Sturgeon Bay Open on Lake Michigan

I just got home this morning from the Sturgeon Bay Open Bass Tournament on Lake Michigan. This is a team tournament, where two anglers team together to get their collective five or six fish limit (most tournaments are a five fish limit, this one was a six fish limit). I fished with my good friend Chris Cox from Belleville, WI. He has spent a lot of time on the great lakes, both lake Michigan and lake Erie, so needless to say, I had a good partner for this one. We managed to catch a limit that weighed 26.44 lbs to finish 21st, quite a blessing considering this whole smallmouth game is pretty foreign to me. We never could get a big bite. All of our fish were "cookie cutters", apparently from the same mold, as they all weighed between 4.25 and 4.50 lbs each. I have some pictures coming that Chris took during practice, as soon as I get them I'll post them.

This definitely was a great learning experience for me, I now feel a little more comfortable chasing these brown fish around. Apparently they like to move A LOT!! I know, major understatement right?

See ya after the Kentucky Lake Tour Event!

Kentucky Lake Stren Series Event

Whew!! I totally missed the boat on this one. I started the week's practice flipping flooded bushes and willow trees. You could catch a hundred fish per day doing this, but end up with your best five keepers weighing only 10 lbs. I knew I would need more weight than that to do well, so I ventured off-shore, in search of productive ledges.

In five hours of fishing ledges, I had a limit that weighed around 17 lbs. So I dedicated my whole last day of practice to finding more ledges.

On day one of the tournament, I went flipping to get a quick limit, which never materialized. At around 9:30 I started fishing ledges, and managed only two keepers by days end. I probably fished 30 -40 ledges in 6 hours, all of them places I had found in practice, places that were holding good quality sized fish. Needless to say I was not in the best of spirits knowing I had put myself in terrible position after day 1, I beleive I was in 147th place. Not where you want to be considering the Stren Series is a four tournament series where you accumulate points at each event (the higher you finish, the more points you get) to qualify for the Stren Series Championship.

Day 2 started much better, by 11:30 I had approximately 15 lbs of fish with four keepers, knowing one more good bite would put me in real good shape, it never happened. We experienced severe storms, high winds and a torrential downpour that when it ended, apparently shut down the fish in the area I was fishing. I never boated another keeper, however, I did end the day with 15.01 lbs of fish that moved me up to 89th place. Not great, by any measure, but definitely a huge improvement. Thank God for one good day to keep me from digging myself into too big of a hole in the points race.

With all of that being said, this experience is yet another chapter in my endless attempt to figure out the why's and how's of Kentucky Lake. And of course, a little more work in the character building area. Enough said, about Kentucky Lake...I need to start thinking about the Detroit River, that's stop number 2 for the series. Until then God Bless!

Stren Series Central Division set to begin

The first tournament of the 2009 Stren Series Central Division is scheduled for May 6-8 at Kentucky lake. I'll be leaving on Saturday morning May 2nd to begin practice that day.

Lord willing the success from the PAA event two weeks ago will carry over.

Neely Henry Baits and Patterns

As promised here are the baits I used to finish 2nd at the PAA event on Neely Henry last week.

The Pattern:

I fished backwater areas, main lake pockets, and creek arms. I specifically searched out small spawning pockets in these areas. The primary factor in whether a spawning pocket would be holding fished, was dependent on having deeper water adjacent to the pocket.

During practice, the fish were set-up on the deeper banks leading into these areas. Most often, the productive banks would be rip-rap, not all of them, but most. Colder weather and slightly falling water had positioned these fish in these areas. With the full moon set to take place on Day 2 of the tournament, the fish were staging up to move in. Other than the first day of practice, the weather was terrible, it snowed, sleeted, was cloudy, rainy

and COLD!! This kept the fish out of the pockets and on the deeper banks.

Fortunately, the last day of practice was sunny and warm, and the fish began to move, the full moon also helped bring them in to spawn. Once the tournament started, I was fortunate enough to get two bites in just a few minutes and that let me figure out how the fish had repositioned due to the warming weather. In the next hour I had my limit, and had culled twice by noon.

The baits:

In practice I used a white Zoom Super Fluke, a Dunn's premium Big Bite Baits Honey Bug, a 3/8ths ounce Lunker Lure Body Lock Jig (white) with a white Zoom swimming chunk, a Hawg Caller Proven Winner Spinnerbait in Sexy Shad, and a Lunker Lure Shakin' Shad (white).

During the tournament the fish had pulled up and I used the Honey Bug nearly exclusively for two the two days of the tournament. I fished this bait on 20lb Maxima Fluorocarbon, coupled with a 1/4 ounce weight and a 4/0 reaction innovations BMF Hook.

Here are some pictures of my baits. I fished these baits exclusively on GLoomis Rods. I pitched the Honey Bug on a 7'5" Model BCFR894, the white jig on a 7' Model 844c and the spinnerbait on a 7'1" Model 853.

More Pics Neely Henry...

PAA Event - Neely Henry Pictures

Here are some pictures from the Neely Henry Event. I'll post more info about baits, equipment and pattern, until then...check out the photos...

Final day at PAA Event on Neely Henry

Just got back to the camper and I'm a little wound up,...I just finished 2nd at the PAA event on Neely Henry, so I thought I'd update my blog. I had a two day total of 29.89. Todd Auten beat me by 1.13 lbs. I had a little trouble with execution on th elast morning, I missed several fish and let a pretty nice one get me wrapped up in some old dock posts and get away, but overall, I feel very blessed to have such a great finish in a tough group of fisherman. Oh by the way, if you haven't used any of the product called Reel Grips, you should, these things are awesome!! Till next time, God Bless!!

PAA Tournament Neely Henry - Day 2 Canceled due to weather

Lightning and driving rain was the weather at take-off this morning. With severe thunderstorms, large hail and tornadoes predicted for noon at Gadsden, AL the PAA Tournament staff decided to cancel day two and allow the whole field to compete on the third and final day..

I was very blessed to catch 17.25 lbs on Day one and be in 4th place heading into the final day. I'm .44 lbs out of second, and 4+ pounds out of first. Lord willing I'll catch a good bag tomorrow and finish in the top 5!!

PAA Tournament - Neely Henry

Well, practice is going ok, I caught a lot of small fish, only a few good ones. I had the chance to go to Birmingham, AL and be on the Rick and Bubba morning show Tuesday morning with Snickers Pro Greg Pugh, and Jasper Engines and Transmissions Pro Chad Morgenthaler. We had a blast!! These guys are a hoot! Any way here's a few pics of the event.

PAA Tour...round two

Well, it's been a month since I posted last, not much has been going on, until now. I've got a few days to get ready for the next PAA event in Gadsden, Alabama at Neely Henry Lake. The lake is high and muddy and with the full moon hitting on the second day of the event (April 10th) the fish are most likely going to be spawning, and impossible to see. It should make for a real fun time...or not so much. Hopefully the rain lets up for the next week and the water clears up some. We'll see. I'll try to post some progress of my practice and the event as the week goes on...