Last Sunday we had a tournament at Lake Oconee.

In the tournament, 18 members and guests fished from 6:30 AM to 3:30 PM. In the nine hours of casting, we brought in 33 14-inch keepers weighing about 65 pounds. There were only two five-bass limits and seven fishermen didn’t land a keeper.

Niles Murray won with five at 11.04 pounds. Chuck Croft was second with five at a very close 11.02 pounds. Tim Puckett got third with three fish weighing 9.20 pounds and his 5.44 pound largemouth was big fish. Javin English rounded out the top four with four keepers at 7.87 pounds.

Niles, Chuck and Javin all said they caught one or two bass early on the shad spawn. Jordan and I fished two places with a lot of shad spawning, but we caught only hybrids. That seemed to doom us the rest of the day.

At 11:00 we didn’t have a keeper in the boat although Jordan landed a 15 pound channel cat on a drop shot worm. I had caught a few short bass on plugs and worms but that was it. We had fished from the ramp at Long Shoals all the way to the mouth of Lick Creek and were very frustrated so we decided to make a big move.

After running the 10 miles to Double Branches we pulled into one of my favorite coves this time of year. On a shallow secondary point Jordan got a keeper on his drop shot then I caught one on a jig head. Within a few minutes each of us caught our second keeper of the day on that point.

About 15 minutes later I got a hit beside a dock and landed my third keeper. That was it! Neither of us caught another keeper although we fished hard the rest of the tournament.

The Potato Creek Bassmasters fished Lanier on April 18 for their monthly tournament. Eleven members fished to land 38 14-inch keepers weighing about 80 pounds. There were three five-bass limits and only one fisherman didn’t land a keeper.

Donnie Willis won with a good catch of five weighing 13.25 pounds, Lee Hancock came in second with five at 11.19 and Raymond English was a close third with five at 11.13. It is always amazing how close the weights often are in a tournament. JJ Compton had four at 9.62 for fourth and his 3.78 pounder was big fish.

Last weekend 13 members and guests of the Spalding County Sportsman Club fished our April tournament at Clarks Hill. Fishing was very good for a few and tough for others. There were nine five-bass limits and one fisherman didn’t weigh in a keeper after fishing ten hours on Saturday and eight hours on Sunday. We had 82 keepers weighing about 163 pounds.

Sam Smith won with ten at 24.56 pounds, his partner Chris Davies had ten at 23.68 pounds for second and Raymond English was third with nine at 23.45. Raymond had big fish with a 6.61 pound largemouth he caught Saturday. My nine weighing 20.86 pounds was good for fourth. My partner Jordan McDonald was fifth with nine at 17.96 and Zane Fleck had ten at 17.19 for sixth.

I went over on Wednesday and fished a few hours that afternoon. The lake is full and the bushes are in the water, usually a great pattern this time of year. I caught several small bass then in the last hour before I went in I landed a three pounder and two more over 2.5 pounds.

Jordan joined me the next morning and we put in before daylight and went looking for shad and herring spawning. We didn’t see any so we started fishing bushes, and were real disappointed. After fishing about ten hours we landed only about ten keeper bass, and all were less than two pounds.

Friday morning we started a little later and again looked for shad and herring spawning. We caught a couple of big hybrids on a blow-through, a place where shallow water between two islands or an island and the bank has a gravel bottom. Wind and waves wash the dirt away, leaving the gravel, and herring spawn on them.

The next one we fished we saw some schooling activity and I landed a two pounder on a Carolina rigged Baby Brush Hog. Then I got a keeper on a crankbait off the Raysville bridge riprap. That should have told me something, but I missed it. After fishing the rest of the day we again had landed fewer than ten keepers and the first one was the biggest.

After three sunny days Saturday morning was rainy so Jordan and I drove the 25 miles from my place at Rayville Boat Club to Mistletoe State Park rather than riding 7 miles between the two by water in the boat. We took off and went to a rocky point I like, and both caught some big hybrids but no bass. As it got a little lighter we went to a nearby blow through but nothing was happening there.

Since it was raining hard by now I just started fishing around the island with the blow though. Jordan saw some schooling fish on a point on the main bank across from it and we went over there, and I got a three pounder on a crankbait. After going back to the blow through I caught another three pounder. Working around the island, I got a 4 pounder and lost two more nice bass when they jumped and threw the crankbait.

I also got a five pound channel cat on the crankbait. Jordan got an eight pounder the next day. Some folks had a lot of noodles out for cats in that area and we saw several with fish on them, and Jordan pulled one up that had an eight pound blue cat on it. Catfish were biting good!

By the time we had to go in I had caught ten keepers and culled three three-pound bass – very unusual for me. Raymond English and I were tied with 16.19 pounds each – one of my best five fish limits ever in a tournament.

