"Now remember, guys, we're fishing for white bass," Gary Dollahon reminded Jake Bennett and me.
Bennett, who founded Numa Optics, had distracted us from the quest with a couple of fat channel cats, and we'd all caught more than our share of yellow bass.
Then I threw us even further off course when something heavy grabbed my Big Strike jiggings spoon and after a few minutes of slow, heavy tugging, a great big largemouth did a wallowing jump and then surged down, pulling harder. Eventually Dollahon slipped a net under the big bass. The fish measured 23 3/4-inches, which is a slot fish at Lake Fork. We didn't put it on scales, but my best guess that it weighed about 8 pounds.
About 10 minutes after we took photos and went back to fishing, Dollahon forgot his own instructions and caught a 5-pound largemouth on a jigging spoon.
Eventually we did get back to fishing and actually got the white bass we needed for a photo. Mission accomplished, and we sure had fun along the way!
