Trophy Out & Dock Most Of the Way For 2023

 

About a month ago maybe even longer ago Roy Ponder of POW Ponder Weather on YouTube looked into his crystal ball and saw it getting cold around the start of November. I filed that in the back of my brain and enjoyed the warmer than average Fall we were having hoping Mr. Ponder had it wrong. Well, he nailed it, unfortunately. There will probably be no November bass fishing for me as I pulled it out of the lake on Halloween. I feared that with the cold temps tonight the area around the dock might freeze up, thus making pulling the dock out of the water a pain. The thought of fishing in 30-degree water temps in 40-degree conditions is not appealing. I'm packing it in for bass fishing in 2023.  I'll still fish at the Jetty and maybe at the GOMH as long as conditions allow.

Will This Be My Last Bass of 2023?

 Will this 2lber I got just outside of Jaimen's Reeds on a Big Blade Chatterbait be my final bass of 2023?

Quite possible, here is the long-term forecast:

I'm keeping the Trophy in the lake, but it's gonna be cold water unless I go tonight, which I don't plan on doing right now.

Fishing with Lois and Chuck On South Long Lake

 

1:50-5:50 PM South Long Lake 

44-54℉, Cloudy some light rain, 3-5mph N
53℉ Water Temp Not much visibility

Thankfully it did not rain. There were multiple rigs parked and no dock. We headed to the West reeds. Lois started things off quickly with a spinnerbait bass. I think Chuck had 4 bass before I got my first bite which was a pike. I got a pounda on the swim jig, then had one close to 4lbs pull off as I tried to lift it in. I got one more bass and pike on our first stop. Then we headed up the lake by the North Reed Bed. Chuck got a couple of bass and I got one pike. As we got beyond the reeds I decided to put on a swimbait seeing as how Chuck didn't have a rod rigged with one like usual. Bam, fish on immediately. We headed farther east shortly after that. Nothing at the top of the lake. We returned to the starting spot and I got 6 bass on the Rage Swimmer including the last three of the trip on three consecutive casts. Lois caught a couple of fish as did Chuck on the last stop. We called it a day shortly after. Chuck beat me on numbers, but I don't think by a great deal.

9Bass 

3Pike 

Snatchers Crush It At The 2023 Bass Club Clash

 

2023 Snatcher's Team, Victory Achieved!

 

The Brainerd Area Bass Club Clash is an annual tournament for bragging rights among the three Brainerd Area bass clubs; The Baxter Bass Snatchers, The Range Bassmasters, and Brainerd Lakes Bassmasters.

Bass Snatchers Won With 83-8 

Brainerd Lakes 70-12 

Range  63-13.  

Snatcher Dennis with the Challenge Cup

3-13lbs Bunker Hawg (blk/blue)

My Boater Ranger Smude

Conditions: Low 40's to mid 50's, Sunny to Cloudy, 0-5mph NE the wind couldn't make up its mind

My Day:

I drew Brian Smude who I fished with two years ago at the Bass Club Clash at Serpent Lake. I was determined to fish better than that poor performance and did. Brian has a history of success on the lake, but this hasn't been his year, and he wasn't able to pre-fish. He also hadn't been sleeping well due to sciatica. We were boat 2 and headed to the NE. I got a small keeper pretty quickly on a Texas rigged black/blue Powerbait Bunker Hawg and added two more small ones to the well in short order. I then got my big bass of the day, which weighed in at 3-13 which had me flabbergasted because my scale had the fish at under 3lbs. I've never had such a mismatch in weights. I had my 5 and culled once before we left for Smude's Juice.

He got two fish there and I didn't get a bite until we were making our second pass. I think it was a pike and then shortly after that I got a 2lber. They both bit on a Powerbait Craw Fatty.  We then worked our way West along the South reeds. I missed two bites on the Poppin Frog before I stuck a good 2lber. I thought it was going to be AWWWWWN, but that was the last bite in the reeds. We then went back to the starting spot and Brian put on a jigworm and filled his limit. I hit a mid-day wall with my energy levels when the fish just weren't biting on anything I tried. We went and worked the cabbage flat behind the reeds as it clouded up and I finally started getting some action again on a spinnerbait, but they were either pike or bass that didn't help. I was bending my spinnerbait wire and it broke. I put on a bluegill Big Blade Chatterbait as we made our way back toward the starting spot. After fishing fruitlessly for about 5 minutes I made the change to blue/black with a FireCraw Big Blade Chatter. It wasn't long and I caught a couple of pike. I culled 2 or 3 times with the Big Blade, but never got that kicker bite I needed.