Sunday was clear and very windy. Although I fished hard I landed only four small keepers and Jordan had the same. What a difference a day made!

Sam and Chris came in first and second by fishing Raysville Bridge. I knew the fish I caught there should have told me something!

Legendary Bass Pros in North Alabama on Lake Guntersville

By Frank Sargeant
from The Fishing Wire

Most of the best-known names in professional bass fishing probed the favorite local spots at Lake Guntersville, in the northeast corner of Alabama, as the Diet Mountain Dew Bassmaster Elite tour got underway on Thursday, April 9, and continued through Sunday, April 12. Daily takeoffs and weigh-ins were at Guntersville City Harbor, adjacent the 431 bridge on the north edge of town.

With water temperatures still in the low 60s, the lake’s giant female bass haven’t completed their spring spawning, and this should mean fishing fans will see some gigantic fish brought to the scales during the four-day event.

“There was a 12-7 caught in a tournament here just recently,” says Elite Pro Chris Lane. “I would be surprised if there aren’t several fish over 10 pounds caught next week. It’s going to be that kind of tournament.”

Lane might well be one of the anglers finishing near the top–he has lived on Guntersville for the past several years, thrives on shallow water fishing due to his Florida roots, and just won an Elite Tour event at the Sabine River.

Guntersville’s vast beds of milfoil, hydrilla and coontail grass will likely play a role as the Elite pros try to figure out what the successful pattern to win here will be. Lily pads, primrose and other shoreline cover, as well as docks, also attract spawning fish here.

Lane agrees with the popular assessment that it could take a four-day weight of more than 100 pounds to win. So does Casey Ashley, winner of the GEICO Bassmaster Classic held on South Carolina’s Lake Hartwell in February.

Like all B.A.S.S. events held in Alabama, the field will include a host of in-state anglers with extensive knowledge of the venue.

Lane, who lives close enough to the lake that he can have his boat in the water in just minutes, finished 36th in the 2014 Bassmaster Classic and 40th in the 2010 Elite Series event on Guntersville – his two most recent events on the fishery.

Justin Lucas, who relocated to Guntersville from his native northern California, will be fishing a professional event for the first time on his new home lake. He’s a top-rated young angler who can never be counted out. Ditto for Kevin Hawk, who now guides on the lake.

Aaron Martens, another California native who now makes his home in Leeds, Ala., has a rich history on Lake Guntersville that includes a win in the 2009 Elite Series event on the lake. He also finished 13th in the 2014 Bassmaster Classic, 17th in a 2006 Elite Series event and 14th in Bassmaster Tour events in 2004 and 2005 here.

Flamboyant pro Gerald Swindle of Warrior will be in the mix, and has proven himself a consistent producer when bed fishing, and Randy Howell of Springville won the 2014 Classic on this lake, though that was a late winter event where crankbaits were king. Randall Tharp, an Alabama native now living in Florida, can’t be counted out here either–Guntersville is practically his home lake.

Launches are scheduled for 6:15 a.m. CT each day from Guntersville City Harbor with weigh-ins also set for the ramp at 3:15 p.m. daily. Launches and weigh-ins are free and open to the public. The B.A.S.S. Outdoor Expo gets underway at noon Saturday and Sunday, and free demo rides from Mercury, Yamaha, Nitro, Skeeter and, Triton will be available.

Skeet Reese won after Mike Iaconelli led for three days. Iaconelli caught only one bass the final day and dropped to 12th place.

For details and results, visit www.bassmaster.com.

Last Sunday 21 members and guests of the Flint River Bass Club fished our April tournament at Lanier. We were all excited – fishing reports said they were biting good and everything seemed right. And when Chuck Croft told us at the meeting Tuesday night he and his partner won a tournament there the weekend before with 22 pounds, we just knew we would catch fish.

Nope. In nine hours of casting, we landed 41 bass weighing about 79 pounds. There were only four five-bass limits and six members didn’t land a keeper. As expected though, there were only eight largemouth landed. The rest were spotted bass. There is a 14 inch length limit on all bass at Lanier, though. Many of us caught a lot of 13 inch bass that would be keepers on most lakes.

We are going to have to stop allowing guests to fish this tournament. Last year William Scott fished as a guest and won the tournament and had a six pounder, the biggest bass caught in any of our tournaments. This year Sam Smith fished as Niles Murray’s guest and won it with five weighing 10.79 pounds. And he had a 3.12 pound spot for big fish.

Brandon Stooksbury should have won but he came in 7 minutes late after being told the wrong weigh-in time on the phone after arriving late for blast off. He did place second with five weighing 8.86 after a 21 percent penalty. And he had a 3.39 pound spot that would have been big fish without the penalty.

William Scott came back as a guest and came in third with five at 8.40 pounds and my five weighing 7.60 was good for fourth place. Jordan McDonald fished with me and had three weighing 5.61 pounds so we had a decent day, but not nearly as good as expected.

