It's official:
Dave Maas wins 2006 Bowfin Championship

Dave Maas won his second Grand Championship in the Minnesota Bowfin Club (MBC). The Hillman, MN angler also won the Championship in 2004. Maas took the lead early, registering a 30 inch fish in April this spring, and was never seriously challenged for the title. His nearest competition was a 25 inch fish recorded by Chuck Fields, of Brainerd, for a distant second place.

Maas caught the winning bowfin (sometimes called dogfish) on April 26, 2006, on Mille Lacs Lake. He was sight fishing, and used a ½ oz white jig & pork rind. Maas is the first person to win two Grand Championships since the club began competition in 1999

The MBC tournament occurs each spring to see who can catch and release the largest Bowfin. The Bowfin is considered a “rough fish,” by some. However, this fish puts up a great battle when taken on traditional bass fishing equipment. The MBC promotes fishing for these fish using artificial lures, and releasing them unharmed. Bowfins play a valuable role in the eco-system of any lake.

The MBC tournament season is held from ice out until June 15th each spring. For a complete listing of tournament rules and registration procedures, please visit the MBC website at http://get.to/bowfin/

FYI-Dave Maas is the BP.

The Week in Tournaments:

Monday June 12th GEM Pepsi Challenge Tournament Town Line Lake:
The fish were on the feed this night with lots of fish caught in all boats. The winner of the 3 Bass, 3 Pike tournament was Dave Lindmark and the 6 kids in the pontoon achored by Sarah's 20inch Largemouth. Sara is a girl, duh, who has mild cerebral palsy and retardation but she held up wonderfully for the week and was a joy to be around; Her 20 incher was big Largemouth for the week and her first fish ever. My boat, Rick and Justin, caught a bunch of bass and some pike but no size.

Tuesday June 13th GEM Pepsi Challenge Tournament Mule Lake:
The weather was sunny which makes Mule Lake tough, the fish did bite late in the day. The Tournament was taken by Guide Mike Thompson and his two kids. I think they won this Multispecies Tournament with 7 species: Largemouth, Smallmouth, Rock Bass, Perch, Sunfish, Crappie, and Pike. Mike caught several 4lb class largemouth on docks and a few good smallies on docks and poppers. My boat, Rick and Justin, didn't try that hard to fish multi-species. I caught a 4lb Larry and 4lb Sally on the Frenzy Popper.

Wednesday June 14th Pepsi Challenge Tournament Town Line Lake:
We went back to Town Line cause the fishing was so good on Monday night, but the weather was warm and sunny which made fishing much tougher. Mike Thompson took the tournament with Rick and Justin on the strength of 3 good Bass and Pike. My boat Malik and Dylan, struggled and didn't have much size on either the bass or pike. We did have fun "surf fishing."

Thursday June 15th GEM Pepsi Challenge Tournament Blackwater Lake:
Conditions were sunny with a south east wind with growing cloud cover late, not ideal but Blackwater has lots of bass and fishing was pretty good. The Best 6 Bass tournament was a tie at 97inches between my boat, Elijah and Alex, and Dave Lindmark and the 6 kids in the pontoon. The pontoon won the tie breaker with Rick's 19inch smallie which was also big smallie of the week. Thus my boat was shut out for the week.

Saturday June 17th Fishers of Men Club Twin Cities Multi-species Buffalo Lake:
The weather was cloudy with a slight South then North wind turning very wet. The fishing was tough and me and my partner Tony Hanf got skunked. Buffalo lake appears to be in the midst of a major decline thanks to winter time over harvest, weed killing, and run off. The Tournament was won by Mike Thompson and his Dad with 10 Crappies and a 20.5 inch Largemouth. The day was not a total wash out as that I had Angeno's Pizza for dinner.

Camp Summary: It was a good week with good kids. On to Lindisfarne.

Great Expectations Ministry

It's time for the me to head off the GEM camps for the summer. I will be spending the next 5 weeks volunteering as a guide to take kids fishing. It's a lot of fun but my blogging will take a big hit as that I will only have access during the weekends and those are busy enough already.

Hopefully I can get some pictures from the camp this year. I think the director has a digital camera.

Please be in prayer for me and the kids
Peace Out!

The BP Tournament Scuttlebutt:
The first two Team Bass tournaments are now history and the results are satisfactory but not spectacular. The first tournament was last week at Lake Osakis in Todd County. Osakis is a big lake that is known more for panfish and walleye than bass. I had a reasonably preductive pre-fish and managed to parlay that into my first check of the year with a fourth place finish out of 17 Teams. This was my best regular season finish since two years ago.

