The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

In a nutshell, that old proverb more or less describes the comparison of today's Dewey's tournament with the one we held last Sunday. Let me explain.

What changed today from last Sunday was the water level. The water last Sunday stood at more than 3 feet throughout the entire day...somewhere around 3.56 feet, if I remember correctly. This morning, when we launched our boats, the water level was more than a whole foot lower...about 2.46, if I'm not mistaken. Despite this radical change, however, the weights from both weigh-ins pretty much mirrored each other.

For example, first place last Sunday went for 14.26, second place went for 13.67, and third place came in at 13.57. Today's first place went for 14.59, second place went for 14.32, and third place came in 13.16. And further, the average weight of all non-money winners last Sunday was 8.40, compared to 8.96 today. By my math, that's pretty darn close.

All that being said, I should point out that today's event welcomed 18 anglers in 11 boats. Collectively, they caught and weighed 50 bass, for a total weight of 104.82 pounds and an average weight per fish of 2.09 pounds.

Laying claim to first place was the solo competitor Gabe Himmelwright, who brought five fish to the scales, weighing 14.59 pounds. His big fish weighed 4.05 pounds.

Finishing in second place was the team of (from left) Richard Hall and Dave Dozier, who also brought five fish to the scales, weighing 14.32 pounds. They didn't weigh a big fish. However, they walked away with the larger of two side pots, since the first-place winner hadn't elected to participate in this award.

Bringing home the third-place prize was the team of (from left) Rob Peppers and Don Carter, who brought five fish to the scales, weighing 13.16 pounds. They also took home the smaller of two side pots, as well as the big-fish pot for their 4.13-pound bass.

Following is how the rest of the field lined up behind today's winners:
     * The team of Dave Anderson and Gary Coderre had five fish, weighing 12.37 pounds, anchored by a 3.72-pound bass.
     * The team of Jim Leavis and Nelson Anderson had five fish, weighing 10.07 pounds. They didn't weigh a big fish.
     * The team of Wayne Hayes and Ken Testorff had five fish, weighing 9.16 pounds. They didn't weigh a big fish.
     * The husband-wife team of Andy and Diana Morath had five fish, weighing 8.43 pounds. They didn't weigh a big fish.
     * Mark Ingram had five fish, weighing 8.27 pounds. He didn't weigh a big fish.
     * Jim Crist had five fish, weighing 8.06 pounds. He didn't weigh a big fish.
     * Chris Fretard had five fish, weighing 6.39 pounds. He didn't weigh a big fish.
     * The team of Rob Chatham and Craig Jones didn't weigh any fish.

By virtue of fishing his fifth event of the current season today, Jim Leavis became eligible to fish our season-ending, one-day Classic in October 2024.

Congratulations to all of today's winners, and thanks to everyone who came out to participate. For planning purposes, our next event is scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 10, with times to be announced by tournament director Wayne Hayes at a later date. Watch your email inbox and this space for details when they become available. Hope you will be able to join us.

Backseaters Don't Always Have To Play Second Fiddle

"Whether you're bass fishing for fun from the back of a buddy's boat or sharing an area with another angler during a tournament, it's important to identify and implement a few techniques to make sure you're making the most of the water available." Thus says Wired2Fish writer Shaye Baker.

As he went on to explain, the guy on the backseat needs to watch where the other angler casts and try not to cast to the exact same spots..."hit anything they miss," as he simplified it.

There are times, however, when the backseater will want to throw his bait to the exact same spot. One such occasion might be when the man in front is power-fishing a buzzbait, spinnerbait or chatterbait. The guy in back should follow up with something more finesse-like, such as a squarebill, small swimbait, or swim jig. Why? Because a bass couldn't get to the power-fisherman's bait in time, or perhaps it just wasn't in an aggressive enough mood to commit to the power presentation. When the backseater's finesse offering comes right back, the fish often will slam it.

Said Baker, "Another great way to catch fish behind someone is to keep an eye on the back graph. Whether you're fishing as a co-angler or fishing with a buddy, watching the graph at the driver's console will alert you to fish that are right underneath your feet...where the transducer for that graph usually is located."

The Wired2Fish writer went on to explain that the backseater should "keep a drop shot or worm handy, and whenever you see a fish pop up on the graph, reel in whatever you're fishing with and drop a bait right behind the motor. A drop shot works extremely well for this because it gives you a bait that will make a beeline for the bottom and get as close as possible to where you last saw the fish. But a shaky head or Texas rig works really well, too, when the angler on the front of the boat is moving along pretty fast. That way, you can just fire your bait out behind the boat and drag it along to try to intersect the fish.

"It's also a good idea to keep an eye on the graph to try and find cover. The down- and side-imaging will reveal boulders, stumps and clumps of vegetation that you can try to make contact with and pick off fish. Just always remember where those images are coming from. Instead of the transducer being a little in front of you, like it would be if you were fishing from the bow, it's a little behind you...likely mounted just below the outboard."

When Baker finds a productive area, he milks it for all it's worth. One way to do this is to go back over the same area with a different bait. Pick one that's a little more finesse-like on the second go-round and hopefully pick off a few fish that wouldn't commit to a topwater, spinnerbait or whatever else you might have thrown the first round.

One thing Baker especially likes to do sometimes is actually to flip those two presentations. He occasionally starts with something finesse-like, then swaps to power-fishing baits on the second or third round...when a good feeding window comes along. An example of this would be a cold morning in spring, while fishing shallow.

Said Baker, "I know that fish should be up, trying to spawn, but a cold night before will make them a little lethargic and reluctant to commit to a power-fishing tactic. Instead, they might just swat at a bait and become even harder to catch. So I'll start with something more finesse-like, such as a floating worm or wacky rig, then swap over to a more aggressive bait like a frog or buzzbait in the morning, as the water warms."

