Rattletrap Ramblings

I recently noticed a book by KVD about bass strategies circa 1995 on amazon.com for practically nothing and had to buy it. Call it an impulse buy but the cost of the book was less than the $4 shipping.

This book is totally awesome…. totally.

It answers a ton of questions I had about what happens to bass with different conditions…. at least what KVD thinks. It’s like you’re calling the guy up and asking for his advice.

I learned that there’s an old adage that bass bite better with a rising barometer and if it’s above 30. Like all adages, they don’t hold true a lot of times but it can be used effectively as a guage sometimes. I didn’t know about this since I go fishing every chance I get regardless of weather.

If the bass are feeding on crawfish and shore minnows, then they’ll be shallow most of the time. If they’re eating perch, then they’ll be deeper and could be anywhere if they’re eating shad.

Bass prefer milfoil over everything, even hydrilla.

Bass are finicky eaters in Spring and Fall, so it’s critical to match the size and color of your bait during this period.

The baitfish are at their largest size during the pre-spawn and KVD uses big baits during this period. This is probably common knowledge but admit I didn’t know this.

During pre-spawn in a reservoir, KVD says to concentrate on deep structure areas like creek channel drops, ledges/drop offs near large spawning bays and flats. Look for deep water adjacent to areas less than 10 ft deep.

In a river, bass like slack water areas in all stages of spawn. Key on main river banks during summer. In winter, look for the deepest slack water area like a marina.

In tidal water during pre and post spawn, look for deep water out of current but close to the river and adjacent to a spawning flat.

The book also covers cold fronts. KVD believes river fish are the least prone to cold fronts. He says to look for moving water areas in backs of creeks or upper end of the lake in a reservoir.

During the fall, a cold front can be beneficial by activating the fall pattern of shad moving to the backs of creeks. In late fall, the bass will move to a winter pattern where KVD loves channel banks and bluff walls.

He also believes clear water bass roam more and more apt to move upwards to eat. They’re also easier to catch in cold water so he’ll move towards the dam where the water is typically the clearest.

Conversely, muddy water bass tend to stick tight to cover, prefer shallow water and hard objects. He suggests making multiple casts to an objects and use spinnerbaits and buzzbaits when the shad are active and jigs and plastics when they’re inactive.

Muddy water also can activate the shad and move them towards the influx of freshwater typically found in the backs of creeks. This exactly what happened at the 2009 Bassmaster Weekend Series National Championship on Lake Dardanelle during the Fall.

Supposedly, bass always migrate with rising and falling water except in the winter when they stay deep. They also become more inactive as water falls and more active as water rises. I noticed this during the BASS Open as Smith Lake. The fish were outright spooky the more they dropped the water.

If I had this book, I would’ve known that the fish I was catching in the flooded bushes moved to the flooded bushes on secondary points in the same creek arm or if it fell a lot, then they were on the main lake points. I would’ve looked for the same depth they were holding in before the water fell in those areas. If they were on grass, then I would’ve known that the inside edge would’ve been key early on in the drawdown.

Supposedly, this is where you’ve got to be careful not move ahead of the fish and the migration associated with water level doesn’t happen immediately.

Conversely, if that tournament was on a river I would’ve known that bass move quickly with water fluctuations and moved to deeper slack water areas such as the mouth of sloughs and deep marinas.

A few other tips I picked up was to lean more towards crankbaits in stained water and jigs/spinnerbaits in muddy water.

KVD also thinks that 2 or 3 hits is enough to assess an area during practice.

There’s obviously tons more knowledge in the book, but these are some of the points that stuck out to me.

Anyway, the book is worth every penny and already a better fisherman because of it.

I’ve been pouring over the internet looking for info on Lake Seminole since I’ll be fishing the BASS Open and the BWS Regional in consecutive weeks and found lots of information. I just may have found all that’s available on the net.

The most important info that I’ve found has nothing to do with a fishing spot or lure to use. According to Georgia Outdoor News, they’ve been spraying the hydrilla from Spring Creek to the Hooch. Since I had planned on fishing hydrilla, my plans have changed drastically without me ever stepping foot on this Seminole place.

I hope I can find hydrilla somewhere else, but if I can’t find it then I’ll probably have to resort to crankin and maybe a swim jig.

I’ve also spoken with a few friends who have tournament experience out there and I’ve pretty much got it narrowed down to an area. Hopefully it’ll be good and I can dial it in even more. My buddy Mike Lott’s been a lot of help with map study and shared what he’s figured out at numerous tournaments and guide trips out there. It’s worth a beer at the very least.

