Pine Bluff Preview

While I was in South Carolina last week, I got a chance to sample the offerings of a new fishing club that is being developed on property that fronts the Edisto River near the town of Ridgeville. Kevin Davis of Black Camp on the Santee Cooper Lakes thought a trip the Pine Bluff Sportsmen's Club property would yield good photo opportunities, and he was most certainly correct. Limited time only allowed us to fish one of the five ponds on the property, but a few hours on a single pond yielded a terrific mixed catch of crappie, bluegills and bass, including the largemouth in the photo above, which provided quite a surprise and a test to my ultralight gear when it attacked a 1/16-ounce Road Runner.

The club and the complete management plan are still being developed, but the ponds, which are restored sand mining pits, have been maturing over the years and already provide outstanding fishing opportunities. No doubt I'm hopeful to get back out there to spend time sampling more spots!

They're Not All Big

They can't all be big, right? That's OK. Sometimes I'm delighted to just get something to cooperate.

Such was the case a week or so ago in Arkansas. Storms were rolling through the area, and rivers were swelling and turning chocolatey. A little lake with public access beside the highway I was traveling caught my eye, and the rain had paused for the moment. I decided to stop and walk the bank a bit, toting nothing to the water but a single rod and the lure that was already tied to the line.

Nothing happened for the first 10 minutes, and I wasn't far from turning back toward the car when I saw a flash behind my lure at the end of a presentation. I repeated the cast, and sure enough the fish swiped again and this time connected. I only caught that one bass, and it wasn't very large, but in my mind one is far better than none, and it certainly justified a quick stop to make a few casts from an unfamiliar stretch of bank!

Week of Bass Fun

Last week's travels landed me in Fort Smith, Arkansas, which was the jumping off point for fishing trips to Arkansas' Lake Ouachita, an Oklahoma stretch of the Arkansas River and Lake Tenkiller. My company's office is also in Fort Smith, so I slipped in an office visit between fishing days.

At Ouachita we spent a bit of time crappie fishing because of some photos I'd hoped to get. The crappie bite wasn't really happening, though. So we mostly fished for bass, and that was fun. I hadn't done a lot of dedicated bass fishing for a while.

At Ouachita, the fish were looking up, so we caught quite a few spots and largemouths on Spooks and other surface lures. When they wouldn't come up, we went down after them with dropshots, C.C. Spoons and live crawfish, with the of those being a locally popular and extremely effective approach during the fall.

The Arkansas River fishing was all up tributaries and all about cranking. We tried a bit of spinnerbait fishing and a little topwater, but crankbaits were the ticket. Our top producer was a Bandit prototype that I can't show a photo of... Yet!

Tenkiller, which is deep, clear and rocky, offered a nice blend of topwater fishing and cranking opportunities with Bandits and Normans, with a nice mix of smallmouths adding to the fun. I had a big time for a while throwing a small BOOYAH Boss Pop, which is probably my single favorite topwater lure.

Next stop is Santee Cooper, where it'll be back to mixed-species fun!

0 for 1

The final morning of my recent Florida trip brought tough fishing in a place where the bass action can be very good. After a couple of hours of having no fish come up for topwater, I tied on a Cotton Cordell Big O amd started cranking.

I'd probably been cranking the Big O for 10 minutes when I felt resistance that I at first thought was from grass. Then the grass started moving toward me faster than I was pulling it, so I snapped my wrist and announced, "Fish."

That word had barely escaped my mouth when a big head emerged, followed by the rest of a hefty bass. With one big head shake it tossed my cranking before returning to the water, and in a moment my opportunity was gone.

I realized too late that with the fish swimming toward me, I should have done much of a hookset. We guessed that bass, which turned out to be the only one to have bit that morning, to have been in the 6- or 7-pound range. Not a Florida giant, but a stout fish and one I sure would have liked to have landed.

Instead it was just another "big one that got away," but I suspect I'll be replaying that jump in my head for a very long time.

Southbound Fishing Travels

My most recent blog post spoke about ice fishing and my odd interest in traveling north to fish during the winter. Still no ice plans in place for this winter, but tomorrow I'm hopping in my car and pointing it in the opposite direction, and I'm pretty excited about prospects. Plans include coastal fishing near Jacksonville for speckled trout and redfish with Bomber pro staffers Nathan Johnson and Chris Holleman and then moving slightly inland to catch bass with Tim Mann. The picture above is of Tim, from Lake George, earlier this year. Tim has a few ideas about stuff we might do, and all sound really good. We'll likely start at Rodman, which I'm really excited about, because it's spectacularly beautiful and one of finest bass lakes in the nation, and I've only been there once. Stay tuned!

Classic Action Begins This Morning

Photo courtesy of B.A.S.S.

Hardly a newsflash that the Bassmaster Classic begins this morning, I know. If you're a bass fishing fan at all, your social media news feeds are likely full of posts from outdoor media sorts, companies and anglers who are in Tulsa right, and that might even include posts from Classic competitors, who are only a few hours from blasting off on day one!

I mention the Classic not in an attempt to deliver news but simply because it's on my mind this morning. I often attend the Classic in some media capacity, and if I was in Tulsa I'd likely be getting ready to drive out to the launch or even on the way. Many of my friends are there this week, either covering the event for some media outlet or working the show for some company. I've been in the boat with about 40 percent of the competitors at some point, so that familiarity certainly adds interest.