However, there's another really big key when fishing shallow behind yourself, as Baker noted. He likes to make sure he's hitting things from every angle. If you're going around a pond, for instance, don't keep going round and round in the same direction. Turn and fish back in the opposite direction, and you'll find new lanes opening up in the grass and between bushes you haven't been able to cast to yet. Your bait will approach laydowns and other cover from a completely different angle, and you stand a chance to catch fish that haven't even seen your lure yet.

Anglers often mistakenly get the notion they've caught every fish in an area after getting a few bites, but that's rarely a fact.

"If the angler in the front of the boat is catching fish pretty regularly and skipping a lot of cover, don't be ashamed to tie on the exact same thing and hit whatever he/she misses," said Baker. "If the bass are just swiping at the other angler's bait, back off on your presentation a bit, and try bringing something more finesse-like along the exact same trails. And always make sure, when you want to recycle your own water, to do it from a different direction. That simple tactic will almost guarantee you to catch more fish."

Welcoming Back Some Folks We Haven't Seen in a While

It's always a pleasure to welcome back folks who haven't fished our Dewey's tournaments in a while. That was the case today for the duo of Heath and Kyle Parker, as well as Rusty Girard and Jim Crist. They were four of the 20 anglers in 12 boats who joined us for a make-up tournament from last Sunday, which was terminated because of high water and concern for everyone's safety. All these competitors combined for a total of 55 bass with a gross total weight of 121.98 pounds and an average weight per fish of 2.21 pounds.

Those anglers claiming monetary reward for their efforts today started with the Parker duo (from left, Kyle and Heath), who finished in 1st place, with a total weight of 14.26 pounds but no big fish. Besides their place prize, they also claimed the bigger of two side pots.

Taking 2nd place was the team of (from left) Dave Anderson and Gary Coderre, with five fish weighing 13.67 pounds and a big fish tipping the scales at 3.48 pounds. They also claimed the smaller of two side pots.

And walking away with 3rd place was Mark Ingram (left), with five fish weighing 13.57 pounds and a big fish that tipped the scales at 4.74 pounds, which earned him the big-fish prize today.

Following is how the rest of the field of anglers did:
     * The team of Dave Dozier and Richard Hall had five fish, total weight 13.46 pounds, and a big fish weighing 4 pounds.
     * Andy Morath had five fish, total weight 12.38 pounds, no big fish.
     * The team of Gabe Himmelwright and Rusty Girard had five fish, total weight 11.09 pounds, no big fish.
     * The team of Don Carter and Rob Peppers had five fish, total weight 10.75 pounds, and a big fish weighing 3.57 pounds.
     * The team of Rob Chatham and Craig Jones had five fish, total weight 9.19 pounds, and a big fish weighing 1.76 pounds.
     * The team of Wayne Hayes and Ken Testorff had five fish, total weight 8.22 pounds, and a big fish weighing 2.23 pounds.
     * Jim Crist had four fish, total weight 6.37 pounds, no big fish.
     * Skip Schaible had three fish, total weight 4.83 pounds, no big fish.
     * The team of Jim Leavis and Ken Matthias had three fish (after a big-fish penalty for weighing a short fish), total weight 4.19 pounds.

Six more anglers, including Gabe Himmelwright, Ken Matthias, Andy Morath, Dave Anderson, Richard Hall, and Rob Peppers, joins five other anglers in being qualified to fish our season-ending Classic tournament in October.

Congratulations to all the winners of today's event, and thanks to everyone who came out to participate. For planning purposes, our next tournament is scheduled for Sunday, July 28, 2024. I hope you can join us.

Fishermen Think Outside the Box, Too

Let me state right up front, though, that I'm not familiar with any who do it in the nude, as depicted in the accompanying photo of "The Thinker" statue.

Let's just say I feel like the vast majority of anglers...bass anglers, in particular...have more class, if you know what I mean. I won't go so far as to insinuate we "style and profile," in the same manner as retired pro wrestler Ric Flair used to demonstrate, but I do feel rather certain we will have "all the vitals" covered each and every time we head to the water, especially this time of the year.

OK, that's enough nonsense for now. Just wanted to start this on a lighthearted note.

What I want to do with this article is to share some ideas I gleaned from another recent round of research on the Internet. I'm not advocating that anyone should try any of the ideas presented here. Rather, I'm just letting you know how some others among us think about what we all do, which often, in my book, is more about "fishing" than "catching."

In a piece on the Ultimate Bass (UB) website, I read a guest author's description of a technique he had learned from the pages of an old BassMaster Magazine. Two fellas bank fishing had separated so they could cover more water when one of them heard a loud "ker-plunk." Upon investigating, he found his partner had tied a large nut in front of a floating crankbait and then thrown the weight-and-crankbait combination beyond a bedded fish. He then slowly dragged the assembly to the edge of the bed, gave the line slack, pulled it back in, and then repeated the process. The result: He picked up a very nice sack of fish. As the angler explained, the crankbait resembled a bream that was invading the bedded bass' nest. Made sense to the other angler, but he offered one slight modification: Use an egg sinker, instead of the large nut.

The UB author also offered the idea of rigging a small crankbait in tandem with a larger crankbait behind it, supposedly resembling a small baitfish being pursued by a larger predator.

Next came a suggestion from the UB author as a way to improve fishing in an area with clear water, post-frontal conditions, on an outside grass line. After throwing a jig, crankbait, t-rig, c-rig, dropshot, and some other things with no success, he decided to take a clear jerkbait, put it on his dropshot rod (with 8-lb. test) and use about 3 pounds of suspend dots to get the lure down and make it stable around 6 feet or so. He cast it out and got his bait to depth, then just stopped it. After what he described as the longest 60 seconds of his life, he twitched it a few times, then waited again. He didn't catch any huge fish that day but managed a limit...one that never would have made it into the livewell without resorting to something a little bit different.

And finally, how many of you ever have heard of the bobber-wacky rig? As the name implies, it features a wacky-rigged soft-plastic worm dangling beneath a sensitive float. Essentially, it lets you deadstick in the middle of the water column, which is a good way to catch pressured fish. This method works equally well for both largemouth and smallies.

