"In the Boat" presented by Jewel Bait Company |
Mid-Central buddy bass
November 1st, 2008
Norfork, Panther bay 7:30-4:00
Anglers: David and Carl Wooten
22nd place 5 bass@ 6.93
This was to be my first tournament since the Cystic way back in April. I took a break from
tournaments for a good while before and after having our little girl. I have been excited to get back
out and start fishing again and hope to get out more often through the week.
I never had the chance to make it out for a single day of practice and Dad could only get out one
day which was the Thursday before the event. Word is the spinnerbait bite is pretty good but the
weather has been fit for that bite for the past month. As we looked at the forecast for Saturday it
was to be a high sky day with no wind and we both were thinking that Dad better invest what time
he had in finding some deep fish (If there were any to be caught). Dad calls Thursday evening after
putting in a long day and reported catching some at 30'+ and most were smallmouth. He said most
of them were around 16" but he figured we could rake out 10lbs or so if we stuck with them all day. I
figured it would take allot more weight than that but Dad was thinking 10 or 11 would place us in the
money if we get that high sky and no wind, so basically we were banking on everyone's misfortune
with the weather. One way or the other, at least he had found something. This thought process has
worked out for us several times in the past but when the sound of pouring rain woke me up at 5:30
am, I was starting to think we may be trouble! I pulled up the radar on my p.c and saw only the very
small dot right over Baxter county. It looked like the little cloud would be short lived. Dad showed up
around 6:30 and we talked about our game plan.
Dad seemed to think we would be ok with the deep bite if we just stuck with it.
The rain was letting up all along and the clouds were thinning and by take off time the rain had quit.
Take Off:
We were boat #38 out of 43 and as we watched 30 of the boats in front of us all head into Benetts, I
was thinking that was good - at least we were doing something totally different. Now if only it works
out for us! I headed to Dad's first ledge and placed the boat out at 80' and the ledge came up to
33'. We started catching fish pretty quickly, but they were all small largemouth and Kentuckies. We
left there with 1 small keeper Kentucky and hit the next ledge. Dad hooks up with a 16" smallmouth,
but it was skinny and may have only been a little over a pound. I was thinking at that time we would
do pretty good on the deep bite, but soon found out the smallmouth were not going to cooperate.
We never got another smallmouth to bite the rest of the day! (This is what I hate about those brown
fish). After several more ledges Dad wanted to run to the lower end of the lake were he had found
his best 2 spots and after the first ledge with no bites I was starting to feel it slip away from us. We
have been in this situation so many times I couldn't count and hit one good school to turn things
around. I was trying to just think positive.
The second ledge dad had found was all the way in brushy creek and I was thinking "Man he done
allot of looking in that one day". We pulled up and started catching one keeper Kentucky after
another and left there with 5 more keepers, but our weight was on the small side. We figured we
had around 6 pounds and needed to cull everything in the box. It was starting to get frustrating
since Dad had all nice smallmouth in practice but they seemed to be extinct today.
Like George W. we stayed the course. We continued the rest of the day on the ledges and it was a
perfect day for such, but we just could not get anything going our way.We weighed in our tiny limit
at 6.93 pounds.
The weights stayed pretty low as 6-8 pounds seemed to be the going weight. Looks like the
Kentucky bite was on but not much else. Most of the top teams reported catching their fish early on
spinnerbaits.
My Thoughts:
It was nice to finally get out and fish with dad again, It was a beautiful day and we did manage a
limit. It was also good to visit with everyone again and hopefully I can get in some sort of groove this
season. The lake is still up in the brush and the blacks will normally stay in the brush until the lake
drops down out of it. There are lots of smallmouth out deep but they didn't turn on for us. The
Kentuckies seem to be everywhere we wanted to fish. We should have started out with the
spinnerbaits, but we stuck with what works consistently for us. That high lake level keeps most the
blacks shallow and when the brown fish turn off, It's over.
Equipment:
7' G-Loomis, 10lb. Seaguar line, 5/8 oz. Jewel Football jig and Eakins craw. We did try tubes and
brush hogs but the jig was the only thing that worked for us.
