Category Archives: Tournament Fishing

Clarks Hill August Bass Tournament

I love Clarks Hill but it surely has not been very nice to me this year in tournaments. I grew up fishing the lake and still have a place there at Raysville Boat Club and thought I knew the lake well. Now I am not so sure.

Last April I struggled to catch fish in a Spalding County Sportsman Club tournament. This past week I spent four days there, going over on Wednesday to practice two days to try to figure out something for a two day Flint River Club tournament over the weekend.

Fishing is always tough in August, and I much prefer to fish at night for bass, but the tournament was during the hot, miserable days. Our tournament was originally scheduled for Lake Russell, where spotted bass and different kinds of cover and structure make it a better choice in August. But since some of the club members couldn’t find a place to stay that they liked it was changed to Clarks Hill.
To make matters worse we put in at Soap Creek Marina up the Savannah River arm of the lake. Although it is only 17 miles from my trailer at Raysville to Soap Creek Marina by road, it is a 40 mile boat ride, one way, by water. Almost all my fishing at Clarks Hill has been up the Little River arm near Raysville and I did not want to make the long run in the tournament.

On Thursday I put in at Soap Creek and fished a little and looked at a lot of places on my deptfinder. It was too hot to sit still very long but I hoped to find something that would give me confidence for the tournament. I didn’t. I never caught a fish, and the places I checked just didn’t look good.

The only thing I found at all was schools of bait and fish under the two bridges in Soap Creek. I like fishing bridges and riprap and that is often a good pattern this time of year, especially since you can sit in the shade and fish! But I didn’t get a bite the little time I spent trying them.

On Friday I decided to check some of my better places near the boat club. Although I tried deep brush piles and similar places where I have caught August bass in years past, the only fish I was able to catch was around the pilings on the bridge near my trailer. So I knew I would not make the long run.

In the tournament, 11 members fished 18 hours in two days to land 53 keepers weighing about 85 pounds. There were four five-fish limits during the two days and two fishermen didn’t land a keeper either day. It was as tough as I expected.

Chuck Croft had gone over on Thursday and fished with two local fishermen before the tournament, and he found a pattern that paid off. He was the only one to have a limit both days and he won with 15.14 pounds. His partner JJ Polak came in second with six bass weighing 14.84 pounds. Niles Murray found a big fish and came in third with six bass weighing 13.20 pounds and his 5.97 pounder was by far the biggest fish. My eight keepers in two days weighed 9.24 pounds for fourth.

Chuck and JJ caught their fish on topwater plugs in very shallow water, and they said that pattern worked all day, a big surprise to me. I never really checked shallow water after the sun got up, just knowing the fish would be deep. Shows how much I know.

I fished a couple of deep points but I spent most of both days around the two bridges. I went to the first one at 7:30 Saturday morning and landed three keepers on a topwater popper by 8:30. Then it got tough. I checked some other places but was back at the bridge by 1:30 and landed my fourth keeper. Then, with just an hour left to fish, I caught my two biggest fish. All the last three hit worms.

Sunday I went straight to the bridges and caught two before the sun got up. With about 30 minutes left to fish, around 1:30, I got my third keeper. I tried a lot of things around the bridges but most of them just didn’t work.

Saturday morning there was fisherman fishing live minnows under the first bridge I went to. I talked to him and he said he had caught a lot of fish during the night but they had quit biting when it got light. It was discouraging when he told me he had caught crappie, hybrids, catfish and gar, but no bass, even on live bait.

If you go to Clarks Hill right now take live minnows and fish under bridges at night if you want to catch something.

What Is Your Summer Go-To Bait?

Pros Throw Go-To Baits All Summer
from The Fishing Wire

If you could only fish a handful of baits this summer, what would they be? We asked Bassmaster pro Ott Defoe and walleye guide Tom Neustrom, neither of whom hesitated before rattling off a short list of go-to lures.