The bobber-wacky rig is the brainchild of Matt Straw (left), one of the finest bass anglers you'll find anywhere. For this rig, he spools his reel with 10-pound-test braided line to facilitate long casts. He slides the line through the center of an A-Just-A Bubble, which has surgical tubing inside that you twist to hold the float in place, with the desired length of line dangling below. He then adds a small swivel and ties on a 3-to-5-foot leader fashioned from 6-to-10-pound-test fluorocarbon. Straw finishes the rig with a single AAA splitshot just below the swivel, and a 3-, 4- or 5-inch soft-plastic worm skewered through the center on a No. 4 Eagle Claw Wacky Worm Hook or Gamakatsu Baitholder Hook. To cast this rig out as far away from the boat as possible, he uses an 8-foot rod.

Said Straw, "I use this rig over boulders, sometimes with scattered cabbage along the edge. I also use it around reed beds and for fish suspended off the edge of sharp breaks. Some days, you need to twitch the bobber vigorously in place, or while pulling it slowly toward you. Other days, the bass want the up-and-down drift under the waves."

And speaking of waves, Straw notes the wind complements the presentation, making it even better.

"I've experienced huge success when water was coming over the bow of the boat, and people on board were turning green"...not from envy, either, he said with a chuckle. "The best scenario is a smaller chop, so that the resulting up-and-down motion of the rig is a little slower and more rhythmic."

No matter what the conditions, he says he'll chuck out a bobber-wacky rig whenever he's otherwise busy with the likes of tying knots or eating a sandwich.

Straw cycles through a variety of soft-plastic worms to find the size, shape and color the bass like best for his bobber-wacky rig. For years, he's relied on 3-, 4- and 5-inch Jackal, Yum, Gulp!, Senko, and PowerBait finesse worms. As for colors, he opts for natural hues, noting that the real attraction is the subtle vibration of the worm, not the color.

In our quest to become better anglers and catch more fish, it's important to remember this: The fish may travel in schools, but they never read a BassMaster Magazine or log onto Ultimate Bass.com. No one's saying you should run out and grab a bunch of bobbers for your next tournament, but you shouldn't be afraid to try a different approach and fish outside the box...just please do it fully clothed, though. Who knows? You just may fill the livewell and invent a new way to catch fish.

Going out of Your Way to Help Others in Need...

That's the definition of a Good Samaritan. And given all the problems there are in the world today, it's refreshing to find good people who still live by this principle. Let me share a couple of instances I found online.

As the late outdoors humorist Ed Zern once wrote, "Most fishermen are born honest, but they get over it." Yet, there are some fish stories that are just so amazing that they couldn't possibly have been only a figment of someone's imagination.

Such is the catch-and-release tale of 14-year-old Connor Halsa who was drift-fishing Minnesota's Lake of the Woods, with his lure 20 feet down on the rocky bottom, when he set the hook on what he thought was a big walleye. His catch, however, turned out to be a wallet containing $2,000 in cash.

While some folks undoubtedly would have kept the money, that wasn't Connor's style. Thanks to a business card he also found in the wallet, a Halsa family member called the number on the card, and the person who answered knew that the wallet had been lost by Iowa farmer Jim Denney. The farmer was stunned to learn that his wallet, which he'd lost a year earlier, stuffed with 20-, 50- and 100-dollar bills, had been found.

Denney recalled that the waves on the lake that day were rough, and his wallet had slipped out of his overalls pocket. He didn't realize it had been lost overboard until he went to pay his motel bill. He was even more stunned when Halsa insisted on returning all of the money and would not accept a reward.

When Denney visited Halsa and his family to say thanks in person, his cash-reward offer again was turned down. Halsa did accept a customized cooler from Denney, who also treated the family to dinner at a local restaurant.

Not even the great author and fisherman Ernest Hemingway could have dreamed up a story that fantastic.

You also might enjoy the accompanying video at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Zwb7RYK-Bo.

(Editor's Note: I was surprised to learn that people who lose their wallet, as opposed to someone stealing it, shouldn't despair. The odds are good that someone will find and return it to you. According to a study in the journal Science in 2019, more than 50 percent of people who find lost wallets with money in them contact the owners and return their wallets, provided they can be found.)

In the second incident, Steve York had left his home in Bronson, Mich. to fish the Bassmaster Southern Open #1 on Lakes Toho and Kissimmee. To avoid the snow and slippery road conditions, he left Michigan a few days early but arrived a few days late, due to an accident on the slippery roads in Florida.

York's travel partner was driving his pickup when a rear tire lost traction, the driver lost control, and the truck towing York's boat spun off the roadway. The rig did a 180-degree turn before coming to a stop in a grassy median. There were no injuries, and the truck received only minor damage, but the boat and trailer flipped over.

Lamented York, "Driving on the interstate with the cruise control set to 70 mph isn't a good idea in the rain." (According to state troopers, "Cruise control should never be used on wet or icy roadways. If your wheels lose traction, the cruise control will continue to accelerate, causing the vehicle to skid. By the time you realize you're skidding, it could be too late.")

He and his partner continued to Kissimmee without a boat. Upon arrival, he updated his Facebook page to share news of the accident with friends. The post went viral and eventually extended outside his network of friends. One of those was a stranger: Lucas McDaniel, a tournament pro from Indiana.

The latter reached out to help a fellow angler in need. He offered his fully rigged and tournament-ready boat to York, even though the two of them never had met. All York had to do was travel to Clewiston, Fla., and pick up the boat in storage at Roland Martin's Marina.

York said he's seen acts of kindness extended to anglers in need before, but nothing like what he experienced.

"As anglers and tournament fishermen, we share information and even lures and gear," he said. "That's just how this sport works. I guess it shouldn't surprise me that generosity can include another guy's boat," he added.

What Would Bass Fishing Be Without a Few Harry 'n' Charlie Moments?

That's a question Wayne and I no longer have to wonder about after the mess I created today. Will explain later, but first let me give you the results of our day on the water.