November 1st, 2008
Norfork, Panther bay 7:30-4:00
Anglers: David and Carl Wooten
22nd place 5 bass@ 6.93
This was to be my first tournament since the Cystic way back in April. I took a break from
tournaments for a good while before and after having our little girl. I have been excited to get back
out and start fishing again and hope to get out more often through the week.
I never had the chance to make it out for a single day of practice and Dad could only get out one
day which was the Thursday before the event. Word is the spinnerbait bite is pretty good but the
weather has been fit for that bite for the past month. As we looked at the forecast for Saturday it
was to be a high sky day with no wind and we both were thinking that Dad better invest what time
he had in finding some deep fish (If there were any to be caught). Dad calls Thursday evening after
putting in a long day and reported catching some at 30'+ and most were smallmouth. He said most
of them were around 16" but he figured we could rake out 10lbs or so if we stuck with them all day. I
figured it would take allot more weight than that but Dad was thinking 10 or 11 would place us in the
money if we get that high sky and no wind, so basically we were banking on everyone's misfortune
with the weather. One way or the other, at least he had found something. This thought process has
worked out for us several times in the past but when the sound of pouring rain woke me up at 5:30
am, I was starting to think we may be trouble! I pulled up the radar on my p.c and saw only the very
small dot right over Baxter county. It looked like the little cloud would be short lived. Dad showed up
around 6:30 and we talked about our game plan.
Dad seemed to think we would be ok with the deep bite if we just stuck with it.
The rain was letting up all along and the clouds were thinning and by take off time the rain had quit.
Take Off:
We were boat #38 out of 43 and as we watched 30 of the boats in front of us all head into Benetts, I
was thinking that was good - at least we were doing something totally different. Now if only it works
out for us! I headed to Dad's first ledge and placed the boat out at 80' and the ledge came up to
33'. We started catching fish pretty quickly, but they were all small largemouth and Kentuckies. We
left there with 1 small keeper Kentucky and hit the next ledge. Dad hooks up with a 16" smallmouth,
but it was skinny and may have only been a little over a pound. I was thinking at that time we would
do pretty good on the deep bite, but soon found out the smallmouth were not going to cooperate.
We never got another smallmouth to bite the rest of the day! (This is what I hate about those brown
fish). After several more ledges Dad wanted to run to the lower end of the lake were he had found
his best 2 spots and after the first ledge with no bites I was starting to feel it slip away from us. We
have been in this situation so many times I couldn't count and hit one good school to turn things
around. I was trying to just think positive.
The second ledge dad had found was all the way in brushy creek and I was thinking "Man he done
allot of looking in that one day". We pulled up and started catching one keeper Kentucky after
another and left there with 5 more keepers, but our weight was on the small side. We figured we
had around 6 pounds and needed to cull everything in the box. It was starting to get frustrating
since Dad had all nice smallmouth in practice but they seemed to be extinct today.
Like George W. we stayed the course. We continued the rest of the day on the ledges and it was a
perfect day for such, but we just could not get anything going our way.We weighed in our tiny limit
at 6.93 pounds.
The weights stayed pretty low as 6-8 pounds seemed to be the going weight. Looks like the
Kentucky bite was on but not much else. Most of the top teams reported catching their fish early on
spinnerbaits.
My Thoughts:
It was nice to finally get out and fish with dad again, It was a beautiful day and we did manage a
limit. It was also good to visit with everyone again and hopefully I can get in some sort of groove this
season. The lake is still up in the brush and the blacks will normally stay in the brush until the lake
drops down out of it. There are lots of smallmouth out deep but they didn't turn on for us. The
Kentuckies seem to be everywhere we wanted to fish. We should have started out with the
spinnerbaits, but we stuck with what works consistently for us. That high lake level keeps most the
blacks shallow and when the brown fish turn off, It's over.
Equipment:
7' G-Loomis, 10lb. Seaguar line, 5/8 oz. Jewel Football jig and Eakins craw. We did try tubes and
brush hogs but the jig was the only thing that worked for us.