Rapala and VMC Lures make many go-to baits

Rapala and VMC offer an assortment of lures ideal for probing the depths during the heat of summer

A Freshwater Hall of Fame Legendary Guide, Neustrom primarily targets walleyes in Minnesota. His top summer baits are the Rapala Scatter Rap, Rapala Husky Jerk, VMC Moon Eye Jig and Rapala Glass Shad Rap.

The 2011 Bassmaster Rookie of the Year, DeFoe hails from rural Knoxville, Tennessee. As a Bassmaster Elite Series and Bassmaster Open tournament competitor, he targets bass all across the country. His top summer baits are a Rapala DT-10, Rapala DT-16, Terminator Pro Series Jig and a VMC Shaky Head Jig.

“With those four baits, man, you should be able to catch a fish anywhere you go,” DeFoe says.

Scatter Rap

Several baits in the Scatter Rap family are in Neustrom’s regular rotation. Built on classic Rapala balsa body shapes, Scatter Raps derive their name and signature sweeping action from an innovative, patent-pending, curved Scatter Lip™.

“I love the Scatter Rap,” Neustrom says. “It’s a great bait with great action, especially when you change the cadence on your retrieve, which changes the action of the bait.”

A Scatter Rap is often a go-to bait

The Scatter Rap Shad has a unique, erratic action, and dives 5 to 8 feet.

Featuring what’s best described as evasive action, baits in the Scatter Rap family perfectly mimic a spooked baitfish fleeing attack, moving from one side to the next, triggering reactive bites.

When Neustrom wants to get Scatter action deeper than a Scatter Rap Shad’s 5- to 8-foot diving depth, he’ll cast a Scatter Rap Countdown, which will sink to whatever depth he wants to fish it. To get it to depth, he simply counts it down, “just like the names says.”

“I like to count ‘one-thousand-one, one-thousand-two,’ and when it do that, I usually get about two- to two-and-a-half feet per ‘one-thousand,'” Neustrom explains. “If you get to ‘five-one-thousand,’ you’re usually down ten feet.”

Once he gets the Scatter Rap Countdown to the strike zone, he slow rolls it back to the boat. “Just lift your rod and reel, pull it back, lift it again, pull it back,” Neustrom explains. “That gives you that erratic action in deeper water.”

Husky Jerk

Neustrom is “really partial to Husky Jerks,” he says. “I’ve caught a lot of smallmouths and walleyes on that bait.”

A natural-looking minnow profile and neutral buoyancy make the Husky Jerk practically irresistible to gamefish. Intermittently pausing the bait on the retrieve is key.

“You just stop reeling that bait and just let it sit there for a couple seconds and then start to reel again,” Neustrom explains. “It’s a great triggering action.”

VMC Moon Eye Jig

When he’s vertical jigging or pitching for walleyes with live minnows, Neustrom will often thread them on a VMC Moon Eye Jig, which features a very effective bait-keeper. “That bait keeper will keep even live bait on the hook, even better than just a straight hook.”

Glass Shad Rap

When trolling for walleyes, Neustrom favors Shad Raps, Scatter Rap Shads and Glass Shad Raps. He ties on the latter in clear water and when he’s needs a little extra running depth.

“I seem to get a little bit better depth with the Glass Rap than a regular Shad Rap,” he says.

His go-to size is a No. 5, which will run 12 1/2 to 14 feet at 2 to 2.5 mph, with 105 feet of Sufix 832 Advanced Superline braid out. His favorite colors are Glass Blue Shad and Glass Perch.

“They just work really, really good in these northern-tier lakes,” he says. “They outproduce a lot of other baits.”

DT-10 and DT-16

Throughout the summer, you’ll find both Rapala DT-10’s and DT-16’s tied on rods on DeFoe’s boat deck.

“Any time the fish are out offshore on deeper structure, as they often are in the summer months, one of those two baits is going to reach the range those fish are in,” he says.

Terminator Pro Series Jig

Not all summer bass live deep. “There’s always fish that live shallow in the summer time,” DeFoe says. “Even when it’s very, very hot.”