After the frog reports I've been getting recently, I figured I'd be watching Wayne wail up on bass all day long. However, you might say the frog bite where we were appeared to have "croaked"...to put it very bluntly. In other words, it wasn't happening...period.

In a little bit of no time, Wayne had put down his frog rod and picked up one of his other rigs. I always carry some Teckel frogs in my box but very seldom tie one on...certainly not where anyone else is around...because I even give "beginners" a bad name with my lack of frog prowess. Put another way, I'm the perfect example of "how NOT to do it."

I'm happy to report, though, that Wayne and I eventually found our stride...in a manner of speaking, that is...and we managed to put a few fish in the boat by day's end, which was shortly after 12 noon. In the final analysis, our best five would have tipped the scales at about 12 or 13 pounds...respectable, but still nothing to write home about.

And as for the Harry 'n' Charlie episode I spoke of in the beginning, I will now explain. Seems Wayne had cast a soft plastic to an area, and when I followed suit a few moments later with my topwater, I hadn't been able to lay eyes on where Wayne's line was. Accordingly, I went across his line, and it wasn't until I had worked my topwater a short distance that I suddenly became aware of my mistake. Almost simultaneously, I felt a strike, but not knowing if I was feeling a strike on my bait or Wayne's, I held back from setting the hook. A split-second later, though, when I felt a more pronounced strike, I offered a "mild" hookset, and then felt a fish on one of our two lines.

Wayne and I both began full retrieval of our lines, and when we jointly lifted our lines free of the water, we only then saw that the fish was on my hook, but the fish started twisting and turning, while suspended in mid-air, creating an even greater problem. Wayne finally was able to remove the hooked fish and release it, but there appeared to be no easy solution to separating our entwined lines. I finally told him to just cut my line, which he did, and we soon were both back in business.

So, that in a nutshell, was our Harry 'n' Charlie experience for the day. However, the only part of recent fishing reports I've received, that we can sign off on as being gospel truth, is the fact the water is very clean and clear at the moment. If there was a frog bite somewhere today, we didn't find it. And we certainly didn't catch 20 or more fish, either...more like 12 or 13 would be more accurate. The bottomline, though, is that we had fun...and, after all, isn't that what this is all about...including the Harry 'n' Charlie moments?

One Great Froggin' Day Deserves Another

After seeing the post on my blog from Andy about his froggin' day (a subject close to D. Mac's heart), the latter went out today with 8 rods, 5 of which had frogs attached. Two had something else, and one had a 40-plus-year-old Devil's Horse in coach dog color.

The results were 25 fish lipped, with the best two just over 4 pounds.

"And yes," noted D. Mac, "the ol' Devil's Horse got some action. I had forgotten what a pain in the butt it is, though, to net a fish hooked by this lure. Those treble hooks are more like three small-wreck anchors."

D. Mac went on to say that a buddy of his fished a river in North Carolina this past weekend (probably the Pasquotank) and had sent him a picture showing the bass thumbs both he and his wife came away with as a tribute to the kind of day they also enjoyed.

"All in all, it was a good weekend to be on the water...despite the heat that was in abundance," concluded D. Mac.

Frederick Joseph "Fritz" Friebel...

Now that's anything but a common household name if ever I heard or saw one. I only came across it for the first time a couple of days ago while routinely scrounging around the Internet, as I am bent on doing...to my wife's considerable distress, I might add.

All that aside, I'm betting there aren't too many others out there who've ever heard of this guy, either...am I right? That being the case, I'm going to tell you a little story about this fella "Fritz" (the man on right in accompanying photo), who just happened to be a fisherman like a lot of us other dudes.

Seems this here "Fritz" was a traveling hardware salesman. He was born in Germany on June 6, 1893. And nine years before George Washington Perry landed his 22-pound, 4-ounce official world-record largemouth from Montgomery Lake in Georgia, Friebel landed a 20-pound, 2-ounce largemouth (see big fish on Friebel's stringer in above photo), reportedly from Moody Lake in Pasco County, Fla. Perry didn't catch his bass until June 2, 1932, while "Fritz" caught his on an uncertain date in May 1923.

The exact date of the catch is lost to memory and history. Some accounts had it as May 19, 1923, which fell on a Saturday. But the Oct. 12, 1952 edition of the Tampa Tribune, contained this quote from Friebel: "It was a Sunday morning, when I should have been in church, and I had to call a grocer to open his store to get the fish weighed."

Because Friebel said he caught the bass on a Sunday in May, it would have had to be the 6th, 13th, 20th, or 27th--not the 19th. An avid angler, "Fritz" carried his tackle with him as he traveled the Sunshine State, selling hardware.

It should be noted here that Friebel's brother, Walter, always doubted his story. Years later, he told outdoor writer Bill Baab that "Fritz" likely had made up the story about catching his fish from Moody Lake in Pasco County, Fla., "just to throw other fishermen off the track." He went on to suggest that "Fritz" more likely caught his bass from nearby (and aptly named) Big Fish Lake.

To catch the giant bass, "Fritz" used a Creek Chub No. 700 Straight Pikie Minnow (see sample at left). The company was so proud of the catch that it featured Friebel in its 1928 catalog...five years after the fact. Their headline read: "The Black Bass Record Has Been Broken--Not Cracked or Bent, But Crushed, Torn Apart, and Split Wide Open."

The catalog article continued, "Gentlemen anglers all! Please leap to your feet and throw your hats in the air. Rah! Rah! for Mr. Friebel and his black bass!"

Then, in Field & Stream's Great National Fishing Contests, came an article proclaiming "the world's record is smashed into flinders. Mr. Fritz J. Friebel, of Tampa, Fla., is the world-record crasher with rod and reel and a mighty largemouth black bass."

That particular article went on to note that when Friebel was weighing the big bass, an onlooker accused him of filling the fish with lead sinkers. Friebel reportedly pulled out his pocketknife, slit the fish's belly open, and suggested that the accuser reach inside to find out for himself.

