple feet deep and worked out bait out to about 20 feet deep.
That seemed a good idea, Will caught his fish, his first tournament fish and also first spotted bass, on his fourth cast with a Texas rigged Senko. I got three bites on a jig but missed all three, I think my frozen hands kept me from feeling the bites like I should, and Will missed two bites on that bank.
We tried a variety of similar places and I missed two more bites, and stupidly broke my line setting the hook on one fish. Usually I retie often, especially when fishing a jig on rocks, but my cold hands kept me from doing that. Will also missed a couple more bites.
I had just about given up at 3:05, with just 20 minutes left to fish, when I felt a thump on my jig and landed my keeper. We had gone back to where Will caught his bass and mine hit in almost the exact same place. We should have stayed there all day!
I love my job! The past week gave me a chance to fish Weiss Lake, the Mobile Delta and Lake Allatoona. Its tough work, but I’m glad I get to do it.
Last Friday I drove up to Weiss and met Cal Culpepper and his dad Saturday morning to get information for a Map of the Month article that will be in the November of both Georgia and Alabama Outdoor News. Cal is a high school senior and on the Harris County High School fishing team, and a very good fisherman. Weiss is on the state’s borders and if popular with bass fishermen in both states.
We had a good day, catching largemouth and spotted bass. The best five we landed weighed about 13 pounds. All were in shallow water around grass, docks and wood cover and hit chatterbaits, topwater and shaky head worms.
On Sunday I drove to Mobile to meet Captain Dan Kolenich, a guide there on the bay, to get information for a saltwater fishing article. I don’t fish saltwater much so I was looking forward to the trip, hoping to catch my first redfish. I knew I would eat some great seafood and I definitely accomplished that goal.
Unfortunately, Monday morning the wind was strong and it was raining. I talked with Captain Dan and we decided to try to go out Tuesday morning when the weather guessers said conditions would be better.
Since I had the rest of the day with nothing to do I went to Battleship Park. This military park has a variety of exhibits, including aircraft, a World War 2 submarine you can tour, and the battleship Alabama docked so you can tour it, too. I spent almost six hours there.
Walking through the submarine I could not imagine being on a crew. The tiny, cramped work and eating areas were bad enough but the racks, or bunks, hung along the walls one over the other, would never have allowed me to get a good night’s sleep. And I could just imagine the smell during missions.
The aircraft fascinated me since I always wanted to fly a fighter for the Air Force. One especially interesting display showed one of the fighters the “Tuskeegee Airmen” flew in World War 2 and a video had very good special effects. It took me several minutes to realize I was not watching actual videos of the dog fights.
Tuesday morning was clear but still very windy. We tried to fish but the wind made it very difficult so I did not catch a redfish. Maybe next time.
On Thursday Wyatt Robinson and his dad met me at my house and we drove through the horrible traffic to Lake Allatoona so I could show them what little I know about that lake. Wyatt is A senior at CrossPointe Christian Academy and on the fishing team. He is a very good young fisherman.
I had a lot of fun and we caught several keeper bass and even more short ones under the 12-inch limit, on topwater plugs and shaky head worms. But the catch of the day was a four-pound channel cat that thought my jig head worm was lunch. Turned out he became dinner. Although that trip was not really part of my job it was fun, except for the traffic going and coming back, and I was impressed, as I often am, with a young fisherman’s ability and knowledge. It is kinda scary that high school fishermen often know more than I do about bass fishing.
The first Sunday in December 12 members of the Spalding County Sportsman Club fished our November tournament at Jackson Lake. After 8.5 hours of casting, we brought 35 keeper bass weighing about 43 pounds to the scales. Most were 12-inch spotted bass. There were three five fish limits and no one zeroed.
Jay Gerson won with five weighing 5.72 pounds, Zane Fleck placed second with five at 5.35 pounds and Sam Smith was third with five weighing 5.05 pounds. Niles Murray came in third with three weighing 4.31 pounds and Carl Heidle had big fish with a 2.78 pounder.
I think I set my goals too low. My goal each year is to win the point standings, and I had a comfortable lead going into this tournament, with just two left. In my mind I thought if I just landed a keeper in each of the last two tournaments I would win.
When I landed a 13-inch spot at 7:45 I relaxed, I had my keeper. Then it hit me that with 12 fishermen I could lose over half my lead with a last place finish. So I started trying harder but could not figure anything out. I finally caught my second keeper at 2:00 and came in 11th place.
That finish did cause me to lose almost half my lead. So, with one tournament left this year, I gotta do better next Sunday!