Today we had our tournament at Lobster lake, as I said yesterday I had low expectations. The weather was better than I thought it would be and I actually had a really good time. I managed to beat my weight from last year by a few ounces but didn't manage to crack the 12lb mark . I thought I had a great shot at another check but it wasn't to be. I ended up in 5th place because the 3rd place team caught a 4lb03oz kicker right at the end of the day, otherwise I would have been ahead of them. I am keeping on track so far with the 5th place average finish that I will need to have a shot at the top 10 at the end of the year. Still no kicker fish for me. The next tournament isn't until July 8th at the Horseshoe Chain.

Kumar Blog Day 3

On tommorrows tournament at Lobster Lake: My pre-fish didn't go well and now lousy conditions are going to prevail. It is gonna get cold and it will be a wet and windy morning. This will probably make the fishing tough. Not looking that much foreward to fishing this one.

BassFan's Jay Kumar is blogging the Skeeters Owners Tournament this weekend at Lake Fork, TX at the BassFan Army Site
Day One Here
Day Two Here

Check out this somewhat new fishing blog Black Gumbo a good primer post would be How We Started This Fishing Thing, and Why Excerpt:

Our first fishing trip of 2006 was spawned by my son’s question “Dad, when can we go fishing again?” I had really been trying hard for years to find some activity that my son really embraced. He had tried sports, and while he was enjoying himself, he really wasn’t embracing it like some kids do. Swimming, soccer, gymnastics, all were tried, all were dropped. He got into BMX racing for while too, but the heat really kills that sport in the summer for all but the most dedicated.

And to add another layer to our quest for something he would really click on, I never really was an integral part of his outdoor activities. That bugs me. You see, we believe in a strong family identity and we foster things that some folks consider out of place. We belong to a classical education home schooling program of maybe 200 kids; we attend a family integrated church where we worship together, not segregated; we actually sit down to eat dinner as a family more often than not; and we do stuff together because we like each other. All four of us genuinely like each other! Imagine that. So my desire was to carry on that kind of togetherness with my son’s activities. Sports wasn’t cutting it.

It looks like the fishing is centered around inshore down in Texas.

See a Fish shaped coffin at The Trout Underground

Don't miss this blog: Spike of Living the Dream has his tribute to Kirby Puckett done. Actually it was done March 17th but I've not been to his blog since then.

Lobster Pre-Fish- UUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

I'll be pre-fishing Lobster Lake tommorrow.

BassFan Chris Koester Grand Lake Co-Angler win story.

He's on BassFan radio too!

BP 2005 Team Bass Tournament of Champions Report

Hellabass Le Homme Deu Tournament Story- Congratulations on 10th Place and making a check. Full Bassmaster Series LHD results here with Co. For the intial Bassmaster Series they had 60 boats and Dean Capra won it going away. Lots of the Excel Bass guys fished this tournament either as a boater or Co.

Tournament Results at the Ohio Bass Fishing Blog

Chris Koester wins the Co-Angler division at Elite Series Grand Lake plus other BassFan Big sticks stories.

GOLIATH fish story at Fishing Jones

Hellabass Prefish at Bassmaster Series Le Homme Deu Chain

Pics and Info at The Bass Hole


Grand Lake Bassmaster Elite Series Champion Mike McClelland
He absolutely smoked the entire field and won by a staggering 15-09 margin.

What I've been up too.

I've turned into a slithering reptile in the TLLB ecosystem, wonder when that happened?

Pre-fished Osakis on Wed. more on that later.

Didn't feel well yesterday, bad head and back aches

I've got a new trolling motor. More on that later.

Holy Schmallies
Caught by FLW Rookie Michael Murphy . Story on the Guy from Bass Fan.

BP sends out Memorial Day gratitude to all soldiers who served this nation. God Bless America!

Pic from the launch on Mille Lacs. Story Here

The Weather edited(from earlier today): It has been rumbling for the last 45 minutes and it has gotten very dark outside. I love a good thunderstorm, just waiting for it to punch. It has started to rain with a medium downpoor... It eventually came down pretty good with some marble sized hail. The temp went from 92 to 74.

Blogs that BP recommends:
Fishing Jones
Ezods
Hellabass One & 2
The Bass Hole

BP finds a new search engine: Dogpile I'm one of the many who are miffed that Google didn't put a tribute to our soldiers on Memorial Day.

Sunday May 28, 2006

BP VS. Cyberfish Bass Opener 2006

Tommorrow is supposed to be hot again. I don't have a plan but I'm scheming to get rid of that Minn Kota Endura trolling motor as fast as I can.

Family News
Congratualtions to my older brother Jeff for being accepted to Hamline Law school with a generous merit scholarship. So William Mitchell, what is thy offer?