There are several similarities between Friebel's catch and Perry's bass nine years later. For one, both anglers weighed their catches a considerable time after landing the fish; the live weights could have been decidedly greater in both cases.

For another, both Perry and Friebel were no-nonsense anglers, not finely dressed dandies out for a little sport. Perry and his fishing partner on his record-setting day had one rod and reel and a single store-bought lure between them. The few surviving photographs of Friebel show him dressed in ragged clothes. As his daughter explained, "Daddy didn't own a boat. He wore the worst-looking clothes because he often waded into water up to his armpits while fishing."

Finally, both men's fish met similar fates--on the dinner table. Though Perry's catch was made in the midst of the Great Depression and Friebel's came during more prosperous "Roaring '20s," both anglers treated their families to fine fish dinners.

Today, Friebel's bass is widely considered the biggest ever caught in Florida and is recognized by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission as the "uncertified state record." That means it is "believed accurate, based on reliable witnesses and other evidence," but is not certifiable, according to FWC regulations.

The "official" Florida record largemouth weighed 17.27 pounds and was pulled from a small lake in Polk County, Fla. in 1986 by Billy O'Berry. He caught it on a yellow and green Strike King Spinnerbait, using what he described as a "moderate retrieve."

In conclusion, it should be noted that "Fritz" Friebel died in 1965, at the age of 72 (as best I can determine). His family subsequently had the marker pictured at left made and shipped to San Antonio, Fla., for placement in the city's downtown park in his memory (click anywhere on this photo for a readable version).

In Case You're Feelin' Froggy...

Now is the time to leap. And that's exactly what Andy Morath did today. He hopped in his boat and went fishin'...high water on the North Landing and all. Best thing about his decision? It paid some handsome dividends.

Said Andy, "It was a pretty good day. The water was surprisingly pretty clear in the creeks. With the high water, cloud cover, and wind today, it made for a perfect frog-fishing day.

"Caught a lot of fish, and pretty much all of them were good quality. I'd say my best five went around 16 or 17 pounds...all on a frog."

Congrats on your great day! Andy.

A Man Who Knows a Thing or Two About Fishing Lipless Crankbaits

Professional angler Mark Daniels, Jr. is a lipless crankbait connoisseur who has spent hundreds of hours with one of these lures in his hands. MDJ first remembers fishing a "trap" when he was 10 or 11 years old.

Now, he has caught bass from California to New York with the iconic bait. What follows is a tip he graciously offered to Wired2Fish staff writer Luke Stoner back in October 2021.

"MDJ learned to get more bites with a lipless crankbait by fishing it in places that other anglers avoid, namely hard, wooden cover like laydowns, stump flats, and shallow brush piles," said Stoner. "Lipless crankbaits have proven themselves as an incredible lure around aquatic vegetation, but they don't get mentioned too much around other cover types."

"People don't throw traps around wood because, honestly, they are pretty bad about snagging," MDJ admitted. "But if you can finesse a lipless through laydowns or around stumps, bass will jump all over it, 'cause it's something they don't regularly see in those areas. To combat a lipless crankbait's tendency to hang up, I simply take the back hook and split ring off the bait altogether."

The only time the pro takes this action is when he specifically focuses his casts around hard, wooden  cover.

"He always upsizes the front hook in these scenarios," noted Stoner. "With the standard 1/2-ounce size, he typically upgrades his Rat-L-Trap hooks to No. 4 Owner ST-56 hooks to improve his landing ratio. When targeting wooden cover, he upsizes the single front hook to a No. 2 ST-56 hook."

"I've tried so many hooks over the years," said MDJ, "because Rat-L-Traps and other lipless baits are notorious for losing fish," he explained. "The ST-56s from Owner are short shank and triple the strength of a regular hook with a ridiculously sharp point. I just don't lose as many fish with these hooks. KVD has proven to the world that short-shank treble hooks catch fish once they have 'em pinned, and I've experienced the same on lipless baits."

With the back hook removed, MDJ's bait doesn't get snagged nearly as often and doesn't affect his landing ratio when it comes to putting bass in the boat.

"If MDJ is fishing the smaller 1/4-ounce version," explained Stoner, "he opts for two No. 6 Owner ST-56 hooks around grass but prefers a single No. 4 front hook when targeting wood cover. Upsizing the front hook when he completely loses the back hook is extremely important to getting a hook into fish that react to the bait."

Lipless crankbaits like the Rat-L-Trap have been catching bass for years and are just as effective today as they were when they were developed in the late 1960s. Don't forget about these proven fish-catchers this fall and apply MDJ's tips to help you get the most out of your lipless crankbaits, regardless of the time of year.

10 Bass Fishing Lures Every Angler Should Have in Their Tackle Box...

With glaring headlines on ads reading like the one above, is it any wonder why so many bass fishermen often are accused of being pack rats, hoarders or such?

Without question, each and every one of those thousands of fancy new baits at the local superstore will catch fish under a particular set of circumstances, but how does one narrow it all down to figure out which lures to buy, and which ones are more likely niche baits?

Some fellas will ask buddies for help, while others simply will let stuff they read on the Internet guide their decision-making. This piece of info, which I picked off the Internet, described a list of "10 essentials that all anglers should have in their tackle boxes." Included in that list were soft plastic stick baits, finesse worms, jigs, lipless crankbaits, spinnerbaits, square bills, deep diving cranks, frogs, topwater walking baits, and jerkbaits.

The ad ended with this line: "Without question, there are effective bait styles that didn't make this cut, but if you've got these 10 bass fishing lures, you'll be able to catch bass from east to west, under any conditions." I, however, submit that you may need only one of those baits listed above: the soft-plastic stick bait.

It's a well-established fact that most bass fishermen (and yes, I include myself in that lot) take a lot more baits with them on each trip than they can possibly use on average. Every once in a great while, though, you meet up with or read about an exception to that rule...like "Frank," a guy whom a fellow club fisherman described as "fishing one type of bait exclusively." Turns out that Frank used nothing but plastic worms.

