Sore Thumbs Again

Nathaniel wasn't complaining when he told me yesterday that his thumb was sore again. Anyone who spends much time bass fishing knows that the "sore thumb condition" is a good thing. It means that you've been grabbing a lot of chunky fish by the lower lip and that their sandpaper-like teeth have worn the skin a little thin on the inside of your thumb.

We were returning from a visit to the King Fisher Society, where Nathaniel had enjoyed a day and a half of doing battle with some of the chunkiest bass on the planet. With neither of our thumbs quite recovered from fishing at Jimmy Houston's ranch a week or so ago, it didn't take many fish to start making them raw again, and Nathaniel was hauling in big bass at a pretty good pace yesterday.

King Fisher Society's Richmond Mill Lake is probably best known for the amazingly big coppernose bluegill that call its dark waters home, but Nathaniel had a hard time putting down the bass rod when he kept ending up with 3- to 5-pound largemouths at the end of his line. Of course, King fisher's bream are so big that they can work on your thumb a little, too. You almost have to lip some because you can't get a hand around them!

Ginormous Bluegills & Bonus Bass

TJ Stallings calls them "ginormous" and I can't think of a better word to describe the coppernose bluegills that inhabit the black waters of the King Fisher Society's Richmond Mill Lake. These gills have shoulders, to say the least, and they are every bit as brutish on the line as you might expect.

I spent a ginormously fun day at the King Fisher Society with a group of friends last week. The crew included Bob Lusk of Pond Boss, whose expertise is behind this amazing fishery, TJ Stallings of Road Runner, Chuck Smock of Cabela's, and longtime fishing buddies and fellow outdoor writers Keith "Catfish" Sutton and Vic Attardo.

So impressive are King Fisher's bluegills that the lake's tremendous population of 3- to 6-pound largemouths hardly gets noticed. In fact, Catfish Sutton yelled at his first 5-pounder, which he caught off the dock before we ever launched boats on the lake. "Get off of there. I'm looking for a 2-pound bream!" The truth is, though, that bass are amazingly fit, power packed and seriously fun to catch. Making a good thing even better, it's a young population, and the bass are getting bigger every year!

We caught the bulk of our bream on Road Runner's new Natural Science Series Trout & Panfish baits. Most bass fell to the same Road Runners (thrown with bluegills in mind) or to various soft plastics. Prior obligations forced me to hit the road earlier than the rest of the crew, missing a late-afternoon photo session, dinner at the lodge and a final morning of fishing. However, my friends were kind enough to send me a camera phone photo of them enjoying their ribeyes together while I was drove into the darkness with a dollar burger in hand.