I couldn’t wait to get to my first place at the 6:30 blast off. A few years ago I did an article on Lanier in early April with Laura Gober and she took me to a place at daylight where we caught several three pound plus spots on jerkbaits, and she said that was not unusual. Jordan and I hit it and fished it for an hour, and caught several short fish. I did hook a 2.5 pound plus spot we could see down about six feet under the boat in the clear water, but it pulled off the jerkbait.

By 10:00 we were frustrated. Although we had caught several small bass we didn’t have a keeper in the live wells. So we took off up the Chestatee River, headed to the back end of it where the lake looks more like what I am used to fishing. Jordan had taken me up there last March in a Flint River tournament and I came in second in it.

On the way we stopped on a hump and Jordan caught a keeper at about 10:30 so our attitude improved. And soon after getting to the very back end of the river, 22 miles from the blast off ramp, I landed a keeper largemouth on a jig and pig from about two feet of water.

We fished shallow bushes, grass and rocks the rest of the day and I landed four more keepers and Jordan got two more. I had only three with about an hour left to fish when I hooked a three pound plus largemouth on a worm in two feet of water and told Jordan to get the net just as it jumped and threw the hook.

With less than 30 minutes to fish we went to a small island and I caught a keeper largemouth and a keeper spot to fill my limit almost on back to back casts. It took us 22 minutes at 60 miles per hour to get back to the ramp, but it was worth the ride!

They say if you don’t like the weather in Georgia, wait a few hours and it will be different. That was certainly true at West Point last week. In the five days I was there for the Top Six we had everything from hail to warm sun shine, pouring rain to clear skies and cold, strong winds.

I went over to Whitetail Campground on Thursday afternoon, put the boat in the water and set up my van camper. The campground is straight across the lake from Pyne Park, the tournament launch site and it is very convenient to leave the boat in the water and go over each morning to the blast off, avoiding the confusion and mess of 100 boats trying to launch.

Friday morning I got up and started trying to figure out where the bass were and what they would hit. When I saw the water temperature was 61 degrees I tried a topwater plug and caught a keeper spotted bass so I fished it for an hour without another bite. After switching to a jig and a Carolina rigged lizard I started catching keeper spots on every gravel point I fished, but I knew they would not win the tournament.

I did catch a three pound largemouth on Saturday morning out of some brush on a point, the size fish that would make a difference in the tournament. But after trying that kind of cover for the rest of the day all I caught were more small spots, although I was throwing big jig and pig.

Sunday morning Jordan McDonald and Jennifer Spell went out with me to practice. Although they were both fishing with the Flint River team and I was on the Sportsman Club team we were working together. The first place I stopped, another rocky point with some brush, I hooked and landed a six pound largemouth and got real excited! Maybe that pattern would work.

About noon we went into a small creek up the river. Jordan had talked to a friend and was told running a square bill crankbait by wood cover worked, and the first stick he tried he landed a 3.5 pound largemouth. The next stick I landed a 2.5 pound largemouth so we were excited.

As luck would have it that afternoon at the drawing, Jordan and I were paired for Monday. The computer won’t pair two fishermen from the same club, but since we were on different clubs we got to fish together. We had a plan!

Monday morning we took off to the point where I had caught the three pounder since it was close. Although there were no largemouth there, spots were feeding and we stayed for almost two hours until we both had four keepers. The rain made us stay longer than planned on those small fish but we didn’t want to run in the pouring rain.

On the point where I had caught the six pounder we caught several spots, but no largemouth. So we headed to the creek up the river, hoping to cull all those little spots. But again nothing but small spots hit there. A little after noon we started fishing pockets in Yellowjacket Creek, the pattern Jordan’s friend told him about, and Jordan landed a 4.5 pounder, but I caught nothing but small fish.

At weigh-in Jordan had a little over 10 pounds and my five weighed an even seven pounds. Jordan was in a good position but I knew I was in trouble. The fisherman weighing in behind me had five weighing 22 pounds! And some others had 14 to 16 pounds.

The second day even the spots quit hitting on the first two places my partner from Savannah and I fished so we went to the creek up the river. We started catching some decent largemouth as well as spots there and I even landed a 5.65 pound largemouth on a Carolina rig. We stayed there until we had to go in.

I had five at just over 10 pounds and my partner had just under 10 pounds to go with the 10 pounds he had caught the day before. My big fish ended up being the seventh biggest in the tournament.

Jordan finished in 16th place out of almost 200 fishermen and I came in 32nd. Mickey McHenry on the Flint River team placed 15th. The Sportsman Club team was 15th out of 33 teams and the Flint River Team was 16th.

Although I was dead tired after all that fishing I am already looking forward to the other Federation Top Six at Hartwell in October and this Federation tournament at Eufaula next April!

