Two tournaments at West Point in the last month showed fishing can be good but the water is still a little cold for it to be great for everybody. The Potato Creek Bassmasters had a tournament there on February 14 and the Flint River Bass Club fished our tournament on March 8 and both had some members with decent catches but others struggling to even catch a keeper.

In the Potato Creek tournament, 16 members fished for eight hours to land 15 keepers weighing about 36 pounds. There was one five-fish limit and nine fishermen didn’t catch a keeper. At West Point largemouth have to be 14 inches long to keep but spots an be 12 inches long.

Lee Hancock had the limit weighing 14.33 pounds and won, and his 3.99 pounder was big fish. That is an excellent catch any time of year. Bobby Ferris had four at 9.83 pounds for second, third was Eric Blessitt with two at 4.96 pounds and Ryan Edge placed fourth with one at 1.83 pounds.

In the Flint River Tournament 19 members fished eight hours to land 24 keepers weighing about 49 pounds. There were two five-fish limits and eight members didn’t have as keeper. The water had warmed some and the weather was much nicer the day we fished, making it a little better.

Niles Murray won with five weighing 9.31 pounds, my five at 9.08 pounds was second, third was Chuck Croft with three at 6.11 pounds and Jack Ridgeway had two at 5.80 pounds for fourth. Gary Hattaway had a 5.30 pound largemouth for big fish. There were only four largemouth weighed in, all the rest were spotted bass.

I have a love/hate relationship with Rapala DT 6 crankbaits. Last Saturday when checking and getting my tackle ready for the tournament I looked at the bill of the one I had caught four of my five keepers on at Sinclair. It was cracked so I tied a new one on. Sunday morning we started at 8:00 and by 10:00 I had caught four keepers on it.

A little after catching my fourth fish I was reeling it along, bumping the bottom, when the line went slack. I thought a bass had hit it and ran toward me so I started reeling fast, and reeled in the bill of the new plug. It had broken just behind the line tie.

So far this year I have broken the bill on five of these $8 crankbaits. The first two I thought were my fault since I slapped them on the water to get leaves off them and they broke. But the third one broke at Bartletts Ferry soon after I landed my only keeper that day, and the one I caught fish on at Sinclair was not useable since it was cracked.

I wish I was not catching almost all my keepers on this bait so I could quit using it. I am scared I am going to hook a big bass on one and lose the fish when the bill breaks. That is when I will throw all of them away. But right now I would rather catch fish and take a chance on breaking the bill than not catch fish at all.

I have three of the baits on my table to send to Rapala. It will be interesting to see how they respond. I have always liked Rapala baits. One of my favorites growing up fishing ponds was the 11S floating Rapala and then I started catching a lot of fish in bigger lakes on the Countdown model. And since they came out Shadraps have caught many bass for me.

I landed my fifth keeper on a jig head worm after losing one on it in the tournament. I got seven bites all day and landed five of them so I was happy with second place.