Pinpoint Patterning

"If they're here, this should be the cast, Michael Murphy said confidently as he released his thumb and sent a bait sailing. We'd made half a dozen casts apiece since pulling up on this area, but he had told me that we'd start a little off from where the fish "should" be. As if the bass had read his script, Murphy leaned into a chunky fish about five cranks into his retrieve.

He had done the exact thing on the previous spot, making a handful of presentations before calling the cast that should produce, and then catching a fish on that cast. He had then explained what he had figured out based on other fish we'd caught that morning.

From time to time an angler "calls" a fish on a perfect-looking piece of shoreline cover, but we weren't working the bank. Murphy's called casts were off long points and were based upon the slope of the point, the distance out, the depth the boat was over, the direction of the wind... The bass were relating to specific types of points in a very specific way, and by fishing a handful of spots and paying attention to every detail, he truly had figured it out

An FLW Tour pro, fishing buddy and ever-eager source of great information, Murphy was helping me with a specific story project. We spent the biggest part of our day doing photo work but still managed a 21-pound bag from our best five. "We'd have won today," Murphy said with a grin as he weighed the last fish, knowing that most recent local tournaments had been won with weights in the mid to upper teens.

Murphy also figured out what the striped bass were doing on the same day, and he used his knowledge of Lake Murray to run a few key spots, where together we caught at least 25 stripers.

One of the greatest privileges of writing fish stories for a living is having the opportunity to spend time on the water with many of the best anglers out there. If I don't learn a thing or two that I can't pass along in stories, I'm not doing my job very well!

Lake Jocassee Trout

When the end downrigger rod popped up and then slammed back down with gusto, Sam Jones of Jocassee Charters was pretty sure the sort of fish we were seeking was at the other end of the line. Several intense minutes later, the flashing silver sides of a big rainbow confirmed what we both hoped, and then Jones slipped the net beneath a 21-inch, 5-pound trout.

South Carolina's Lake Jocassee has been one of my favorite places to fish since the late 1980s. The steep and rugged surrounding landscapes and ultra clear and deep waters defy many folks' images of the South, as do the rainbow and brown trout and smallmouth bass that call Jocassee home.

Despite its small size of only 7,500 acres, Jocassee holds claim to five state record fish (smallmouth, spotted and redeye bass and rainbow and brown trout). Because the terrain surrounding Jocassee is so steep, most tributaries come in as waterfalls - among them Lower Whitewater Falls, which tumbles more than 400 feet before settling in the lake.

Having not fished Jocassee for quite a while (too long), I was so excited upon arriving yesterday, that I had to slip down to the bank behind my villa at Devils Fork State Park to steal 10 minutes of casting from the bank before I got ready for dinner. That was all it took to catch a small but feisty smallmouth on a Road Runner and to get me even more excited about today.

Jones and I actually spent much of this morning "touring" several spots for a story I am writing for South Carolina Sportsman, but we did manage to squeeze in a bit of fishing, and a little time was all he needed to help me catch a few trout, including one very nice fish. Jocassee would be a great place to spend a morning, even if the fish weren't biting. But when a mean smallmouth or a big trout wants to latch on, that's OK, too!

On the Fly

Gusty winds and a big list of needed travel preparations didn't make today seem ideal for reacquainting myself with fly-fishing. However, when I opened my new Cabela's 5-weight LSi/WLx combo, it wasn't long before I found myself putting the backing on the reel and adding the fly line -- and then one thing led to another.

Nathaniel and I limited ourselves to one quick lap around the pond, but that was enough time for me to land six bream. I also broke off a chunky largemouth, which was careless on my part. I sort of forgot I was fly-fishing and had pretty light tippet and tried to get the fish canoe-side a little too quickly.

I'm really excited about the new fly combo. It has a great action and casts beautifully, even with the wind blowing and me doing the fly casting. It's also a 4-piece rod that came with a hard tube that's only a little longer than the sections. That makes it super portable and easy to tote along on fishing forays. In fact it's in the truck, just in case I need it in Tennessee or Arkansas this week!