Oh, he used various sizes...from 4 to 10 inches. And he rigged them different ways: T-rig, weightless, split shot, or his own version of a shakey head...before shakey heads became a big thing. He had fished for many years and had impressed this fellow clubber by placing in the top three in many club tournaments. Frank had the utmost confidence in his lone bait choice, which made the fellow clubber question if he might be overthinking his decision to have many choices of baits.

"Maybe we should be driven by confidence first," he thought. "Fish the one that works most often, and keep it simple. Besides, many trophy bass hunters, who specialize in targeting big bass, usually rely on one bait to catch the biggest fish."

In the words of another angler, "I had a lake that I fished for a few years out of a canoe in which I took only one rod and Senkos. Caught the five largest fish in my life doing that. Never got bites off other tackle, so I stopped bringing it."

Then there's this from a third fella, "Most of us think that if 'this' isn't working, then 'that' must be better. Then we add in different colors, sizes, and action, and before we know it, we're more confused than when we started."

And finally, there came this from an angler who had been paired with "Frank" for quite a few tournaments. He said, "Ol' Frank may have been old and set in his ways, but most of us could learn a lesson or two from him. Frank used only ribbon-tailed worms, but he could cover the entire water column from top to bottom and from fast to dead-sticking it. He never was in the boat with me when it came to a 1st-place finish, but I lost count of the times he and I finished 2nd or 3rd. Sadly, he passed a few years ago."

Let me close with this. Just yesterday, I watched an online video by Roland Martin, in which he reaffirmed for the umteenth thousandth time that, if he had but one lure he could fish, it would be none other than a Senko. I also ran across another bass guy who seconds that idea. He is the tirelessly creative writer, graphic designer, marketer, photographer, and videographer Kurt Mazurek of Summerville, SC.

"The Senko works everywhere that bass swim, at every time of the year, and under every set of conditions," he said. "In the vast world of fishing tackle, the soft-plastic stick bait, commonly known by the name of the originator, the Yamamoto Senko, has emerged as the undisputed champion. And since the introduction of this soft-plastic category, just about every other manufacturer has launched their own version of this bait--the YUM Dinger, the Berkley General, the Strike King Ocho, etc. Renowned for its versatility, subtle action, and undisputable history of success, the soft stick bait has secured its place as the closest thing to a magic lure for bass enthusiasts across the globe.

"There are flashier lures. There are more efficient lures. But the soft-plastic stick bait is the most consistent bass lure ever. Not only does it always seem to be able to tempt some bites, it may be one of the easiest lures to present, making it an excellent choice for beginners and seasoned anglers alike."

Leave It to Me to Create Problems

It was time today for Wayne and me to get back on the water and see if we could hone our plans a bit better for the Dewey's tournament this coming Sunday. As things worked out, about all we accomplished today was eliminating some areas from further consideration.

Just a week ago, we finished a day of pre-fishing with about 17 pounds of bass, compared to only about 7 pounds today, with less than half the number of fish we caught a week ago.

As usual, I was having my share of errant casts, but one such occasion couldn't have come at a more inopportune time. At the same instant Wayne was taking his daily diabetes shot, my cast went over a limb in the distance and fell about a foot or two into the water. Instantly, a bass hit my bait, and I set the hook. Try as I might to raise the fish out of the water and flip it over the branch, it wasn't going to happen.

Seeing my predicament, Wayne told me just to feed some slack in the line, allowing the fish to stay in the water until he could finish his shot and go rescue my catch. To my disbelief, the keeper fish stayed buttoned the entire time. Handing my rod to Wayne, he extricated the fish and handed the rod back to me, so I could land the catch.

This indeed wasn't the first time I've ever landed a fish after having my line go over a limb, but it was the fist time I was able to keep it fastened as long as the one today. Suffice it to say I was able to release the fish, no worse for wear, from the event.

Is the Silver Minnow Just Another Forgotten Old Lure?

Anyone who tried to convince my kayaking friend, Charlie Bruggemann (right), of that back in 2015 didn't get very far. Why? Because, as the now fully retired angler explained to me back then, that bait from 1920 still was one of the most productive lures in Charlie's arsenal at the time.

And as I've learned through some online research since, the now 104-year-old Johnson Silver Minnow continues to be a productive favorite among many anglers yet today.

One of those gents is Dale W. Verts from Florence, Missouri. In his own words, "It's the MOST versatile thick-cover bait that there is for me. It comes through the muck better than a frog and is way more effective than a frog because you just can do so much more with it (but I still LOVE my frogs). It's also maybe the BEST follow-up bait that there is behind a frog...better than a worm."

Continued Verts, "Folks, this thing is the real deal, and I am truly amazed that I don't see more mention of it on the Internet. Even more so, I don't see it in pro fishin' discussions when the bite is in the vegetation. It's just weird to me, but then again, there are several baits and techniques that I'm not seeing. Maybe I'm just gettin' too old.

"If you want to give this thing a shot, here's how it works. First of all, for some reason, all I've ever thrown is the 1/4-ounce model. I don't know why, except that it works. And the only colors I've ever used are chrome and black chrome. There are more colors and sizes available, of course."

Verts went on to explain that the Silver Minnow works best with a trailer. "The drag of something hanging off the back of the spoon gives it a tantalizing and 'woopsy' wiggle. The type of trailer you use, and sometimes the way you use it, can change the action from a tighter shimmy to a wide wobble. Those tricks are a secret, though, that I'm gonna keep to myself. Y'all can have fun figuring it out for yourselves."

This "show me state" veteran uses a few fairly basic trailers. First is a hard-to-beat rubber or an old vinyl skirt. He suggests looking at the old Arbogast Hula Popper to get an idea of the style skirt he's talking about. Put it on longways, not backwards or inside out.