I’m ready to go to Lake Seminole right now and start checking out places, but I’ve got to nail down a place to stay which is unglamorous side of fishing out of town.

Stay tuned.

There has not been any big tournaments as of late, so I’ve had some time to reflect on my year so far. There’s no great finishes to speak of besides some small local tournaments.

It’s my first year fishing the BASS Opens and I think I just blew it on the first two. I should’ve been punching matt the majority of the time in Okeechobee and didn’t fish the conditions…. although if it warmed up a little quicker, I’m sure I would’ve caught them. At Smith Lake, I should’ve moved out as they pulled water out but did not adjust to the falling water like I should have.

The one thing I’m learning this year is adjusting. When you find a group of fish, they don’t go very far. They’re somewhere nearby and I need to learn to figure out where they go. I need to look for places where fish might go if conditions change. Usually I’m so worried about finding a stack of fish that I’m not worried about where they might go but I’m thinkin you gotta keep that in mind the entire time.

The last Open is on Lake Seminole in October, and I’m already researching spots and patterns. There’s been so many big tournaments here that there’s a lot of stuff to decipher, but I think I’ve zeroed in what to do. I like to flip and will probably focus on flippin and possibly froggin in the hydrilla. I like to go in with an open mind but it’s one big place and you can’t cover everything. It’ll take a lot of time just figuring out how to run the place without killing yourself.

This is going out on a limb, but I think I’ve had enough learning this year and due for a good finish at Seminole. We’ll see if my premonition is right. As long as it doesn’t rain for a week straight prior to the tournament, I believe I know what the fish are going to be doing.

It looks like the Elite Series is coming to Florida in 2011 with the first event on the Harris Chain and then moving to the St. Johns River in Palatka. They’re starting in March for whatever reason and it’s gonna be a sight fishing festival as long as there’s no cold fronts. I can’t wait to see how the pros figure it out around these parts.

My prediction is that someone’s gonna find all the clear water canals where we’re catchin’em right now around bluegill beds on Harris and Eustis but in the spring those beds will have bass on them.

I’m thinkin that the St. Johns River will be won out of Lake George, Woodruff, or Dexter…. probably Lake George depending on the weather. Rodman or Crescent may play a role if the grass ever comes back.

2011 BassmasterElite Series Schedule

I just got back to town from the BASS Open on Smith Lake and saw a lot water that I’ve never seen before. The depth finder reads 200 feet most of the time when you’re running and most of the docks are in a minimum of 50 feet.

I’m used to fishing 3 feet, so Smith Lake took a little getting used to.

I began practicing on Wednesday and recent rains had many of the buckbrush, willows, and laydowns submerged. The water was slightly stained in the backs of the creeks where I concentrated on for largemouth. Within the first hour of practice, I pulled in an 18 inch Kentucky with a spinnerbait and started feeling comfortable.

I began running shallow water and found them in a lot of places with a green pumpkin jig, sexy shad crankbait, a Revenge deep runner spinnerbait in chartreuse shad, and a green pumpkin lizard with the tail dipped in chartreuse JJ’s Magic Dye. It seems like all the fish like a little chartreuse for some reason. My guess is that the panfish actually have a chartreuse tail. I noticed it when one of them tried to eat my spinnerbait and followed it to the boat.

I tried different patterns there every day and caught literally 50 fish a day. The only problem was that most of them were under the 15 inch minimum and the bigger fish came from shallower water. For Smith Lake, shallow means getting into the back of creek where you’re sitting in 10 to 15 feet of water and throwing into about 3 to 4 feet of water.

The fish I was catching were just moving out from spawning and not all the way back in the creek. I had several places where I had caught a limit of 15 inch fish in an half an hour.

The final day of practice, I decided to find some places near the dam where the tournament would come out of to have a place to catch some last minute fish if I needed it. The way practice went, I didn’t think I’d need it but was checking just in case.

I found 3 points near the dam where the fish schooled every morning and caught them on an 1/8 spot remover with green pumpkin Zoom Speed Craw or Finesse Worm tipped with chartreuse JJ’s Magic Dye.

I told my co angler that we were gonna have a limit within the first hour. In the future I’ll keep my mouth shut.

The first day of the tournament I started on one of those points near the ramp and the fish were schooling everywhere. They wouldn’t eat my spook but I managed to catch a 3 pound largemouth on the shaky head. After the first hour, those fish turned off and I figured it was time to go shallow.