Ott Defoe’s go-to bait

Elite Pro Ott DeFoe relies on a variety of lures to score despite hot weather.

Flipping a Terminator Pro Series Jig in shallow water is among DeFoe’s favorite ways to catch summer bass. “Those fish, when they want to bite something, a lot of times, they want a big meal,” he explains. “You can put a big trailer on the back of that jig to give you a large profile.”

Featuring a unique head design, the Terminator Pro Series Jig is much more versatile than most jigs – it’s not just for shallow presentations. “You can cast that jig deep too,” Defoe explains. “You can basically do anything you want to do with it.”

Custom jig-skirt colors, color-matched brush guards, a single rattle and a heavy VMC® Black Nickel hook further differentiate the Terminator Pro Series Jig from other cookie-cutter jigs that all pretty much look the same.

VMC Shaky Head

When the going gets tough, DeFoe’s going to break out the spinning tackle and toss a green-pumpkin finesse worm on a VMC Shaky Head Jig.

“When times are tough and you need to get a bite, you can tie on that combination and catch one,” he advises.

Bass Fishing Tournament Payback Increasing

Payback Plus-The Next Generation of Tournament Fishing?

Tournament promises maximized winnings for competitors.

By Frank Sargeant, Editor
from The Fishing Wire

In the early days of bass fishing tournaments, it was common for the tournament director to keep a healthy portion of the entry fees for himself to pay for his investment of time and energy, dividing up what was left with the competitors. Understandably, in the case of a few more tight-fisted promoters, this resulted in some pretty scant purses for the anglers.

Tournament blast off

Big money events can lure hundreds of anglers to compete in bass tournaments these days, and for those who come out on top, the rewards can be substantial. (Frank Sargeant photo)

Those days are for the most part long gone thanks to the amazing choice of tournaments anglers have these days; 100 percent payback has become common in well-run major events, and good anglers get a strong return on their entry fees.

But Morris Sheehan, head honcho of the American Bass Anglers headquartered in Athens, Alabama, goes these events one better with his new 100% Plus Team Tour, slated for the lakes of North Alabama as well as Tennessee and Kentucky in 2015.

“We’re actually making a total payout greater than the sum of the entry fees in each of these events thanks to our sponsoring participants,” says Sheehan. “The top team is going to take home a $20,000 Triton/Mercury/Motor Guide bassing rig, and since these are what we call “contingency” tournaments, those who fish with late model rigs from Triton and Mercury, T-H Marine, The Boat House in Athens (Morris Sheehan’s boat dealership) and two dealerhships in Tennessee can earn big bonus money from the companies on top of that–the total for the winning team could run as high as $32,000 for each event.”

Sheehan said there will be a North Alabama division with four events on Lake Guntersville and one on Lake Wheeler, and a Tennessee/Kentucky division with four events on Kentucky Lake, one on Old Hickory.

“The tournaments are slated on alternating weekends so a team could fish both divisions if they want to,” says Sheehan. “About 20 percent of the field at each event will get a check so it’s a really good payback.”

The first tournaments of the season are March 14 at Guntersville for the North Alabama division, March 28 at Kentucky Lake for the Tennessee/Kentucky division.

Top five teams in each division will not only go home with the prizes and bonuses, they’ll also earn a no-fee entry into the Ray Scott Championship at a location to be announced during the season. (This year’s championship will be Nov. 12-15 on Lake Wheeler.) Top boater in that draw team event will take home $100,000 in cash, top co-boater $50,000.

Entry into the tournaments is $250 per event, and anglers can fish as many or as few as they want–though having a shot at the Ray Scott event will require fishing at least one division fully. A $100 optional bonus pot entry will also be available, with top rods splitting the entry fees.

