Bass Snatchers Mississippi River Tournament Tomorrow

Tomorrow is the 2nd Bass Snatcher Tournament of the year on the Zebulon Pike Reservoir, which is the section of the Mississippi River to the South of Little Falls.  We have only 8 boats and 15 people fishing.  Hopefully the tricks I've learned fishing rivers over the years will be enough for a good finish.  I was out there twice pre-fishing with my boater Tom "Swannie" Swanson and he was out there one other time without me.  It looks like it's going to be cloudy with a pretty good breeze out of the NW.  I hope it is more WNW than NNW just to help keep the current and boat control a little more manageable.  It's going to be on the cool side as well with temps not supposed to get out of the mid 60's. It looks like they have taken rain out of the forecast, at least for now.  Cold fronts aren't supposed to effect river fish as much and I don't foresee there being a drastic drop in river temps.

From the reports I've heard and our own pre-fishing, it will probably be a grind rather than a smash fest.  Not sure what effect the cloud cover will have on the fish.  I think the keys for me will be accurate casting and hooking/landing my bites.  Have no clue what it will take to win or even be competitive.  I'll guess a 15lb+ limit to win, 12lbs for the Top 5 and 10lbs for Top 10  A limit might be golden or not, who knows.  From pre-fish I believe a 11lb limit is doable, anything more is gravy.

I'm going to start with topwater, but swim jig, and spinnerbait will probably always be right at my feet.
If I have to go to the Texas Rig, that is probably not a good sign.

7'2" Tatula MH Braid Plopper
7'1" Tatula MH Fluro Bladed Swim Jig
7' Avid H Fluro Texas Rigs
6'10" Crucial MH Buzzbazits
6'8" Avid M Fireline Topwater
6'8" Avid M Mono Topwater Prop Baits
6'4" Avid X M Fireline Spinnerbaits
6'6" IMX MH J-Braid Swim Jig

Big Bass & Breaking in My New St. Croix 7' H

20" Mad Maxx Frog

All it takes is one bite to turn an extremely mediocre morning into a great one.  Today I got that bite.  She hit the "Big Sexy" and fortunately didn't take me into the pads like it could have.  She was barely hooked.

To that point in the morning, a good hour and a half into fishing, I missed a jumper and a toothy on the Stanley Phantom and got one 14.5" jumper on a watermelon/red Tonka Tackle Craw Tube.

In the picture you can see my new and vastly improved St. Croix Avid 7' Heavy.  It's lighter than the previous rod and actually loads a little bit when I cast, which the previous rod that was a total broomstick did not really do.  Casting distance is improved and I can now  use it for pitching, which the previous rod didn't do well at all.  It's not quite as powerful as the previous rod, but I'll take that trade off as it still has plenty of power.  I also think it's gonna be quite a bit more sensitive, but I really didn't get enough bites to gauge that very well.  Overall I'm very impressed.

Note- My previous Avid 7' Heavy was a pre-IPC technology rod.

That was all I got at the Grumpy Old Man Hole this morning.  I got a couple of nice fish (16",15") on the Horny Toad at the Culvert and got a total dink at the Inlet on Sullivan on a black/blue Tonka Tackle Craw Tube.  That was it.  I fished from 5:45 to 9AM.  Quite a change from the past two morning where I caught a bunch of small fish.

Yesterday Morning
2 Days Ago

My 1st Broken Rod Post

I didn't realize I only published this at the Fishing Log Blog, not here at mother ship blog.

I wrote this on 6-26-13

Kind of had a feeling this might happen thanks to my cat climbing were it shouldn't have been. He shut the Explorers rear window on it and 2 others. I'm hoping the heavy rod makes it through the season at least. The good thing is they were all St. Croix Avid's, so I can replace them with a new rod at more than 50% off what a new one costs. I'll have this rods replacement before my next tournament.

17.5"

I had caught this jumpin' bullhead, my best of the morning, and 10 others on it between this morning and my last two outings before the rod cracked and broke in two. 