On a Sunday in November a few years ago ten members of the Flint River Bass Club fished our November tournament at Lake Lanier. After eight cold, windy, rainy hours we managed to land 11 keeper bass longer than 14 inches, all spotted bass. There were no limits, the most any one fisherman had was three. Four fishermen did not have a keeper. They weighed about 26 pounds.
I managed to win with two keepers weighing 7.11 pounds and my 3.81-pound spot was big fish. Alex Gober had three weighing 5.44 pounds for second, Chuck Croft was third with three at 4.67 pounds and fourth was Don Gober with one keeper weighing 3.30 pounds.
The windy, cloudy day seemed perfect for throwing a spinnerbait on windblown rocky points and banks, usually a very good pattern this time of year.
I hit three places like that quickly that morning and on the third one, at 7:25 AM, I landed the 3.30 pound spot on one of Ryan Coleman’s Mini Me spinnerbaits. That fish jumped two feet out of the water when I hooked it, unusual for a big spot, and made my heart stop.
That got me excited that I had a good pattern going so I fished it hard until 11:30, trying spinnerbaits, jerk baits and crankbaits. All I caught was two 13-inch spots, no keepers. At 11:00 I got tired and tried some brush piles out of the wind but got no bites.
At 1:00 I went back to rocky points and fished a jig and pig, working areas out of wind since I was so tired. I caught my bigger fish within five minutes and again got excited, thinking that pattern would work. But two hours later I had not gotten another bite trying that pattern.
Those big spots at Lanier fight hard and are fun to catch but unless you fish the lake a lot they are difficult to pattern. The day of our tournament a guide there, Lanier Jim, posted pictures of the big spots he and a client caught. He knows the lake well and fishes it every day. They caught about a dozen keepers and their best five weighed about 18 pounds. And they fished the same area of the lake I fished. Knowing the lake makes a huge difference!
The Sportsman Club is fishing our November tournament there next Sunday. I’m sure it will be tough but fun if we manage to hook any of those magnum spots!
Note – I won it, too, with a limit weighing 12.65 pounds i caught off wind blown points on spinnerbaits early and had big fish with a four-pound spot that came off the same rock as the 3.71 above!!
Sunday, January 9, eight members of the Flint River Bass Club fished our January tournament at Jackson Lake. After casting from 7:00 AM to 3:00 PM, we brought 23 keeper bass weighing about 26 pounds to the scales. There were three five-bass limits and one fisherman did not have a keeper.
Alex Gober won it all with five weighing 7.35 pounds and had a 1.80 pounder for big fish. Niles Murray came in second with five at 5.52 pounds and Doug Acree was third with five weighing 4.34. Lee Hancock came in fourth with two weighing 2.50 pounds, beating my two at 2.48 pounds by .02 pounds!
It was a tough day. Niles said he caught his five in about an hour. This time of year there is often a “bite window,” a short time when if you are in the right place at the right time you can catch fish.
New member Will McLean fished with me and we fished hard. But at 2:46 with five minutes left to fish I had gotten only one bite, a four-inch crappie that hit a spoon. I found fish in many places, some of them set up under baitfish and looked like perfect places to catch one. But it did not happen for either of us.
As time ran out Will and I were working around a rocky point. I told him I would make a couple of casts across the downstream side of the point then we had to go in, even without anything to weigh.
On three casts I landed two keepers and lost one at the boat on a DT 10 crankbait. On my Panoptix I could see baitfish all over the end of the point with fish moving around under them, like in a few other places, but they were feeding better.
I wish I could have made a few more casts but we pulled up at the ramp two minutes before being late!
The Flint River Bass Club tournament scheduled for Sunday, January 15, 2017 was canceled. Who knew it got cold in January! I decided to go anyway and had what I consider a good winter day fishing.
It was cold so I delayed going until later in the morning. When I put the boat in the water there was a little ice on the ramp from a boat that was launched earlier but I had no problem launching. The only trouble I had was no water was coming out of the tattletale on my motor when I cranked it.
Usually a small stream of water comes out of the motor showing the water pump is working. My boat has a water pressure gauge and it showed the right pressure, so I knew the opening for the tattletale was frozen up. That does not really cause a problem but I idled to a nearby rocky point to start fishing rather than making a run. Sure enough, after fishing for a few minutes I cranked up and the stream of water flowed like it should. The warm sun and motor heat melted the ice.
Within a dozen cast with a crawfish DT 6 crankbait I hooked and landed a three-pound spotted bass. The water temperature was 51 degrees so the fish were about as active as I could expect this time of year. By the time I quit fishing four hours later I had also landed a two pound largemouth, a keeper spot, three short fish and had two more pull off without seeing them.