Cabela's Celebrates 50 Years

When Plans A & B didn't work, Dick Cabela didn't give up.

The son of a furniture store owner in a small Nebraska town, Cabela had come across a vendor selling bulk fishing flies at a furniture trade show he attended with his father in 1961. He bought a couple thousand flies with plans to sell them in his dad's store. Finding little market there, he tried a classified ad in a local paper, offering a dozen flies for a dollar. That got one taker.

Then came Plan C:

Cabela changed the ad to read "FREE introductory offer!!! 5 popular Grade A hand tied flies. Send 25 cents for postage and handling to..." and placed it in a national hunting and fishing magazine. The response was big and immediate, and Cabela and his wife, Mary, began filling orders from their kitchen table. They also built their new business by reinvesting profits in various hunting and fishing gear and sending a list of offerings with every order of flies.

Within a couple of years the lists developed into the first true catalog, that about the same time that Dick and Mary Cabela convinced Dick's younger brother Jim to join the business. Cabela's, the World's Foremost Outfitter, was on its way. From the beginning, customer service and quality products were top priorities. Fifty years later, Cabela's is a $2.7 billion a year company with thriving catalog, Internet and retail store businesses and more than 14,000 employees.

As a self-employed writer and father of five children, each with unique gifts and interests, I appreciate Dick Cabela's entrepreneurial way and his unwillingness to give up when things didn't turn out as planned the first time.

Be sure to check out the Cabela's website. The company is offering some cool limited-edition 50th anniversary merchandise, doing a "Cabela's 50 Years, 50 Trucks Sweepstakes" and much more! Cool stuff.

Happy 50th, Cabela's

Paul Marks Wins Lanier

Paul Marks of Cumming, GA took top honors in the PAA Tournament Series opener on Lake Lanier this weekend. Marks, who has a lot of history on Lake Lanier, used a Classic Lanier approach, fishing a Fish Head Spin matched with a Fluke, plus a Lucky Craft jerkbait, to catch suspended bass. Marks' three-day weight of 44.44 pounds was a little more than 2 pounds heavier than that of second place Derk Remitz.

Spring Roller Coaster for PAA Pros

Pro anglers from all over the nation are getting a big dose of Georgia spring and the ups and downs this season can bring as they take on the sprawling waters of Lake Lanier in the season opener of the PAA Tournament Series presented by Carrot Styx.

Until about a week ago, warm weather had prevailed in North Georgia. Lanier's waters had been warming, and its largemouth and spotted bass had been moving shallower -- all good thing for exciting fishing and big weights. A couple of fronts have changed everything, though, pushing a lot of fish back and causing them to either not feed or to bite tentatively.

Tales of lost-fish woes have abounded as the anglers have paraded to the scales for the first two days' weigh-ins. Another common theme has been constant change. Report after report has told of fish acting different every day throughout practice and the tournament, most likely in response to ongoing changes in weather conditions. Only the top 20 anglers are fishing today, and while the morning started cool, the sun is shining brightly and the day is warming quickly. That will mean more change, but this change might be good, with the fish probably moving up again and feeding more aggressively.

Most anglers either have been targeting pre-spawn spotted bass with jerkbaits and shaky-heads over points in the lake's main body or going way up the rivers and fishing for largemouths in more stained waters. That too is changing, though, as the stain from big rains a few days ago is settling out, leaving the rivers clearer.

One note of interest is that three of the top five anglers, leader Paul Marks, and Troy Morrow and Tom Mann, Jr. (fourth and fifth, respectively) are from North Georgia and are veterans on Lake Lanier. The second and third place spots are held by North Carolina's David Hendrick and Arizona's John Murray.

The top 20 pros will weigh in this afternoon at Bass Pro Shops in Lawrenceville. It will be interesting to see what the day brings.