At Oconee on Sunday 15 members and guests of the Spalding County Sportsman Club fished our March tournament. After casting in the rain for eight hours we brought 65 bass over the 14 inch minimum for keepers and they weighed about 140 pounds. Fishing was good, with 8 five fish limits weighed in. Only one person didn’t have a keeper.

Kwong Yu showed up for his first tournament with the club this year and won it all with five weighing 14.38 pounds and big fish of 6.15 pounds. Craig Zoellner, also fishing his first tournament this year with the club, was second with five at 12.12 pounds. Raymond English placed third with five at 12.06 and fourth was Zane Fleck with five weighing 11.61 pounds.

I thought I had a pretty good catch until everybody started weighing in the big stringers. Niles Murray had five at 10.53 pounds to come in fifth and my five at 9.96 pounds was sixth. My partner Jordan McDonald had four weighing 9.84 for a close seventh. We had a lot of fish weighing two pounds or more so the bigger fish bit pretty good.

I caught six keepers during the day, all on a Texas rigged Baby Brush Hog. Jordan caught his on a variety of baits. The fish were on secondary points and banks back in coves and in three to five feet of water. Niles said he and Raymond caught their fish in similar places but all on Carolina rigs.

Today is the last day of practice at West Point for the state Top Six. The tournament is Monday and Tuesday. I am hoping the fishing will be good but the cold nights this weekend have me worried. Bass moving toward the shallow bedding areas and fairly easy to catch often back off and feed less if the water temperature drops.

At Jackson Sunday we had five youth fishing the youth tournament and four teams of youth and adults in the buddy part of the tournament. After six hours of casting on a beautiful day we brought in 20 keepers weighing about 26 pounds. Almost all were spots but they bit pretty good.

In the Youth tournament Dawson McMonigle won, Tyler Gruber was second and had big fish and Hunter Jenkins placed third. Treston Cheeves and Kemson Cheeves also fished but did not place in the top three.

In the Buddy tournament Sam Smith and Dawson had five weighing 7.14 to win, Hunter and I had five weighing 6.76 for second, third was Raymond English fishing with his two grandsons Treston and Kemson with two bass at 3.88 and big fish weighing 3.09 pounds and fourth was Larry Cook and Tyler with one at 1.35 pounds.

Hunter and I caught more than a dozen keeper spots and some smaller fish, mostly on jig head worms. The fish we caught were all on rocks, something spots love, and most were right off the main lake in five or six feet of water. Many of them picked up the bait and started swimming with it without me feeling the hit.

I think everyone had a good time!

I kept some of the spots and fried filets on Monday night. They were delicious. Jackson is overrun with spots under 14 inches long, there is no size limit on them since they are invasive and hurt a lake when they get in it, and taste good. Right now is a good time for a trip to Jackson to catch some to fry.

At Sinclair 12 members of the Sportsman Club fished our February tournament on a rainy but fairly warm day. We had 35 keepers weighing about 62 pounds. There were five five-fish limits and only two fishermen didn’t have a keeper in the 8.5 hours we fished.

I was lucky enough to get five weighing 10.98 pounds for first, Billy Roberts had five at 10.36 pounds for second and big fish with a 3.57 pound largemouth, third was Niles Murray with five at 8.83 pounds and fourth was Zane Fleck with five at 8.15 pounds. Those weights were fairly close but for big fish I had a 3.53 pounder and Raymond English had a 3.50 pounder. The three biggest fish were separated by seven hundredths of a pound!

I have had a good year fishing with a Rapala DT 6 in crawfish. Of the four tournaments I have fished this year I have two first, one second and one fifth place, all on that one plug. I have weighed in 14 keepers and all but two of them hit it. I think I will keep fishing it!

Sunday morning I started on a steep rocky bank with docks and brush on it but didn’t get a bite. My second stop was on a point with a good drop on one side, then a very shallow clay flat for about 30 yards before a series of docks start I fished the point without a bite then started toward the first dock.

I usually don’t fish the shallow flat in February but I cast the DT 6 up into about two feet of water as I headed toward the dock, and caught a 3.5 pound largemouth. That got my attention so I started hitting the flat hard. It took 30 minutes, but then I got the 3.53 pound keeper, my big fish. A couple of casts later I got a third fish about 1.5 pounds.

After switching to a jig head worm I got my fourth keeper, one about 1.5 pounds. I felt pretty good, especially after working down the docks and catching a short fish by a dock post, then a keeper about 1.3 pounds on the next cast. I had a limit.

With an hour left to fish I was back on the flat and got a 2 pounder on the crankbait, culling my smallest keeper. I missed a bite on a jig head worm and on a Alabama rig, and had one come off the crankbait before I saw the fish, but I didn’t need them to win. But would one of them have been big fish? I will never know.