The schedule for the North Division is:
Guntersville Lake 3/14/2015
Wheeler Lake 4/18/2015
Guntersville Lake 6/20/2015
Guntersville Lake 7/18/2015
Guntersville Lake 8/29/2015

The schedule for the Tennessee/Kentucky Division is:
Kentucky Lake 3/28/2015
Old Hickory Lake 4/25/2015
Kentucky Lake 6/27/2015
Kentucky Lake 7/25/2015
Kentucky Lake 8/22/2015

For details on the ABA 100% Plus Team Tournament, visit http://www.americanbassanglers.com/ABANews.php?Newsid=1163 or call 256-232-0406.

A July Fishing Trip To Wheeler and A Tournament At Sinclair

I got to fish two different lakes this past week with different results. On Tuesday I went to Wheeler and met Dawson Lenz, a college fisherman from Peachtree City. He won a lot of youth and high school tournaments here then chose North Alabama College since it is right on a great fishing lake. He says he can be on the lake 15 minutes after his last class each day.

Dawson organized a college fishing team there and is its president. This year they are rated the number one College team in the US. They have 28 members and most of them have boats, and most are very good fishermen and they win a lot of college level tournaments and many of them plan on a professional fishing career.

A week ago last Friday Dawson fished Wheeler and landed five bass weighing 18 pounds. He caught them on one ledge in
Spring Creek. We started at daylight and I hooked and lost a nice three pound bass on a popping frog on top. A few minutes later Dawson had another three pounder hit and it, too, came off.

We fished hard until about 2:00 PM but never caught a keeper bass, even on the place he landed the great catch just a few days earlier.
There was no current on Tuesday, a death knell for bass fishing on many lakes like Wheeler, but there had been current on
Fridays when he caught them.

Dawson did catch a couple of throwbacks before we left by flipping shallow grass but that was it.

He is a good fisherman but some days are really tough. Friday was one of them.

Last Saturday night eleven members of the Spalding County Sportsman club fished our July tournament at Sinclair. We braved rain when we started at 5:00 PM and then heavy boat traffic when it got pretty at about 6:30. Fishing was tough, with only two limits and three people not catching a keeper in eight hours of casting.

I was luck and won fish a five fish limit weighing about 8.5 pounds and had big fish with a 2.75 pound largemouth. Brian Bennetth was second with the other limit weighing a few tenths of a pound less.

At dark I was real frustrated. I had fished some of my best spot in Little River and Rooty Creek without getting a bite. Just before full dark I decide to run to the dam and try to change my luck.

I stopped on one of my favorite places, a sea wall with rock that drops into deep water quickly. One of my first casts to the seawall with a Zoom Mag 2 worm got a hit and I landed a two pounder. I was excited, a good keeper in the boat at 9:00 with four hours left to fish.

I worked on around that bank and caught another keeper beside a boathouse on the same seawall. By now it was full dark and I saw three shoreline lights ahead of me. All three lit the water around them and I got a keeper off each. Two of them hit as soon as may worm hit the water. The big one hit in two feet of water between a dock and the bank at 11:00 PM.

I fished hard until 1:00 when we quit but never got another bite, but those five were enough.

Fishing Lake Wheeler and Lake Sinclair

Dawson did catch a couple of throwbacks before we left by flipping shallow grass but that was it.

He is a good fisherman but some days are really tough. Friday was one of them.

I was lucky and won fish a five fish limit weighing about 8.5 pounds and had big fish with a 2.75 pound largemouth. Brian Bennetth was second with the other limit weighing a few tenths of a pound less.

At dark I was real frustrated. I had fished some of my best spot in Little River and Rooty Creek without getting a bite. Just before full dark I decide to run to the dam and try to change my luck.

I fished hard until 1:00 when we quit but never got another bite, but those five were enough.

Flashback To A Jackson December Tournament When the Lake Turned Over

Jackson proved to be as tough as Lanier, if not worse. The lake had turned over, never a good sign when it first happens. In the fall, as the surface of the lake cools due to cooler days and nights, the water at the top gets heavier. Cold water is heavier than warm water down to the point where it freezes.

All summer long the water in lakes is stable, with colder water at the bottom and warmer water at the top. This creates its own problems since the lower levels don’t get fresh, oxygenated water from upper levels. There is a section of water, called the thermocline, where the water drops in temperature and oxygen starts getting low. Below the thermocline the water is much colder and has little oxygen.