I ran to my first spot in a creek and started fishing where I had been catching them before. I should’ve noticed that the water had dropped a foot and a half and started further towards the mouth of the creek. I caught one keeper largemouth and proceeded to my supposedly best spot which was up river.

All the cover that I was fishing was out of the water here and didn’t get a bite. I run to the back of another creek way up river and catch another keeper largemouth. My co angler had a 3 pound largemouth follow his bait back to boat and just turn away. I forgot to tell him that a lot of my bites came from swimming a lizard back to the boat… oh well.

I run back down river and try a few other points for some Kentucky’s but couldn’t get another bite.

I end up with just 5 and a half pounds but it was still good enough for 48th place.

I came up with a game plan for day 2 and decided I wasn’t going to beat anyone fishing like a yankee. I was gonna spend more time flipping and try to beat everyone fishing the way I like to.

I started out on a point near the launch site for day 2 just like I did for the first day and caught another nice keeper on the shaky head. My co angler catches one on a clear Super Spook and I decided they were gonna hit topwater today. I start throwing my Sammy and catch 3 fish but they were all short.

By 9 o’clock, I decided it was time to flippin and proceeded again to my best creek but started more towards the mouth where the water was little deeper. I catch a nice keeper largemouth right away as well as my co angler. At that point, I decided I was gonna finish out the day here.

The only problem was that I started missing fish. I probably got 7 bites and lost all of them. They were just biting the lizard weird and my lizard would come back with the tail missing half the time.

They weren’t small fish neither. I moved a few of the fish on the hookset to see they were keepers. I had a guy named Shawn Strader staying next to us at the Super 8 and he mentioned that the shallow fish get real spooky when they drop the water real fast and I think he was right.

The water had risen 3 feet and stained when I first arrived at Smith Lake but was clear and lower by 3 feet when the tournament started. I need to keep in mind that shallow fish get real spooky when this happens. I do recall spooking a couple of three pounders when I’d pitch that lizard by the laydown. They didn’t want anything to do with it. They would attack that thing earlier in the week.

I probably should’ve made the audible and pitched a weightless white fluke or a green pumpkin senko. May I should’ve thrown parallel to the bank but landing the bait past the target and swam it back. All I can say was that they were spooky.

I had the fish located but things just didn’t pan out. I wasted so much time in Coon Creek that I didn’t have enough time to catch that fish my co angler left behind at the Bear Branch the day before and that probably cost me a check.

This is one case where a fast boat would’ve saved me some money.

The fishing style here is a run and gun style. It’s a lot different here in Florida where you camp out in a spot most of the day.

If I fish another tournament here I’d probably do the same thing. I’d find a point near the launch where I can capitalize on the morning schooling and then go find largemouth. I would however throw a lot more topwater than I did.

The topwater baits that worked the best were spooks and buzzbaits. I don’t know why it never occured to me to throw a buzzbait but I figured the spook was just as good.

Another thing I’d do is burn every moving bait I fished. It seems like they just liked everything fast.

I ran nearly the entire lake, but never did make it to Crooked Creek where Gerald Swindle was fishing for largemouth. He led the tournament for 2 days and says he lost a boat load of fish the last day to lose.

I also checked out the very north end of Ryan Creek the first day I got there but it was downright muddy. I had an inkling to check it out the day before the tournament but never made it back over there. It sounds like that’s where many of the top finishers including eventual winner, Andy Montgomery, fished.

One of the techniques I learned while fishing here is throwing a swimbait under a dock and counting down to 20 before retrieving it back to the boat. I gotta admit I was stumped on fishing docks that were 50 to 100 feet deep. You can’t throw a worm in there… it would take forever to hit the bottom. The fish were actually suspended in 12 to 15 feet of water under these docks and even if you didn’t let it sink enough, the water was clear enough that the bass would follow the bait out.

I also saw some things on my Lowrance that I’ve never seen before. When sonar hits rock, the surface is so hard that you actually see a echo. I’d never seen this before and thought my unit was going all out of whack for a while until I figured it out.

The fish here seem to relate more to long tapering underwater points with rock and this echo thing made it a lot easier to locate the right points.

It also appears that fish get on docks during the post spawn in Alabama. I was just stumped a little with them sitting in 5o to 100 feet. I doubt I’ll ever see it again but I’ll know what to do next time.

Another technique I learned was throwing a wacky worm into fry. It’s a great way to catch bass guarding fry. It worked real well in practice but never did get to utilize this during the tournament.

