Weekend On Guntersville

Well this weekend was nothing short of AWESOME! First I got to fish the club tournament with Dixieland Bassmasters with my wife Beth. This would be her first tournament this year due to her being out for the summer break. Well you could not tell she had not been much. We started on some topwater fish I had been catching on guide trips the last few weeks in the mid lake area. She boated fish from the first cast and had a limit in the first 15 mins of the stop on the Jackall SK Grande'(Tenn Shad color). We then made a move to an area to work on bigger fish. With the sun not coming out like in days before the deeper fish I had would just not help us so we made the run back to the mid section. We boated fish on several stops and had more than 50 fish for the day total. We never got the bigger bite before time ran out so only had 18.92 on my scales. After getting back to the weigh-in I saw several guys that were over the 20lb mark and knew we were not in the money. Being that I had not fished but one event with them this year and a long way out of the points we made the dession not to mess anyones points up and tossed ours back. We had a great day on the water fishing and spending some time together in the boatand the day was mostly about that anyway. I do have to say the traffic on the water was the worst I have seen it in sometime. I can't believe how some people act when they are fishing a tournament. Now don't get me wrong not all anglers are guilty of this but we had boats come in on top of us all day in several areas. One boat that was at our first stop was a good 400 yards from us fishing the other side of the pocket(with thier back to us) after Beth boated her second fish they turned and came in on us so close he was casting to the fish we were catching and even had one of the fish he caught splash water on our boat after he hooked it. We stayed on the waypiont and never moved. Later in the day I had a pair of guys troll in so close I could step in his boat and even set the hook on a fish under his trolling motor. I asked him if he could pull his motor up to avoid the fish wrapping up in the shaft. We just could not believe the way some people acted on the water that day. The point to this "rant" is please be considerate of other anglers on the water and give them some space. I heard one person say at the ramp he was given more room by Jet Skiers and Ski boats than fisherman(which to the norm never happens) and I had to agree.

On Sunday I fished a small local "wildcat"(5-11AM)tournament with a few guys from Lake's Edge Tackle out of Spring Creek. The best part of this day was my fishing partner named Will Peet. For those of you who do not know Will, he is a client I started fishing with when he was 12 and now he is 16. He and his father and brother came down from the "windy city" to fish with me a couple of days and being it was his Birthday trip I had him fish with me in his first tournament. I was amazed at how far this young man has come from the first time we have fished together to present. Will has not only grown in years but his skill levels of angling. I told him the tournament was his to win and I was doing nothing but give advise and drive the boat for him(although I did net some fish for him). We made a long run up river to the same place Beth and I had fished the day before and they were still there. Will had a 5 fish limit in less than 10 mins on the SK Grande'. I told him we needed to get a bigger bite so we moved a little deeper but only sized up by ounces on each fish. He had a couple of fish on the Jackall Muscle 10+ off the ledge that helped out but we never got the bigger fish to hook up. Once back to the ramp we found out it was only a 3 fish event but were allowed to cull at the ramp. Will put HIS fish on the scales and had just under 8lbs good for a 3rd place finish. He executed extreamly well the entire event and only lost one fish. I think he learned alot and had a great time as well. Congrats to him on his first tournament and thanks to all the guys for letting us fish with them.

On Monday I fished with Will again and his younger brother Eric on a trip out of Waterfront. We fished ledges and worked on some new tactics he had not used getting him ready for the BASS Open on Lake Champlain in Aug.. He is fishing this event as a co-angler so we worked on some things to do from the back of the boat and how to adjust to what his boaters would be doing. Monday was a little harder on us as far as fishing goes but we did manage several solid limits before he had to get on a plane to go home. I had a blast fishing with them both and can't explain how nice it is to have them come down to visit. This family is a true blessing to both Beth and I. Eric, which has a strong future at NASA, had a good time on this trip and beat his brother by a fish or two. It was fun to see them "rag" each other but at the same time support each others efforts all day. I can just hope when Beth and I have children they are half as good as these boys are.

One Tuesday I fished with 3 guys from Birmingham that have fished with me before. I had set the bar kinda high back in March with both of them catching numbers and big fish on the last trip so I had a little presure on me from the start. We hit some topwater areas with a couple of smaller fish to show for our efforts but not what I was looking for. We then moved up river looking for a bigger bite. They fished hard and boated several solid fish along with great numbers for the conditions we had. On the last stop of the day(just like our last trip in March) they hit the "mother load". We pulled to a ledge and within 30 mins one client had his best 5 fish limit to date pushing 29 lbs on a Jackall Muscle 15+ crankbait(and that was with a 3lb fish he could not cull). His buddy Steve got his 2nd biggest fish ever on the same bait as well. I had so much fun watching them I held the trip over 2 hours to watch them catch some more.

The rest of the week seems to be lining up well with a trip on Thursday with an old friend and co-worker from Birmingham Police Department and a great return client from Tenn on Friday. Rodney and I are fishing a tournament on Guntersville both Sat and Sunday of the weekend. I just hope the fish stay in the same mind set for the rest of the week. The baits that have worked will in the last few trips have been the Jackall Mucsle 10 and 15+ crankbaits, SK Grande' and Dagored for topwater, and Lake Fork 10" worms. All baits fished over grass lines from 4-35 feet of water. I hope everyone has a great week and looking forward to this awesome weather. Remeber to take a kid fishing.