Mom got a speeding ticket in Florida

I got a call from Isabelle Todd and Kristen yesterday

Devin Sage lost Grandma Maas to the road as of yesterday. Mom is heading north.

Liveblogging the 2006 MN Bass Opener

I didn't repeat last years mistake and got up early to hit the PRO where the early bird gets the worm. I woke up at 5:00 and was on the water by 5:35. It was a cool 67 with a bit of a SE breeze already stirring the air. I headed straight for the Platte River Outlet.

Upon Arrival I had several rods rigged and ready to go. I picked up the white swim jig and reddish purple trailer first. I got a hit on my very first cast but it was a pike. The Swim Jig was getting to caught up in the rice and so I switched to a green Zoom Horny Toad, shortly after starting to throw that I landed a 13.75" bass. Shortly after that I landed a 16.75" fish on the Horny Toad, then I landed a 17" bass with the swim jig. I then caught another 13.75" on the Toad and then a pike and then a 12" bass.

I had started making my way into the river at this point and another boat was coming in there with me. I landed a 15" right in front of these other two guys. They proceeded to go right in front of me and start fishing almost immediately the guy in the front of the other boat caught a 14-16" fish. I kind of worked slowly allowing for us to have some separation. I then started thoroughly working the wind blown side of the river. I caught a couple of 12 inchers then I got 2 that were 15-16", this was fishing behind these two guys. I narrowed the gap between us and decided to split.

I went to a semi-protected part of the PRO outside of the river. The slop was thick enough that it was Snagproof Frog time. I started by throwing a white frog and was shortly rewarded with a 16" bass. A little bit later I caught a 15" fish. I switched to a brown Snagproof Bobby's Perfect Frog, I got a bite and broke off, I'm not sure if it was a pike or not. Disappointed I tied on a Black Red Sparkle Frog and kept fishing. I worked my way to the river mouth then headed to the south shore of the PRO. All I got on the south shore was a few hits from Pike.

I then headed into "Old Cabin Bay" to do a little dock fishing except the good dock run was all covered up by parked panfish fishermen. I moved beyond them and started on docks with a black and green jig. I got a few on the docks and missed a few but nothing bigger than 15" and the fishing was fairly slow. I headed in about 11 O Clock. Overall I did alright. Conditions started to get tough with that wind, there were a ton of people on their docks or out in boats, it was a zoo out there by 9AM.

And then I took a nap

I went out for about 45 minutes around 4:30PM. I was fishing docks in our bay with the black and green jig. I managed to get one little bass. Didn't see much activity but a few sunnies. I left my polarized glasses here at the house. I got back to the house by 5:30 and shortly after that Mike "Cyberfish" Thompson arrived and we had dinner. He had been out on Mille Lacs hammering crappie and sunnies. He said he saw a lot of bedding Larry's and Sally's but could not get them to bite. After Dinner Mike cleaned crappie for a fish fry tomorrow.

We decided to go out around 7:30 in the calm area just to the East of our place. I got one 12"bass and Mike had a couple of follows. This area is full of rice which caused the Trolling Motor to overheat and now I have no working forward speeds. NICE! Fricking Minn Kota piece of crap.

Tomorrow is supposed to be warmer and more windy than today. Dad will have a look at the trolling motor tomorrow. I have a sinking feeling that I will be using our old trolling motor for at least the first couple of tournaments. I think it will work out ok provided I don't have to fight millfoil or rice. Tomorrow with the high winds and boat out of commission Mike and I may go float tubing on a little lake.

Tournament Reports 2005 for Knife and Platte Sullivan are up at the Tourny HQ.

MN Bass Openner is now just under 24 hours away!

The Plan: Wake up at day break and hit the PRO, from there it's anybodies guess but I will be out today looking for beds and bass activity. I suspect I'll be throwing lots of jigs and trick worms at docks with maybe a little bit of action in the slop. It's supposed to be quite windy and warm.

Mike Thompson will be coming up on Sat. night and we will hit the lake after church on Sunday which is supposed to be into the 90's. We may hit Mille Lacs if it's nice on Sun. or Mon.

Gar at The Bass Hole has been whackin and stackin

Mosquito's the little buggers started to be out in force today with the warm weather. Bass openner is now just a few short hours away. Visions of Snagproof Tournament Frogs will be dancing in my head tonight.

Hellabass wins at Wapo

BP fishes with Gordy

Mille Lacs Launch with Dad

BP Feature: BP's 2006 Tournament Outlook Part 1

Picture of Devin Sage Maas

This is what Uncle Todd had to say at his blog.

Welcome....

Devin Sage Maas my wonderful new little niece coming in at 21 1/2 inches and 8lbs 7oz at 4:51a.m.