I really feel I had enough fish located to at least make the top 30 and blew it my making the wrong decisions. It also didn’t help losing all those fish on day 2 but they were just biting weird. I probably could’ve did something a little different to actually catch those fish but really don’t know for sure since they don’t have places where they drop the water a lot in Florida and I don’t have too much experience with it yet.

The only thing about Smith Lake is that I’m paying my dues. I got my butt kicked again but ready for the next event on Seminole.

I also met a lot of neat people.

One of them was my co angler from day 2, JJ Pollack of JJ’s Magic Dye fame. He’s a heck of a nice guy and fun fishing partner with lots of advice. He also gave me a Froggee Buzzer that I’m dying to try out on Toho. Spots love chartreuse tails and I went through quite a bit of JJ’s dye during the week.

There was also a guy fishing the tournament as a co angler who calls himself T-Money who offered to split gas and oil if I took him out when I pulled up to the ramp. I was broke, so I was like heck yeah… just be prepared to go sun up until sun down. He’s a little out there but loves to fish.

I also ran into Capt. Don Lewis who guides on Bienville Plantation which is supposedly some famous phosphate pit in North Florida.

There’s also Shawn Shrader who’s been at this game for a long time and staying next door. Every night we’d shoot the shit and knock down a few cold ones back at the Super 8.

I met a lot of neat people this week and got my butt kicked. I managed a 65th place showing which isn’t good for anything. There’s always next time.

One of these days I’ll show those pro’s who they’re dealing with.

What can I say, fishing is a tough game to figure out. I fished the Bassmaster Weekend Series on the Harris Chain and squeaked out a check with 12 pounds.

In 2 days of practice, I caught one fish and had no clue what to do going into the tournament. The water temperature was in the high 50′s on the main lake but in the 60′s in a canal I checked out.  I found a 3 pounder on bed the last few hours of practice and figured I’ll go there and pick that joker off so I don’t get a big fat zero.

I go to that fish first thing in the morning and it wasn’t there. I look around the corner and there’s a 6 pounder on bed with a buck. I told my co angler Dana Foster that it won’t take long to pick these fish off and after 5-10 minutes they were in the livewell.

Dana was a great fishing partner and we had a good time just being out on the water. He caught a fish on a trick worm with a 1/16 ounce Spiderhead worm hook made by a company called Slider so I asked him if I could get one. I tied one on and caught a nice 4 pounder a few casts later.

The tournament director forgot to get exemptions so I already had a fish over 22″ and the other fish were gonna take quite a bit of time to coax so we did some running and gunning. We hit 2 spots and told my co angler that either you or I are going to catch a fish in one of these spots as we idled out of the canal we were fishing. Well, my co angler pulls in a nice 3 pounder with a rattletrap and I got nothing.

I think I could’ve gotten one of those other ones I was looking at to bite but it could’ve taken a few hours. I may not have gotten them at all. There’s always some second guessing about these things but all in all it was a fun day on the lake.

One of the cool things about fishing these tournaments is that you meet so many cool people that’s as crazy about bass as you are and it was like being out on the water with a friend just enjoying a day on the lake.

I just don’t get it. I have a good practice and do bad in a tournament. I have a bad practice and do good in a tournament. It shouldn’t be this way and I gotta figure out how to make the two correlate.

First of all, I have to say watching the Classic being a trap contest made watching it that much more disheartening that I missed making that event by .22 of a pound. I don’t think I would’ve zero’d and it would’ve played into my strength as an angler. I keep telling myself things happen for a reason, but who knows.

I just got back from the Big O with another disappointing tournament at the FLW All American. I guess I’m on one of those bad runs.  It’s one of those when you start questioning whether or not you’re cut out for this line of work. That’s twice now that I got my butt kicked by the Big O. I had another great practice in warm weather and the weather ruined my spots. I failed to make the adjustment when I needed to.

I could’ve caught 20 pounds without even trying in practice, but couldn’t fish those areas during the tournament because of the winds. It was gusting 26 mph the first day and all my spots had 3 foot rollers with white caps in 2 feet of water. I tried fishing those spots anyway and the battery died on my trolling motor battery by 11 am from fighting those winds.

The wind were still howling at the beginning of day 2 but died down to nothing by about noon. I stayed with my spots but only managed a 3 pounder.

In retrospect, I should’ve found spots that were going to be out of the wind but it’s hard enough finding fish much less trying to find them in places that’ll be out of the wind in a couple of days.