I'm content to not be there. Tulsa is a long ways from here, and I travel plenty. Also, while I certainly am a fan of professional bass fishing and enjoy being in the middle of a big event, given the choice, I'd rather spend my days away from home fishing than covering tournaments. Nevertheless, there are aspects I miss, and you can be that I'll be peeking at blogs and will track the results, and while I'll be driving to Florida on Sunday, I may end ups stopping somewhere with internet along the way to watch the final weigh-in on the computer.

If you want to track the action, visit bassmaster.com and you'll find a host of options for following everything going on. Or you could make a last-minute call and drive to Tulsa this weekend!

Ready to Roll

Junk is in the Fiesta hatch, and I'm just about ready to get on the road for my first April trip of 2015. Assuming thunderstorms don't keep us off the water, I should be fishing by early afternoon. Largemouth fishing tops the agenda today and tomorrow. Spots may come into play more on Wednesday, when we'll float a stretch of the Coosa River.

I'll be fishing from a Hobie-Fishing kayak with folks from Hobie, including fishing legend Hank Parker and NFL hall-of-famer Jackie Smith.  The Hobie boats are super efficient and a load of fun to fish from, so I'm looking forward to that approach.

Watch for updates here, and I'll do my best to do a better job of keeping things current than I have of late. A new phone that isn't bogged down and is better suited for blogging takes away one excuse, so we'll see!

Boys Went Bass Hunting

After a pretty cold snap for Georgia, today has been damp but surprisingly mild, and the trend appears to be toward warming for a few days. I've thought since early this morning that it would be a good day to be fishing, but upcoming travel plans and stuff due suggested that I should stay here and write fish stories.

I'll have to settle for fishing vicariously through Nathaniel and Asher. They announced an hour or so ago that they were headed to the pond for a while, and soon after they were pulling out in Nathaniel's truck. We do a lot of vertical fishing for bluegills this time of year and typically do pretty well with that approach. However, Nathaniel said that he and Asher intended to cast for bass today. I know he mentioned a shaky head. I don't recall what else he planned to try.

So far no phone pictures have shown up in texts, but I'm eager to get a report. Maybe they'll accomplish enough that I'll have a whole story to share in a blog tomorrow.

Ice: Love It or Hate It

Like most things, fishing has it's subgroups, and many anglers I spend time with are very specialized in their interests. Some dedicated bass fishermen would just as well go grocery shopping as wade a trout stream, and the same concept applies equally in the other direction. Others, like me, enjoy a little bit of everything, while still others fall somewhere in-between.

For all the preferences of species and fishing styles that can exist, though, I don't think anything polarizes fishermen quite like ice fishing. I'd say more dedicated anglers than not want nothing to do with walking on ice in 8-degree weather and trying to pull fish through little holes. I hear that perspective a lot, especially from fisherman friends from this part of the country, when I talk about my ice fishing plans.

Those folks who like ice fishing tend to love ice fishing. Few fishermen I've met just like it OK. Even in the heart of ice country, there are basically two camps. Either you quit fishing or venture south when the lakes freeze or you spend as many days as possible ice fishing while the opportunity exists.

If you glance at this blog even occasionally, you know I fall in the "love ice fishing" school. I'm Minnesota bound on Monday and am more than a little eager to get back on the ice!

The Boat Ride

"This is the hardest rain I've ever seen," James Hall announced to his GoPro, which was likewise getting pounded with sheets of sideways rain.

I couldn't argue. I'm pretty sure I've never been wetter (even submerged), and the rain came so hard at times that it stung my skin. Adding drama, crosswind-formed waves kept the boat rocking, lightning flashed around us and the combination of the rain and the low cloud we were in made it seriously tough to see. Plus, we were deep in Sierra Madre Mountains on a wild and remote lake.

Our guide calmly persisted as we gritted our teeth, ducked our heads and laughed at the situation for lack of anything else that could be done. I'm not sure what our guide was thinking because he didn't speak English and I don't speak Spanish.  James speaks some Spanish -- enough to communicate as needed while calmly fishing. But given the situation, all we really could do was hang on and trust the man who was steering the craft knew which direction it should be pointed.

We had noticed the clouds gathering and felt the rain start. It looked like it would pass, though, and none of us minded getting wet. Plus we were fishing Lake Pichachos, Mexico's newest bass lake, and we only had a few hours that afternoon and a couple of hours the next morning to fish. We really didn't want to cut it any shorter than was necessary. By the time we knew the rain had set in to stay and we'd better get moving, it was coming down as hard as rain cold fall, and under those conditions, we were a good 20 minutes ride from where we needed to be.

By the time we got back, the lightning was notably closer and more frequent. The rain subsided a bit at the end, but we actually kind of missed it because it was a warm rain and the wind was cold on soaked clothes. The adventure continued with a truck getting stuck on a newly cut and rain drenched dirt road and us climbing the hill on foot in nearly complete darkness. We made it out safely, and having done so, I have to admit that I'm glad for the storm. It was an adventure I won't quickly forget.

How to Imitate a School of Shad with One Lure

You may have heard a bit of the buzz about the new BaitBall Series of lures that LIVETARGET introduced at ICAST. This short video with Elite Series pro Stephen Browning explains the concept and talks about how to use these lures to catch bass. For more videos, please visit the our YouTube Channel.

Hook More Fish

Do you do too much swinging and missing when you fish for bass, or do you hook fish initially, only to have them throw the hook when they jump? FLW Tour pro Marty Stone has made a lifelong study of what works and what doesn't work for him when it comes time to set the hook, and he sums it up nicely in this short video. Check it out.