Fish tend to hold in the thermocline during the summer and move more shallow to feed. This limits them some. But as the surface water cools it starts falling and the lower levels will mix with the upper levels. This lowers oxygen content through-out the water column and makes fish sluggish most of the time. And they can move to any depth, so they become more scattered.

The water usually gets murky when turnover happens. It does not look muddy but is cloudy. Jackson had been very clear lately so when people said the lake had gotten stained, and we had no rain, I knew the lake had turned over. The water temperatures confirmed it.

The Potato Creek Bassmasters had a buddy tournament at Jackson last Saturday, the day before our two day tournament, and most of them had a tough day. A couple of fishermen had pretty good days but most did not. In fact, some members of the Flint River club that fished the buddy tournament on Saturday had such a bad day they did not come back to fish on Sunday.

We had 18 members of the Spalding County Sportsman Club and the Flint River Bass Club fishing for eight hours on Sunday. There were only 27 keepers weighed in. Two members had limits but there were eight fishermen that did not weigh in a keeper. The 27 keepers weighed 34.88 pounds and almost all were spotted bass.

Kwong Yu had a good day, landing one of the limits and winning with 8.96 pounds. His 2.60 pound bass was big fish. Raymond English had the other limit and came in second with 7.99 pounds. My four keepers weighed 5.35 pounds for third and fourth was Brandon Stooksbury with three at 3.35 pounds.

By 11:30 I was very frustrated. I had not hooked a bass even though I had fished a lot of places in four hours and tried everything I could think of to try. Then, to make matters worse, I missed a bite, broke my line setting the hook a few minutes later and then missed a third bite. I was about ready to give up.

I talked to two other fishermen at about that time and they had not caught any fish either. I decided to run way up the Tussahaw and try to scratch out a keeper. The first place I stopped, on a rocky point, I got a good keeper spot on a jig and pig.

After fishing around the area for more than an hour with only one more bite, another keeper spot that hit by a dock, I ended up where I caught the first one and caught two more keepers, one on a jig and pig and one on a jig head worm. I stayed there until the end of the tournament but could not catch another fish.

The tournament year is over for all three Griffin clubs now since Potato Creek fished their December tournament yesterday. We will all start over in January so now is a good time to plan on joining a club and showing all of us how to catch bass. The Flint River Bass Club meets at Hong Kong 2 the first Tuesday each month at 7:00, Potato Creek Bassmasters meet the Monday after the first Tuesday and the Spalding County Sportsman Club meets at Panda Bear the third Tuesday each month at 7:30 PM.

Each club fishes the weekend after the meeting except when we have two and three club tournaments. Both the Sportsman Club and Flint River fish on Sunday and Potato Creek fishes their tournaments on Saturday. So you have some choices of which weekend day to fish.

We have a lot of fun in the clubs and you can learn from other members, sometimes. Most members share how they caught their fish – after the tournament is over. But that is good info for the next time. And you can get good information on boats, motors, rods, reels and fishing lures and lines from other members based on what they use.

None of the clubs have draw tournaments so you and a friend can join and fish together. If you don’t have a boat or a friend with one, you can join and we should be able to find someone in the club for you to fish with.

Catching Bass At West Point Was Tough In My Club July Tournament

Last Sunday 14 members and guests of the Flint River Bass Club fished our July tournament at West Point. After 8.5 hours of casting, nobody had a limit and three people didn’t land a keeper. We weighed in 17 bass that totaled about 32 pounds.

A teenage guest of Rick Burns, Patrick Thomas, beat us all with two bass weighing 5.51 pounds and his 4.72 pound largemouth was big fish. Chuck Croft has four at 5.47 pounds for second, third was Gary Morrow with one bass weighing 3.95 pounds and my two at 3.79 pounds was good for fourth.