I never really got cold. My hands were cold when I got out in the wind and tried to fish, but back in coves, out of the wind, I had to open my jacket because I was too warm with the sun beaming down. When I was running on plane I wore gloves so even my hands were comfortable.
As I write this it is 74 degrees outside. Potato Creek Bassmasters has a tournament scheduled for Saturday. I hope it is not canceled because it is too hot for January!
For some reason folks seem to want to make up weird words and names for things they do, especially in sports. Nowhere do I see more of these stupid words than in bass fishing. Some of them amaze me, others are just so disgusting I ignore them to the point I will not even “like” a post on Facebook containing one of them.
I could understand using a more succinct name to save words, but when the new dumb name is as long or longer than simply saying “big bass” what is the sense? I guess folks are just trying to be cute or trying to be different just like everybody else.
Most of us do not catch big bass very often, so some think they need to show off by naming them something odd. Growing up I might hear a big bass called a “hog,” which morphed into “Hawg” over the years, but there were few others.
One name used for years was catching “Ole Nellie” for a landing a big bass, but more often it was “I lost Ole Nellie” today, meaning anything from hooking a stump to feeling a tap on your bait, setting the hook and missing the bite, never seeing the fish. But “Ole Nellie” was so common a Georgia tackle company used it for their name.
Nicknames like “bucketmouth” have been around for a while, but somehow largemouth are often named “largeheads” now. Why? Seems stupid to me. A largemouth head is no bigger than a spot or smallmouth, but it is used to delineate between the species. Will those folks now call smallmouth “smallheads?” What will they use for spotted bass? “Spothead” or “Medium Head” maybe since it seems to relate head to mouth size?
The first time someone said they caught a “Slobber Knocker”” I thought they had taken a picture of a couple of ten-year-old boys fighting. That image of a kid being hit in the nose and snot flying still comes to my mind rather than an image of a big bass.
A similar silly name is “Swamp Donkey,” a term that seems to be favored by college fishermen. My mind brings up someone putting out traps for a Sasquatch. Folks using that term are almost always fishing on a lake, and donkey and bass just do not jive in my mind.
“Chunk” or “Toad” or “Tank” makes some sense to me since those words describe a big fat bass pretty good, as do “Sow” or “Lunker.” I start getting lost when it goes to “Porker” or “Butterball” though.
I understand the term “green trout” for bass since bass were often called “trout” by some of my uncles. But how did the made-up word “Slaunch” get associated with fishing. I have heard “Slaunch Donkey,” (there’s that four-legged mammal again) or just a “Slaunce.” If someone on the street said “Slaunce” in a conservation, would it make you want to call the mental hospital?
“Gorilla” makes a little sense but it makes me think of a zoo, not fishing. But if you say “Hydrilla Gorilla” like one weigh-in guy on TV tournament shows, it rhymes a little, and makes some sense but is still silly. But how do you get “beefers” or “bulls” for a big bass?
Where in the world did “ditch pickle” come from? I often hear it from Lake Lanier fishermen this time of year, and fishing ditches in the winter there is a good pattern, but a “pickle?” I guess bass are green.
I try to have some respect for the game I kill and the fish I catch, and these names are just the opposite of respect. It’s weird – some fanatical bass fishermen that go crazy if a bass they caught dies will say they want to “Rip Some Lips.” That sounds like an effort to kill the bass. There is even on guide service called “Lipripper” and that name makes me ignore everything they say.
Fishing is supposed to be fun, even on those tough days when fish just do not bite. But I constantly hear fishermen say “It was a grind,’ or worse “I grinded it out to catch some.” Sounds like a miserable day at work to me. If it is that hard, why do it? Go grind where you get a salary, not trying to win a bet on catching fish.
The first time I saw a post that said “I got the dub on my home pond with this slaunch,” I ask the site to convert it to English, but it didn’t change. I knew if had something to do with bass fishing since the picture was a four-pound bass. I checked and it was posted by a college fisherman.
I guess he was trying to be cute, or different like every other fisherman his age, by using “hip” words. What he meant to say was “I got the win on Lake Logan Martin with this nice bass.”
I’ve already given my take on using “slaunch” for a bass. I don’t know if he was ashamed he was on Lake Logan Martin, trying to hid it or just being cute by calling it his “home pond.” Without research no one knows where his “home” is and calling a 17,000-acre lake a “pond” is just odd.
It took me a minute to figure somehow new-speak turned “Win” into “W” then “Dub.’ Really strange, I wonder what he is going to do with the millisecond he saved by using “Dub” rather than “Win.” Oh, wait, they are both three letters.
I have lots of pet peeves. Growing up I thought beatnik slang was stupid, in college hippy talk was cool but now every new thing that comes along just seems dumb. I guess my age is showing!