Results: My fish weighed 13/7, which put me in 8th out of 20 anglers. Smude only had 10/4. I thought he was much closer to me than that. I ended up beating all but two Rangers and two of the Brainerd Club. I think I may have been the top non-boater. The tournament was won by Ranger Arnie who beat out Snatcher Dennis on the tiebreaker but Arnie wasn't actually on the Rangers Clash Team, so Dennis won the Challenge Cup. Jim Eide of Brainerd Lakes took 3rd. 

Snatcher Hammer and Arnie tied for big bass with a 4/15 fish a piece. Arnie originally weighed the wrong bass and wasn't going to reweigh because he didn't think it was going to beat Dennis's fish, but was goaded into it by fellow Rangers. Arnie was also the Weigh Master for his own fish. Not sure how Snatcher Chuck and Dennis let him get away with that, but it's water under the bridge now.

The score sheet

What my scale said I had.

Snatcher Darren left me a selfie
or
two

Snatcher Goofball

Rods and the Plan For The Bass Club Clash @ Mission Lakes

 

The Plan: I drew Brian Smude of the Range Bassmasters Club. I fished with Mr. Smude at the last Challenge Cup/Bass Club Clash I fished on Serpent Lake in 2021. My head wasn't in it that day, and I only caught 2 bass. Smude offered me the front of the boat multiple times, but I foolishly didn't take him up on it. I will definitely work something out with him this time because I do want to run the front of the boat unless we are clobbering them. Smude is a jig guy, so I expect to be on the weedline and maybe in the reeds on the Upper Lake.

Rods I'm Bringing:

7'6"MH LTB (Jig)

7'4" H Tatula (Buzzbait, Frog, Spinnerbait, Swim Jig)

7'4" H Tatula (Worm)

7' H Avid (Texas Rig)

7'MH Mojo (Cranks,Chatter,Topwater)

6'10" MH Tatula (Jigs, Chatter, Spinnerbait, Ned)

6'9" H Tatula Elite (Spinnerbait, Jigs)

Spin:

6'6" MH Veritas (Neko, Ned, Fluke)

We Took Out The Pontoon Today

 

Todd came up. We got the pontoon out of the lake. He got Mal and friend settled then headed home. We'll get the lift out next week. I went out fishing, even though I've got the Bass Clash tomorrow at Mission Lakes. I sorted my tackle last night.

The Dumster Fire Got Put Out

 The Minnesota Vikings finally won a game thanks to a scoop and score and a stout D that rattled a young QB. The Vikings offense wasn't great, only putting up 14 points for us, and 7 points for them on an early pick 6.  Final Score Vikings 21 Carolina 13. This win at least opens the door up for some hope for the playoffs and maybe a little hope we might be able to steal a game from the Chiefs or 49ers at home this month. They just have to turn off the turnover spigot on offense and get the crowd into the game. The Chiefs focus level might not be there this week after pulling out a close one vs., the Jets in NY this past week. And the 9ers play may be in a similar situation after playing the Browns in Cleveland the week before facing us on Monday Night Football. Division games at ChiTown and Green Bay will just need to take care of themselves. All we really need is two more wins this month and our playoff hopes are alive and well.

I had no clue who that Akers kid we acquired was, but he looked stout. 

Another MN College Kid Is Going To The Bassmaster Classic

 

Easton Fothergill from Grand Rapids, MN won the B.A.S.S. College Championship for the right to go to the Bassmaster Classic next year at Grand Lake next year. Minnesotan Trevor Lo made it to the 2016 Classic, which was also held at Grand Lake, as a college angler. The Sleepy Assasin, Austin Felix, won an FLW College Championship 2015 for the University of Minnesota as well. 

It's great to see MN kids representing.

Story at Bassmaster.