Fishing was tough for us but the West Georgia Bass Club, a buddy tournament trail out of LaGrange, had a tournament the same day. They had about 180 boats in the tournament and there were many teams with good catches. It took five bass weighing 17 pounds to win and at least 11 teams had more than 12 pounds.

I started fishing between the railroad bridge and Highway 109 bridge. They took off at about 6:20 AM and I saw only about ten boats headed down the lake. I stayed in that area all day and I guess that was a mistake. Most everybody in the West Georgia club went up the river. Maybe that is where I should have headed.

I started in the dark fishing a spinner bait on rocks but never got a bite. At 6:30 I was fishing a buzz bait and hooked a keeper, and it fell off as I tried to lift it into the boat. That gave me hope I could catch some fish on topwater but I never got another bite on top.

After the sun got over the trees I switched to a jig head worm and fished some rocks in about eight feet of water. I missed one bite but a little later, at 7:30 I hooked and landed a keeper spotted bass. At least I had one in the live well and would not zero.

I fished that place hard and a couple of more without catching anything then I ran to a rock pile where I caught seven or eight spotted bass a month ago. I fished it for 30 minutes without a bite, then just as I was about to leave, hooked and landed a bass that was close to three pounds. That fired me up and I stayed there for two more hours – without getting another bite.

With less than two hours to fish I hit several more spots but never caught another fish. It was a long, tough day for me and everyone else in the club. I thought my three pounder might have a shot at big fish but there were two others bigger than mine. Just my luck.

Saturday night is the July Sportsman Club tournament at Sinclair. The tournament will run, or ran by the time you read this, from 5:00 PM to 1:00 AM. I hope the fish will bite better at night. At least the weather will be much more bearable.

Fishing Lake Weiss In June

Lake Weiss is usually a great lake to fish in June with lots of quality bass in shallow water, even in the heat, so the Spalding County Sportsman Club scheduled our June tournament there last weekend. We should have known fishing would be tougher than normal. Sam Smith said during practice on Friday he talked with several local bass fishermen and all told him fishing was the worst it had been all year.

In the tournament 12 members and guests fished for nine hours on Saturday and nine more on Sunday in extreme heat. There was little breeze either day, making the heat even worse. We landed 63 keepers weighing about 94 pounds. There were six five-fish limits and no one zeroed for the two days.
I got lucky and caught a limit both days. My ten keepers weighed 16.93 pounds for first. Russell Prevatt had the best one day catch with a limit on Sunday weighing 12.5 pounds and his eight weighing 16.51 pounds for the two days was a close second. Sam Smith had nine bass weighing 13.04 for third and fourth was Mickey McHenry with seven bass at 10.83 pounds. Zane Fleck had a pretty 6.08 pound largemouth for big fish and it broke the cumulative pot for the third time this year.
I went over on Friday and spent a couple of hours riding around to get orientated on the lake and check some spots where I had caught fish there in years past. I also looked at some places I had put on maps in Alabama Outdoor News articles. Those old articles, with GPS coordinates, really help.

Although I made only a few casts Friday one of them provided a key for the tournament. In my last club tournament there about five years ago I had caught some good fish by casting worms and spinner baits under overhanging trees along the bank. The only fish I hooded Friday hit a spinner bait on that pattern in the late afternoon.

Saturday morning I ran to a bridge and started fishing it with a topwater plug at 6:00 AM. I quickly caught a keeper spotted bass then lost another keeper that jumped and threw my plug. At that time I didn’t realize how hard it was going to be to hook a keeper so I was not too upset at losing one.

After working some gravel banks and points I went to docks at about 10:00 AM and fished a small jig and pig around them. Although I caught two keepers in the next two hours, I had fished a lot of docks without a bite.
After noon I decided to try the overhanging brush pattern and ran to the back of Spring Creek where trees overhang the water. Although the water along the edge is usually only a couple of feet deep, and you can’t hit five feet of water with a 30/06, it sometimes works. Even though the water was almost 90 degrees.
I caught two keepers in the next hour then a bad thunder storm made me head for the van, parked at the Spring Creek ramp. I sat in it for over an hour. I hated to miss fishing but will not go out when lightening is flashing. I did not get a bite after the storm.