On the way back home, I decided to test out my theory. I was driving by Harney Canal on the way home and checked out an area that’s been protected by the North winds that were blowing during the tournament. I had a hunch to go there during the tournament but never made it over there.

Well, I caught 10 pounds in an hour with 3 fish punching matt in that area. I know what to do and didn’t adjust. Maybe I just got lucky and caught these fish but I think there’s a pattern there.

I should’ve gotten out of the wind and abandoned my best areas but it’s awful hard to do when you saw so many big fish at the end of your line in practice. When the wind finally died down, I could still see the big fish in my best areas just cruising but they wouldn’t bite.

I guess I need to start factoring in the forecasted wind during practice but the weather man isn’t always right. Perhaps a day or two before the tournament is the best time to start factoring in wind and temperature.

I’ll have to put this theory to the test this weekend. I have a Bassmaster Weekend Series event on Harris this weekend so we’ll see if this is the way to go.

If you read my last post, you’d know I was pretty excited about the Xtreme Tournament on the Harris Chain yesterday. I had numerous 8 pounders locked on bed and an area where I caught 20+ pounds on Friday shaking most of the fish off. I mean the ones I hooked were huge with the smallest being 3 pounds.

I was so excited, I had to get a few drinks in me so I could fall asleep with delusions of grandeur.

Saturday rolled around and everything changed.

I went to my bedding area first and the bedding fish were in a different mood. What was once a lock turned into a struggle of wills. They would pick up my worm and take it out of the bed on Friday, but on Saturday they’d spook off as soon as I clicked my reel.

After about an hour of this, my partner and I went to Griffin where we caught all those fish the day before and there were 3 foot rollers on top of a spot that only had 2 feet of water.  The fish were still biting although you could barely stand in the boat and we had about 9 pounds before we decided to head back and if it wasn’t for my Kistler rods, I would’ve never known I had a fish.

We decide to go to the bedding fish again but they were still spooky and never caught any of the big ones we were looking at. It’s one of those cases where the fish won, but they better watch out. I only wonder what could’ve been if there wasn’t 40 mph winds and a drop in water temperature by 2 degrees. I guess that’s why they call it fishing.

Once again, a perfect practice turned into a meager day of fishing come tournament time. I can’t think of any adjustments that I could’ve made to salvage the day so I’m dumbfounded at the moment.

Everyone that did well in the tournament focused on bedding fish and it took over 25 pounds to win. I guess I should’ve gone to some other bedding areas to see if those fish would bite. The only problem was there were 6 foot rollers I’d have to battle to get there and that didn’t seem like a good idea at the time.

Oh yeah, did I mention a boat capsized during the tournament? I don’t know if I would’ve capsized but it would’ve been a bumpy ride.

OK, I’ve just fished 4 days in a row and I still feel like I want to go again today with it raining outside. If that doesn’t sound like a fish junkie then I don’t know what is. Reality is it’s time to make the donuts so I can afford to go again.

I fished the BWS and the ABA 150 out of Camp Mack this weekend and almost won enough money to break even on the entry fees but factor in gas, food, and lodging and you’re in the hole.

I practiced Thursday and Friday and should’ve been looking for beds the majority of the time. The winner of the BWS tournament had 35 pounds and caught two 9′s off a bed somewhere in the south end of Lake Kissimmee. I sure wish I knew where.

I myself concentrated on 3 areas for the tournament which included Seven Palms, Overstreet, and the School Bus area. They all had bedding fish but it was so windy during practice days that I mostly threw a search bait in practice and during the tournament. Lake Kissimmee is fishing so good right now that you can literally catch 50 fish in any descent area of the lake. Most of the time that’s a good thing, but most of the fish will be small. That’s what I did during the BWS tournament, caught lots of small fish which started getting aggravating after 11 o’clock. I should’ve just started looking for beds at that point, but I just kept on chunking for a whopping 6 or 7 pounds.

I believe the thing to do is find one of those areas in the shallows and then find a protected cove or protected pocket where the wind’s not hammering it and look for bedding fish. Almost everyone that made a check fished around bedding fish and caught a fish off a bed.

My next tournament will be the Xtreme on the Harris Chain and I am gonna spend an entire day just looking for beds. As long as a cold front doesn’t come in, then they will be there because it’s dang close to a full moon and the water temps will be in the mid to high sixties.

I fished the ABA 150 tournament on Sunday and made a little adjustment. My partner and I got a limit by 9 o’clock at my spot on Overstreet and started looking and found a bed with a 3 pounder and a 9.5 pounder.