 It was a good morning of fishing.  I hit the GOMH, the PRO Culvert, and the inlet getting fish at each and missing a bunch as well. I arrived at the GOMH at 5:50AM.  I started off getting them on topwater on a Lucky Craft Kelly J (12.5"), a Frenzy Popper (2x14", 15") and the Stanley Phantom (2x13", 3x14", 15", 16" and two little toothy bullheads).  Then I got them on the Fluke until the rod broke (2x14", 17.5",11.75" and a small toothy bullhead).  I got 1 (14") and yet another small toothy on a Chigger Craw.  I left to go to the culvert around 9AM.

There I missed my first several hits on a Horny Toad before finally getting a 13", I also got 1 (14") on a Chigger Craw and 1 (14") on a Subwart in the culvert.

I then headed to the Inlet and missed two good fish on the Grass Pig before connecting with a 15.5".  That was my last fish of the morning.  I quit at 11AM.

Best 6 Fish
17.5", 16", 15.5", 15", 15" and 14.25"
20 bass Total and 4 Pike

Broke The Heavy

Well looks like I'm replacing all 3 rods.  I broke the 7' Heavy St. Croix rod fighting a little northern that got down in the weeds.  The rod cracked and broke in two.

Here is the window the cat tried to climb out on resulting on the widow shutting on the 3 rods.

Unfortunately I caught the cat instead of the window. I was really hoping the Heavy St. Croix would make it.  I'm glad I found out now, so I can have the rod back by my next tournament.

Fishing sucked. I didn't get anything at the culvert, and the "new new juice" had two guys fishing it.  They were keeping some jumpin bullheads and letting some go. They were also getting some orange bullheads.  I got 2 jumpers on the SW side and that toothy that I broke the rod on.  I fished from 10AM to 11:45AM.

Bait Monkey's Got That Look In The Eye...

Update: My monkey's high bid wasn't high enough, there was one monkey who was willing to pay more. The rod was a discontinued Avid 7'3"MH telescopic. I already have 2 of them; They are my #1 hollow body frog rod and my #1 buzz toad rod. Did I really need another?

In the Mail

AC70HF, Line Weight: 14-25 lbs. Lure Weight: 3/8-1 1/2oz. Fast Action. Great for pitching jigs and plastics around grass and thick cover and spider jigs in deep water. Throw heavy spinnerbaits and even light swimbaits and set the hook with authority.

I won this St. Croix Avid on Ebay. It isn't an IPC rod, so it is at least 3 years old. I got the rod specifically for fishing craw tubes.


CRC-C70MH, Line Weight: 10-20 lbs. Lure Weight: 3/8-1oz Moderate/Fast Action. This rod will excel at throwing medium to heavy crankbaits up to 1 ounce.

File this one under oops. I did not realize until I was writing this blog post that this rod I got from Ebay is a CRC-C70MH and not a CRC-70MH. That extra C is for crankbait and somehow I missed catching that on the Ebay listing. Originally I had gotten this rod thinking craw tubes, but then a few days later I won the above Avid, so I figured I'd make this one into a jig rod. Well that is totally out the window. I think this rod will probably work better than anything I have for heavier topwaters like Deps Buzzjet and Buzzjet Jr's, Megabass Pop Max's, and Paycheck Baits Repo Man's. Guess I won't know until next Spring.

Hard Luck Slabberday

The Aitkin Jaycees Ice Fishing Contest was a bust for me. I couldn't even bring up a little perch. I had two quality bites on minnows and whiffed on both hooksets, should have let them have it longer. Pout were 3 out of the top 4 places with a walleye in 3rd. I think there was 1 tulibee in the top 10, one other walleye in the top 20 and the rest were perch, including a couple that bested a pound.

Afterward I decided to head to Sullivan and try for some slabbers. I put in at the West Access and by accident ended up working a hump for eye's. In the process of doing that I accidentally had my St. Croix Avid Ice Stick, my best ice fishing pole, get to close to the Coleman Lantern and the blank got weakened but didn't break. I think if I put some kind of splint on it that maybe it can be saved. At that point I was one frustrated dude. I did manage to get off the break and find 6 solid 10" slab crappies and missed several more on bad hookset and probably also not feeling the bite. They were biting really light. What finally tripped the trigger was a big minnow on a Custom Jigs Glow Demon beneath a glow dropper as an attracter. In my other hole I had a small minnow on a Glow Demon. I would jig the big minnow and they would inhale the small minnow and just sit with it.

Now that I've found these dudes, look out.