At weigh-in I was first in line. After my fish were weighed I headed to the van and campground since another storm was coming and just got parked on my campsite before it hit. I had no idea I was in second place with my little limit.

Sunday morning I decided to try Cowan Creek since I had not found any concentration of fish in Spring Creek. As soon as I stopped I got a nice three pound largemouth on a spinner bait from a grass bed but after an hour did not get any more bites around grass. At 7:30 I cast under an overhanging tree and caught a small keeper on a spinner bait. That made me fish that pattern and I got four more keepers on spinner baits and worms under overhanging trees in Cowan Creek before the 3:00 weigh-in.

I didn’t think I had a very good catch and was surprised to win. It helped I was the only one with a limit both days.

Summer Bass Fishing and Topwater Baits

Topwater baits are often the way to catch summer bass.

Sometimes I don’t think I know what I am doing when I am bass fishing, but most of the time I am sure I don’t know what I am doing. A trip to Sinclair a week ago Friday drove this home to me. The Sunday before that trip the Flint River Bass Club had fished the lake for nine hours and it took only 6.1 pounds to win and my five at 5.68 was fourth.

The following Friday I fished Sinclair with Bo Larkin, a UGA College Team fisherman. He lives in Watkinsville and fishes Sinclair a good bit, but I am three times as old as him and I started fishing Sinclair 20 years before he was born!

We started fishing at daylight and we both caught some keeper fish. He had one about 2.5 pounds, bigger than anything I caught the Sunday before. At 11:00 we were marking holes for the GON article and stopped on a small island. I pointed to a nearby cove and told him that is where I started in the tournament and landed a small keeper, but it was the only one I caught there.

Bo said he had never fished that cove and wanted to try it. I told him I didn’t think it was worth our time since the sun was bright and I had gotten only one bite there. But we went over to it and he started throwing a buzz bait, his favorite way to fish.

I thought he was wasting his time since the sun was high and bright and the water was only about three feet deep. But he caught a bass weighing over seven pounds from the shallow water on his buzz bait. Right where I had fished. Shows how much I know.

I fished a buzz bait right where Bo got the big one but didn’t get a bite. Maybe I was fishing too slow or too fast. Maybe I was fishing the wrong size or color buzz bait. Or maybe he knows something I don’t.

It always amazes me when my clubs fish the same lake the day a big tournament is going on there and we don’t do nearly as well as they do. And when I go fishing with really good fishermen, from college team members to established pros, they fish the same baits in the same places I fish but they catch more and bigger fish.

Maybe they have some special talent or sixth sense about catching bas I don’t have.

Last Saturday Raymond English had that special something at Oconee. The Potato Creek Bassmasters fished their June tournament with19 members landing 59 bass weighing 126 pounds. There were five five-fish limits in the tournament.

Raymond blew everyone away with five bass weighing 18.85 pounds and had the big fish of the tournament with 5.52 pounder. Bobby Ferris had fve at 13,01 for second, third was Ryan Edge with 12.32 pounds and Kwong Yu had 11.32 pounds for fourth.

Raymond said he caught his fish early on a topwater frog and had a second bass over five pounds but not quite as big as the other one. Several people got fish around five pounds each early in the morning. It was a great day on Oconee.

Fishing for bass can be tough this time of year but as the two trips above show, topwater baits can still catch good fish. One of the best area to fish topwater baits in the summer is where bream or bedding or feeding. Last week during the full moon lots of bream were bedding and that is always good.

But bream live shallow all the time, so fishing a topwater bait around grassbeds and wood cover in shallow water often works. That is the pattern Bo fishes at Sinclair and most of the spots we put on the map are like that. Details will be in the July issue of Georgia Outdoor News.

Also, Mayflies hatch and lay their eggs during the summer and bream feed like crazy on them. That almost always means you can catch bass on topwater baits. Bream are concentrated in a smaller area and are intent on feeding, so that makes them an easy meal for a hungry bass.