By the time 11 o’clock rolled around, we decided to run to Seven Palms to look for bedding fish. I turn the key on my engine and it wouldn’t start. It turns out my partner kept the livewell on constant to make sure the big fish survived and it killed my battery.

We troll over to the dock at the Overstreet ramp and borrow jumper cables, a battery, and all sorts of wrenches for a few hours of adventure. We try to jump cranking battery off my trolling motor battery but it was too run down to give enough juice to start. We then switch the trolling motor battery and the cranking battery and it was still too low to start. Finally, someone actually had a spare battery that had plenty of juice, so we switched back the trolling motor battery and the cranking battery and jumped it again. Thank God it finally started. By that time we had a dozen people watching the big fiasco and we had to show them the 9.5 pounder they helped us save.

By the time we were up and running again, it was close to 1 o’clock and we decided to just go to the School Bus area where it was close enough to get towed in by another competitor if my boat wouldn’t start again. We catch a few small fish there and never did see anything on bed.

My boat did start again and we weigh in for just shy of 19 pounds and a $500 second place check.

I guess the moral of the story is to just replace your battery every 2 years and to spend a lot of time looking beds instead of fishing during tournaments around the spawn. It’s also dang hard to win a one day tournament during the spawn cause no amount of weight is safe.

I’d like to report otherwise, but my first BASS Open was a complete disaster. I weighed in only 2 fish over 2 days for a whopping 3.5 lbs. I’ve fished in a lot of tough conditions and it’s definitely the worst I’ve ever done in any tournament in any condition.

I was catching literally 50 fish a day the week before the tournament and then one of the most severe cold fronts in Florida history blew through Okeechobee. The weather forecast was for warmer weather during the tournament but it wasn’t enough to warm the 40 degree water quick enough to make a difference.

The text book says you should punch matt during these conditions but I figured the water would warm enough to turn my shallow fish on. Well from the results you know those shallow fish never turned on.

I remember watching the Art of Angling by Rick Clunn before I left town and I should’ve followed his zen philosophy he spoke of in the show and looked at every day of practice as if it was the first day on the water.

Almost all of the top 30 punched matted hydrilla along the Moore Haven canal and I should’ve joined them. I figured there were 50 boats in there already and those fish were getting pounded but they all caught fish in there.

I’ve said it before on this blog and I’ve gotta learn to punch matt a little better. The next time there’s a severe cold front, I’m gonna go out to Lake Cypress and punch matt until my arms fall off. This is one technique I don’t have a lot of confidence in and it’s the best way to catch big fish when it’s super cold and super hot.

I went out on Saturday to see where the leaders were fishing and they were still along the Moore Haven canal punching matt so I know that it’s the way I should’ve fished. I watched Chris Lane yo yo a bait 15 to 20 times before he pitched to another spot. Also watched Russ Lane punch a matt for an hour without moving his boat. Randall Tharp and Larry Cahan were doing the same thing but moving around a little bit more all within 50 yards of each other. I saw Terry Scroggins the first 2 days of the tournament and he was punching matt along with everyone else but he took off along with Chris Lane towards the Sportsmans Channel. That Randall Tharp guy is one good fisherman and I’d love to be half as good as he is. I was shocked to hear he didn’t do better on the final day.

I wish I would’ve followed Chris Lane and Scroggins once they left Moore Haven but I’m pretty sure they went to some other matt or some shallower fish because the water had warmed enough by late in day 2 and second half of the final day.

It seems like you’re always learning something and I now know that I gotta get better at punching matt. All you had to do was catch 12 pounds over 2 days to make the top 30 and punching matt was the way to do it.

I guarantee you that the next time we get a severe cold front during a tournament in Florida, I’ll be dang good at pulling those suckers out of the matt.

This tournament sucked for me but at least I know where I need to improve.

JT Kenney had the best explanation of what happened during the tournament on the Anglers Channel. Here’s the link to the video interview he did http://www.anglerschannel.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=radio.home&filename=2010-01-17-07-bass.wmv

And I should’ve had only two rods on the deck for day 1 and most of day 2 like Andy Montgomery http://www.anglerschannel.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=radio.home&filename=2010-01-17-06-bass.wmv

The next time there’s a severe cold front around the spawn in Florida, I’ll have two rods to punch matt with and a flippin stick with a 3/8 ounce sinker to fish in water deeper than 3 feet and perhaps a skinny dipper and a fluke if the water temperature gets warm enough in shallower water.