Tuesday was the second Sportsmen's Digest Series 1 event of the year and I decided to spend that day "making sure" my umbrella rig deal was over. I fished from Paris to New Johnsonville dropping A bomb's on every place I could think of and at 11 a.m. I had one bite, a 2.5lber. I spent another hour really working one of my productive areas from last weekend over in hopes of relocating the school. I fished from the river channel to the back of a pocket and never had a bite. At about noon I was almost convinced that I wasn't even going to catch a limit of bass after catching 15 limits just a few days earlier. I pulled out my old trusty Redeye Shad and headed to the shallows and ended up catching 18.62lbs which landed me in 5th place and I had 2nd big fish with a 5.20. The key thing I learned from this tournament was that if a 5.20lber was the 2nd biggest fish caught in a tournament featuring some of the best New Johnsonville fishermen alive, the "biggun's" were definitely on the move.
Since my track record in April on KY Lake is far from stellar (unless the water hits the bushes), I was definitely planning on spending my practice time on Barkley after Tuesday but my guide trip the next day on KY changed my tune. I figured I'd take the guy out and whack a bunch of 3lbers on a Redeye Shad and then head to Barkley on Thursday and Friday to try and figure something out for the tournament. My client could only do a half day so I met him at Paris Landing at 11 a.m. and we headed to the place I'd caught a few in the Series 1. I gave him my all time favorite spring rattle bait, the Chili Craw Redeye Shad and told him it was THE bait he needed to be throwing because every fish I've weighed in this year on a lipless crankbait has come on that very bait. He started fishing and asked me why I wasn't fishing and I said it was his trip and I wanted him to catch the fish. He told me that was like us going to play golf and me just keeping score so he wanted me to fish. I pulled another Redeye Shad out in Sexy Shad that I'd thrown some the day before and not had a bite on thinking that would give him the best shot at catching the fish. My third cast with the Sexy produced a 2.5lber. He commented that he thought his bait was supposed to be the magic color and I assured him that it was. A few casts later I bowed up on a pretty good one. I swung it into the boat and it was pushing 5lbs! By this time he's really on my case about how his bait was supposed to be better than mine and again I explained to him how I'd caught so many on the Chili Craw that the paint was chewed off and I hadn't had a bite all year on Sexy Shad. I tried to swap baits with him but he said at that point he was determined to catch a fish on the "magic" color. I power poled down and fan cast around for a few minutes and then I hooked into something I couldn't move. At first I thought it was a stump but I could hear my line singing as it was cutting through the water and just as I said "this can't be a bass", an absolute toad tried to exit the water but she was just too big to get much air and my Redeye came flying back at us! He looked at me and said "that was a ten!" I assured him it wasn't a 10lber but it was definitely in the 8-9lb class and I was just thanking the good Lord we weren't in a tournament! To make a long story short, we caught 'em pretty dang good the next few hours and yes, he did finally catch some on the Chili Craw but I never heard the end of how I gave him the color the big ones didn't want and all that good stuff. It was all in good fun and we ended the day with about 22lbs and could've had substantially more had I landed the giant.
Even after the pretty solid thrashing we put on them on Wednesday I was still skeptical about running that far during the tournament. We were launching out of Barkley Lodge, 80+ miles from where we were catching our fish and those shallow Redeye fish tend to be very undependable. One day their big, the next day their small, the next day their gone, the next day their medium sized, etc., etc. I still wanted to get some time in on Barkley and if I didn't figure anything out over there, I'd roll the dice and make the run to my Redeye fish on KY. That night I found out there were several other tournaments on south Barkley that weekend and that's all I needed to hear. I made up my mind to make the run to KY Lake.
TOURNAMENT: I made the 80 mile run yesterday morning in just over an hour. There was a big college tournament going on at Paris and those guys were all over the bank I was fishing but they weren't on the little flat where the fish were holding so I felt like I was going to be in good shape. I got lined up and dropped my power poles and caught a short fish in just a few casts. A couple casts later I hooked a solid 3.5lber. I smiled at my co angler thinking we were about to unload on 'em but I never had another bite. After trying several baits from several angles, I just couldn't get them going so I made a move. I pulled up on the stretch where I'd lost the giant on Wednesday and pretty quickly put another 3lber in the boat. I slowly fished the bar dropping my power poles and fan casting different baits around making sure I gave every fish around a fair chance to ride in my new Triton. I made it right to where I'd lost the big one Wednesday and hooked a fish! It pulled a little drag and I thought I had hooked another monster but it ended up being a foul hooked 3lber. My next cast I caught a fish pushing 4lbs and that was it for that stretch. I fished another area mainly to give my other two places time to rest and never caught anything. I made it back over to where I started and caught a 2.75lber on my first cast which was number five. I was relieved to catch a limit but I was a little disappointed in the quality. My very next cast one smoked it and it was another good one pushing 4lbs but it came off about half way to the boat! I can't complain because that's the first fish I've lost all year in a tournament but at the time I had no idea how critical that mistake was going to be. I ended up culling once more that day with a 3.25lber and had to leave to head back at 1 p.m. I had a long time to think about my day as I made my way back to Barkley Lodge and really I couldn't think of anything I would've done differently. I felt like other than losing that fish that only cost me about a half pound I'd fished pretty efficiently considering I only had 4 hours to work. My main goal at that point was getting a check to pay some of my gas bill and when I weighed in I learned something a little disturbing. I was in 2nd place with 17.40lbs and 17.50lbs was leading. That's when it really set in that the one I lost could very well come back to haunt me. I was just hoping that somebody would weigh in a big stringer so I wouldn't have to think about losing the winning fish and I finally got word that Harry Barber had a good bag and was probably going to win it. When Harry weighed in he took the lead and eventually won with 17.75lbs! I like Harry a lot and was happy for him to win but man I couldn't quit thinking about letting that 4lber get away. I ended up 3rd and got my Toyota Bonus Bucks again for the 5th straight event so that was a good thing.
SUMMARY: These low weight tournaments drive me nuts! These are the tournaments that you have to capitalize on and this is the 2nd tournament in less than a year out of Barkley Lodge that took 17lbs to win and I was right there just a few ounces out of it. There's a fine line between fishing to win and being stupid and I leaned towards the stupid side in this one. I was bummed out that my fish weren't the size I was hoping for and I got a little sloppy trying to land them. I sort of took it for granted that they were "just" 3.5lbers and not the kind of fish you win with but when it was all said and done, they were the winning fish I just didn't know it. This is something I definitely need to work on. I have it in my head that you have to have 5+ lbers to win a tournament and I don't put the TLC into landing lesser quality fish. Unfortunately this isn't the first time I've made this mistake. Oh well, it could've been worse, I'm just thankful to make it through another event safe and sound with a top 5 finish. Congrats to my friend Harry Barber on the "W" and my good buddy and Guntersville legend Ed Gettys on his 4th place finish.
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