Second, he advises using a plastic pork-type frog chunk or something like a Zoom Swimmin' Chunk. "Those last good," he said. "I do, however, keep them fairly short, unless the bass are just eatin' 'em up. I also use old Uncle Josh Pork Rinds, too.

"By changing colors (shades) and styles of trailers, you easily can trade-up your presentations to fine tune. I will say 80 percent of the time, I throw a white or pearl-colored trailer. The rest of the time, it's gonna be black."

Verts noted that the Silver Minnow was made with heavy tackle in mind. "Braid is perfect for fishin' it in the thick stuff," he said. "I throw it on 20-to-25-pound mono if I'm using regular line, but most days, I'm chunkin' it on 65-pound braid.

"Of course, I also use a rod to match...at the moment, a Dobyns 734 Fury. I also sometimes use a 735, but the 734 casts better with the smaller 1/4-ounce bait.

"These spoons, at least my older ones," he continued, "that I've had since 1993, come with very dull hooks, even for braid. A few long passes with a file will put you in the game, though."

Continued Verts, "I keep my casts short in the heavy stuff, even though this little bugger will fly if you want to launch it. It'll go so far that you may need to file a flight plan. But I keep my casts to under 30 or 40 feet most of the time. This is a big-bass bait for a thick-cover presentation. I don't give the bass any more than I have to, generally speaking."

At this point, Verts described an incident in which he just had caught a 6 and one-half-pound bass, and less than five minutes later, made a 60-foot cast up past a small pod of pads that still were green but surrounded by dead pads and stems. He only had retrieved his Silver Minnow about 5 feet when the bait was inhaled by one toad of a bass.

"I commenced to crankin', and the bass turned sideways enough to give me a good look. It was in something less than 2 feet of water, and it got my heart to pumpin'. But being it still was 50 or so feet away, and there were all these dead pads to come through, she got me into one of them. The hook grabbed hold of the stem, and the battle was over. The video of what happened hurts too bad for me to watch it. I just know the bass would have weighed more than 9 pounds.

"I fish the Silver Minnow with a slow to medium retrieve most of the time. When the fish are bitin' good, a steady retrieve does the job. However, it's sometimes better to run the bait into stuff, then kill it, and start retrieving again. Most of the bass I catch are larger ones that respond to a change in the 'woodsy' cadence of the lure.

"Anyway, use a trailer of your choice (they all will work), sharpen the hook, and make sure your tackle is heavy enough to handle heavy cover. Know, however, that the Silver Minnow also works well in open water." There further are those who say the bait works well in stump fields and areas with standing timber, too.

Bass Abandon the Shallows for Deep Water in the Middle of Summer...

That's another myth you often hear in fishing circles. Here are a couple more: Put the topwaters away when the sun hits the water. Hang up your gear until winter relaxes her grip on your favorite lake, and the water temperature climbs into the 50s.

You really don't have to look very far on the Internet to find all of these and many, many more just like 'em. Fortunately, anglers generally aren't as gullible as some would have you believe. Among the savvy ones is Gainesville, Fla. resident Bernie Schultz (above), who knows better than to pay attention to such tales. As he noted, "I've had some very good tournaments fishing in places that nobody else thinks hold any bass."

According to writer David Hart, at least some "bass anglers follow those long-standing myths like lemmings following the herd off a cliff. But rules were made to be broken, and anglers who can break away from the crowd and fish with an open mind can score some tremendous fish. Forget about what the experts say. Bass behave in ways that even the best anglers never will understand, and sometimes that means they go places and do things that few anglers expect."

The idea that "you have to back off and dredge the bottom in 25 or more feet of water during summer couldn't be farther from the truth," said Schultz. "Many bass do cower in the depths when the water sizzles, but plenty are catchable for those who prefer to cast to visible targets in shallow water.

"It doesn't matter where you are," he continued. "I've caught bass in shallow water in hot weather in the North, South, on natural lakes, reservoirs, rivers...all over the place. The truth is, plenty of bass stay shallow in the middle of the hottest, brightest day. I've caught some tremendous fish from 2 feet of water when the surface temperature was 90 degrees. They really become predictable after that initial period of high activity in the morning."

Once the early morning feeding turns off in shallow water, Schultz does what very few anglers do--he stays right where he is. But unlike experienced anglers, he switches gears and targets very specific types of cover with a handful of lures.

"I go to what I call high-percentage areas: wood and grass," he said. "Shallow bass use those types of cover because it provides shade, although they don't necessarily need a canopy over them. Areas with some sort of shade just seem to produce better."

Schultz recalled a tournament held on Minnesota's Lake Minnetonka, where he stayed on a shallow pattern while other anglers fished deep. The bass had finished spawning, but contrary to popular belief, many of those postspawn females still were shallow. He found them in as little as a foot of water under mats of reeds, where the bank had washed out under the plants to form a sort of undercut right against the shore. The fish were somewhat lethargic, so he threw a tube and worked it slowly along the bottom to tempt those finicky bass.

"That slow retrieve," said Schultz, "is key to catching shallow bass during the heat of a summer day. He typically uses soft-plastic lures with little or no action (e.g., straight-tail worms, tubes and craws) and works them at a glacier's pace along the bottom, adjacent to wood or grass cover.

"It's also really important to make accurate casts," he continued. "The fish are going to be very spooky, so it's going to make a huge difference if you make quiet presentations and keep boat noise to a minimum. I'll even use a push pole instead of the trolling motor to move through shallow grass.

"And if you think it's too bright, too hot, too anything for a topwater bait, you need to think again."

"Some of the best surface-lure action can take place when most bass anglers least expect it"--that's according to Rick Morris, a familiar Virginia Beach, Va. pro back in the 1990s. He let the fish tell him when it was time to stow the Pop-R and reach for some sort of sub-surface bait.