I am an uncle again. So welcome little one, my prayer for you would be that you would know Jesus, know Jesus, Know Jesus and that you would grow in wisdom and mercy. Wisdom and Mercy will be your the 2 godly attributes that I will pray be raised up in you.

Congrats Steve and Kim and of course Haley! I'm sure you are exhausted. Love you,

Uncle Todd

We are all very excited!!!!!!

Fishing Rod and Reel Story from My Fishing Chronicles- "Fishing is a Passion." This is one good fishing blog, lots of pictures and stories.

Gar with Big Korean bass at The Bass Hole.-Check it out!

In case BP fans are wondering, why all the blogging. It's kind of cool outside and I don't think the fishing will be that great, plus bass aren't officially open, plus the weather is supposed to take a turn for the better starting tommorrow; that's why I blog today.

The first BASS Major is over with Peter T taking home $250,000 at the Bassmaster Memorial.

Check out this Blog: Bassin' the Net (a very fishy blog)

Devin Is Born! Plus Misc

Hooray! my Brother Steve and Sister in law Kim had Devin Sage Maas at 4:40AM. She was 21" inches and 8lbs7ozs. I haven't seen any pictures yet, but Steve says she is definitely a little Maas. The labor went on for 15 or 16 hours. Poor Kim had a terrible time of it, but everything is good now.

Hellabass has his first tournaments of the summer this weekend. Preview

Because we are fishing these two tournaments "No Cull", it changes how I may go about things. I feel pretty confident I could start out with Jerkbaits & lipless cranks and get a limit in the morning. If I do that and females make themselves easy pickings in the afternoon, then I am hosed because I am stuck with a livewell full and I cannot cull them out. So if the water looks right, I may just start the morning looking for bigger fish.

Although traditionally our May club tournaments are pretty stingy, so I may put the first few keepers in the box regardless of size. I have been burned before by throwing keepers back. I feel there is a pretty solid chance there will be some fish ready to spawn by tomorrow afternoon.

I don't know about in the Amery area but up here the weather threw a curve ball from the actual forecast. It was nice up until about 11 and then the clouds rolled in the wind picked up and it even rained for a while. This front wasn't supposed to come through so fast. The bite up here on Sullivan for pike went from so so to tough. I hope Hellabass wasn't counting on the bite getting better as the day wore on.

Have I been dissed?

Anyhow, if you want a target to shoot for, it makes more sense to target Instapundit than Bass Pundit.

via basil's blog

Man he could have used any of the other 143 other Pundits out there, but NO basil chooses to smack me around.

Actually I thought it was funny. I think I'm gonna add it to the top of my page.

Today...

Was a nice day a wee bit windy. I hung out most of the afternoon throwing the frisbee to Pattie Lou. Eventually I braved the wind and went out fishing. I caught 3 Pike including a strong 29" that made my day. I also had a break off and caught several bass. I fished Sullivan.

Tommorrow I will be heading to Lake Minnetonka for the inagural Fishers of Men 3rd Thursday Outing. At this point I expect to be the only boat out there. Oh well.

More trolling motor problem, my bracket broke, but dad worked out a pretty good fix for me. Minn Kota Endura transom mounts are junk for serious fisherman, step up to the Maxxum's.

Brought the Widow Olson some fish to eat and she repaid me with a choclate bar and banana bread. Had fish for dinner, yum.

Still no word on Kim, tommorrow must be the day

Tommorrow is the start of the Bassmaster Memorial Major-be sure to get those Fantasy Bass Rosters up to date.

All for now.

How much longer until bass opener? Anyone seen any dogfish I can catch?

It's been a pretty lethargic last couple of days, I did get the boat cleaned and visited the Minnesota Fishing Museum with Dad yesterday.

Go check Hellabass for some interesting Wapo informationO. I am amazed that he would write about his pre-fish before the tournament was over. Or maybe he was doing PsyOps with the competition.

Here is Cyberfish's openner report: via Catch-N.com

No walleyes for me either. We took some kids out on a pontoon for some pike
and crappies. the lake I wanted to fish had too shallow ramp for the toon.
Decided to mosey on over to whaletail, where I have heard rumors of huge pike
and slabs. Well, I am sure they are in there, but we didnt find em. The bass
must have known the season was closed, cuz that is all that was biting! I threw
a huge spinner with a heavey steel leader, but only got two nice bass. Mitch our
best GEM fishing guide boated a huge bass over 21inches and full of eggs. No
pike not even a hammer handle, no crappies, one kid got a couple of sunfish on
waxworms. Everyone had a good time, we got out of the wind and it didnt rain too
much.

Kim, I think you should have your baby today;)