Work a buzz bait, popping plug or plug with spinners on the ends where the bass are feeding and you should catch some. The time before the sun gets on the water is usually best, but as Bo showed it is worth trying all day long.

Fishing A Tournament At Lake Allatoona

Each month I write a “Map of the Month” article for Georgia Outdoor News. In these articles I go to a lake with a local expert and we discuss the patterns for bass fishing that will work during the month. Then we mark 10 spots on a lake map where you can fish those patterns, and describe how to fish each spot in detail.

On a Sunday a few years ago the Flint River Bass Club had a tournament at Lake Allatoona. Although I have done several “Map of the Month” articles there over the years, I have never fished out of my boat there and never fished a tournament on that lake. I did not have a chance to go up and explore the lake and try to find some fish before the tournament.

I pulled out a copy of my article on Allatoona in August, 2002 with David and Pansy Millsaps. I read it Saturday night and rigged baits they suggested. On Sunday morning I headed to hole number 1 in the article and started fishing as instructed. I quickly caught a 14 inch spotted bass on a tube jig on a boat ramp.

I kept fishing that spot and caught a two pound spotted bass on a Carolina rig. I felt pretty good with two keepers in the boat on the first place and I had nine more to fish. As I idled to the second spot I read the instructions again – fish around the point with a jig and pig, then throw a crankbait before leaving.

After fishing around the point twice, first with the jig and then with a Carolina rig, I had gotten no bites, so I started to leave. I remembered about throwing the crankbait so I picked up a rod with one tied on and hooked a good fish on the first cast. It was a 3.65 pound spotted bass and turned out to be the big bass of the day.

When I headed up to hole number 3 skiers has churned the lake up pretty bad. I fished it and caught a short bass but no keepers. It was rough fishing in the waves, and the sun was getting hot. When I headed to hole number 4 I had to idle under a bridge and the shade felt good, so I stopped and fished there.

I quickly got a hit on a small jig and pig and landed another two pound spotted bass. About 30 minutes later I caught another solid keeper on the jig and pig. That gave me my limit. I fished one more spot from the article but caught nothing there before heading to the weigh-in.

We had 14 members fishing the tournament and my five bass weighing 10.8 pounds gave me first. The 3.65 pound spot was big fish for the tournament. Bobby Ferris had a five fish limit weighing 5.12 pounds for second, Don Schafer had 4.92 pounds for third and Kwong Yu came in fourth with 4.78 pounds.

In the tournament three members caught five fish limits but there were six people without a keeper. We landed 26 bass weighing 33.61 pounds and there was only one largemouth weighed in.

For many years Lake Allatoona has been called the “Dead Sea” because it was so hard to catch a bass there. The population of spotted bass has increased over the past few years, and now some decent catches come out of Allatoona. I was real lucky to have the article I wrote three years ago help me out in my first tournament there. That information really helped.

Another tournament fishing the same places didn’t work as well.

On a Sunday a few years ago eight members and guests of the Spalding County Sportsman Club fished our September tournament at Lake Allatoona. Three of the members managed to land five fish limits and there were two members that did not catch a keeper bass.

Javin English had a limit and won with 5.55 pounds. Brent Terry fished with me and beat me out of the back of my boat with a limit weighing 5.48 pounds. I had a limit weighing 5.21 pounds for third and Jason Wheeler had two bass weighing 3.71 pounds for fourth. He also had big bass with a 2.73 pound fish.

Many members caught a lot of bass shorter than the 12 inch limit. Although Allatoona has been called the “Dead Sea” because of its tough fishing, the eight of us weighed in 20 bass, but they were small. It is still a lot of fun to catch that many bass. Alltoona seems along way away since you have to drive right through down town Atlanta, but it was only 74 miles from my house, about the same distance as Sinclair or West Point.

I caught my fish on a jig and pig and a jig head worm. Brent caught his on a Carolina rig. We caught most of them fairly shallow toward the backs of creeks.

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