"You have to realize that, like any type of lure or tactic, topwaters aren't going to work all day long every day," continued Morris. "You won't catch a bass on a spinnerbait all day every day, either. There are certain times of the year, however, when topwaters can produce some fantastic results all day. It doesn't matter how hot it is, or how bright the sun is. If the bass are shallow and active, they might even eat a Zara Spook or a Pop-R better than they would something else. Two of the best times to throw a topwater, no matter what time of day it is, are in the fall when the water starts to cool and bass move shallow, and then again right after the spawn, when fish feed heavily to rebuild strength."

So how do you know if it's the right time to throw a topwater? Morris said you really can't tell. You just don't know until you try it.

Another pro who is bent on dispelling the myths about fishing shallow water is Randy Howell. He and a friend were practicing for a tournament on Alabama's Lake Wheeler when the water temperature was 37 degrees, and a light snow was falling.

"We ended up catching two bass, one 7 1/2 pounds and a 7-pounder from stumps in 2 feet of water," said Howell. "We were pitching jigs to these visible stumps, and the bass were hitting the lures just like they do when the water is warmer. They really smashed them."

While living on Virginia's Lake Gaston, Howell often would pitch jigs to docks in December and catch some tremendous fish. The majority of other anglers who targeted bass that time of year worked deep water, but Howell caught some of his largest bass from skinny water during the coldest months.

During an FLW Tour Event on South Carolina's Lake Murray, he caught good numbers of big fish from shallow docks with brush under them when water temperatures hovered in the high 40s. And like that day on Lake Wheeler, a steady snow fell during part of the tournament. Howell pitched Lunker Lure Rattleback jigs tipped with a Hog Caller trailer to docks with brush on them. They were the same docks that produced plenty of bites during practice, when the water was warmer, and the weather was more suited to shallow-water fishing. The bass simply stayed put, although plenty of other anglers backed off and worked deeper water during the tournament.

"I think the key to finding shallow bass in winter is to have deeper water nearby," said Howell. "They won't be shallow all the time, but if you aren't catching them deep, move shallow. That's what happened with those two big ones we caught on Wheeler. There was a 10-to-12-foot-deep ditch right next to the area with the stumps, and I think the bass moved up to feed.

"Equally important," he added, "is to fish slowly and deliberately."

Howell noted that although many of his shallow-water strikes are quite violent, the fish seem to want a slower-moving bait.

"Jigs are ideal," he said, "although some anglers score on suspending jerkbaits, even when the water is hovering around the 40-degree mark.

"There are no set rules when it comes to finding shallow bass in the winter, or in the summer, for that matter. Anglers who can break away from the age-old myths that run rampant through the bass-fishing community can have some tremendous days. Try something new, and you might be pleasantly surprised."

July 2024 Bass Fishing Forecast

(Click anywhere on this chart for a slightly enlarged version.)

I May Have Duped Myself

Who could blame me, though, what with all the material about various fishing superstitions/myths I've been researching here recently?

A moment of truth came yesterday morning as I launched my first cast of the day from the back of my buddy Wayne's Ranger boat. My bait just had hit the water when a fish swirled under it. I had two choices: Swing for the fence and perhaps jinx myself/us for the day, or let the moment pass and maybe have one heckuva day. I thankfully opted for the latter.

Five hours later, when Wayne and I quit for the day, our combined best-five total weight (out of about 15 fish caught) amounted to approximately 17 pounds. The question I'm still wrestling with in my mind now is: Was that because I passed up the chance of catching a fish on my first cast of the day, or because that's just the way the day would have turned out, no matter what I had done on that initial opportunity?

I'll never know the answer for sure, but I'm not the only one who ever has had to confront such a situation.

As writer Darrell Davis explained in an article he once wrote, "There are some interesting stigmas regarding a day's first cast--mostly the belief that catching a bass on the first cast is bad luck." Something to do with 'first casts' was mentioned by about 90 percent of the anglers Davis interviewed for that article.

For openers, Peter T's first cast is never in the direction that he wants to actually try to catch fish. If he does so, he says his day is ruined, and it never will feel right.

David Dudley has a similar belief but about bait changes. "If you make any kind of bait change and catch one on the first cast, you have to cut it off," says Dudley. "Otherwise, you might as well just take the boat and dock it."

Jeff Sprague follows suit with not catching a fish on the first cast, but he has other superstitions as well, starting with not touching his dip net. He also never leaves the ruler on the floor of the boat.

Clothing came up several times, too, during Davis' interviews. For example, Charlie Weyer says he has to wear his tournament jersey when he is fishing. He considers it good luck while on the water, and if he doesn't have it, his entire day is thrown off. Casey Carpenter says he has to wear the same pants and shoes. Davis' buddy, Gene, a longtime Wheeler Lake resident, has to wear a certain patch. He keeps it in his truck now to keep from forgetting it.

Some superstitions have been passed from one generation to the next. One that stood out to Davis concerned hats. Dion Hibdon (like his father and grandfather) believes it's bad luck to put your hat on the bed. If that happens, and he thinks he might accidentally wear it, he will cut the brim so that he can't.

Occasionally, anglers find something in the water, such as a unique rock, duck decoy, etc. If the place where it's found becomes a good spot, they end up taking that item and keeping it in the boat.

For some anglers, superstitions dictate their routine. Clayton Batts says that, during a tournament, if he catches them really good, he repeats everything he did that day the next time. He will wear the same shirt, eat at the same place, park the same way, and even fish the same way...kind of like Groundhog Day!

Bill McDonald goes for beauty when it comes to his superstitions. He cleans up his fingernails and toenails before he leaves for a tournament and never touches them until he returns home.

As for yours truly, I spent a number of years with two superstitious habits: (1) I never ended a day with a backlash...I only would stop after at least one clean cast; and (2) I always would start each new fishing day with the same bait I had ended the previous one with, provided it had been productive. My premise was that to do otherwise would mean one really bad day the next time I hit the water.

We can sit here and talk about old "wives' tales" all we want, but make no mistake that, to a bass angler, they are very real. Each individual may or may not have his/her own set of unfounded beliefs, so when you get in another person's boat, remember that, unjustified or not, the consequences are real. And if you choose a banana for a snack, it could be gone.