2012 Tournament Fishing

2012 Santee Cooper FLW Everstart Recap

Published: 22 April 2012
Written by Bait Bro
1 Comment
Categories: 2012 Tournament Fishing, 3:16 Lure Company, Huddleston Deluxe, MS Slammer, Rate of Stall, Rigging, Shimano, Small Bait Fishing, Themes from our Southern Trout Eaters DVD, Triple Trout, Weedless Swimbaits

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Wacky Rigging.  One of my favorite things to do in a small bait, finesse, tough bite, you just need to catch 5 fish and haven’t had a bite in a while style of fishing is wacky rigging.  Wacky rigging is the canary in the coal mine to me at times.  If you can’t get a bite, wacky rigging, you are very likely not around ’em.    My 2012 FLW Everstart tournament on Santee Cooper, started by picking up my boat in Augusta, GA on the way to lake, with a fresh fiberglass patch from the damage it sustained from Seminole.  So, I only had 5 days to prepare for Santee Cooper, and in case you don’t know, Santee Cooper is 2 lakes, connected by a canal, and it HUGE.  I mean, a man could spend a lifetime learning Santee Cooper, and because it has grass in it, which even the types of grasses are constantly changing (and growing and being sprayed or eaten by introduced grass carp), Santee Cooper is a lake that changes often.  Add to that, South Carolina’s real estate on the Eastern seaboard.   South Carolina, goes from extreme mountain trout eaters  in the West, to the lowland black water swamp, palmetto tree + Spanish moss frog, swim jig, skippin’ jigs, buzzbait, 30 pound sack capable water, to Atlantic Coast beaches that people surf regularly ( I scored fun 1-2 foot peelers at Hilton Head one 4th of July circa 2006, 10 foot single fin, 80+ degree water,  and a lot of hootin’ an’a hollerin’!) in the East. Santee Cooper is big fish fishery and it didn’t disappoint.  Look at the weights from the event, lots of 11-15 pound, 3 fish sacks getting weighed in.  Guys on 4-6 pounders pretty good, just numbers hard to come by.   Santee Cooper is on a healthy cycle and it could be a sleeper for an incredible event if scheduling and weather permit.   I wished I’d had more time to practice and explore things, because a bigbait bait there is inevitable.  I threw Slammers, 3:16 Sunfish, 22nd Century Bluegills, and skipped the 6″ weedless Huddie too.   I didn’t have tons of practice, but my gameplan was mostly around catching 4-6 pounders off cypress trees, but of course trying to just go fish and find big ones coming or going or on beds.   I thought I could win with the wacky rig—if I got the bites and got them in the boat, there are just some awesome moments in tree fishing where you can get on ’em good.  I had good bites going, just not lots of them, and it was the same stuff I had done here 3 years ago when I finished 7th place.  I had the bites to win last time.  This time, I didn’t have the bites to win, but I had a shot at it, and I knew I could compete and perhaps win, just like last time, but this time, things didn’t work out quite so well, but I did jump off a big one that cost me a Top 20 or so.  5-6 pounder eats my Senko on the base of tree with sparse grass around it in about 3 feet of water, and rips line off immediately for 10 feet right under the surface just hot and full dig style and when I went to turn and stop her, she reared up and jumped mouth open wide reverse flip backside roll tail grab fakey and spits the hook.  Fudge. Whatever, I’m sitting in 7th place overall in the the SouthEast Division, and had a great tournament and finished 35th place, just solid, nothing great, but I’ll take it because Santee Cooper is tough as she is awesome at times.   I had 3 fish on Day 1 for almost 12 pounds, so fun day getting 2 bigguns onboard, and one 14.5″ keeper.  Big fish on the spinning gear around trees is just exciting and fun.  I kept working and working, and also had a grass pattern going that never panned out, so I felt like I fished pretty damn hard and smart, just didn’t have the next levels of fish I needed.   Look at how few guys caught limits both days.  See Results Here.  Ken Ellis won the tournament wacky rigging a Trick Worm on deep trees.  So, I was on the right track and had the right gameplan, I just didn’t have the trees and the knowledge of what trees.  Finding deeper trees is a key, sparse grass is key, and areas adjacent or near spawning grounds, where the fish are pulling out of their spawning areas and resting up, feeding up and hanging loose on the natural cover/structures in the lake.

The Old South. Santee Cooper is near Charleston, a city rich in old America history, and is two lakes, connected by a canal: Lakes Marion&Moultrie, named after American Revolutionary War 1770s era Generals famous for using the swamps and natural terrain to drive the Brits out. And of course, the first shots fired in the Civil War, happened in Charleston at Fort Sumter. My journey from Atlanta to Santee Cooper literally mirrored General Sherman’s notorious “March to the Sea” campaign, that ended with the Confederate surrender of Fort Sumter and terms being served, where the first shots were fired 4 years prior.   I enjoy that kind of stuff, because I really try to understand the various regions and people of this country that are so different than my own home, and their history.   I like South Carolina for the fishing for sure. I used to do great business in nearby Columbus and I know Charleston is really cool and happening and fun, and yet you can get yourself extremely rural and off the grid in a hurry too.   Perhaps I have a soft spot for South Carolina because my personal best 14.60 largemouth came from South Carolina in 2006. But I think it’s just a killer state of mind and of fishing. The extreme Appalachian to Atlantic old timey Southern feel is highlighted with the weather. You want to talk about hot and muggy? We had low 90s and 100% humidity a couple days. Sweltering heat at times for what feels like ‘early in the year’. I believe in the summer time, Santee Cooper might be the hottest place on earth.  You just feel lowland and can sense the warm ocean offsore influencing things. But then again, as the tournament came around, cool, windy, foggy, really windy, really really windy, rain and volatile weather came, making finesse fishing around trees, a bit more challenging!  I wore my bibs all day on Day 1, that cold you get when you’ve been baked by the sun and then things cool down and you’re just cold because you aren’t baking hot.   Finesse fishing, wacky in particular, is best served up under the above weather conditions, because the smooth water allows you to make precise and long distance skips of your bait to the tree.  Wind creates surface waves which put your bait up in the tree and ruins the distance and accuracy thing horribly, but it isn’t game over, you just have to work that much harder to fish the trees properly.   The calmer, the more finesse you can get, for example, throw a Trick Worm vs. a Senko, because it falls and stalls mas bueno, which is the thing about wacky, it is about fall and stall, which becomes neutral or floating mid water column at some point, which means you can keep your bait suspended or ‘floating’ one foot down, one foot off the tree, in the shade spot on base of cypress tree better than just about anything else.       Stall + Fall = 0

I stayed in Eutawville (“Utah-Ville”) at Bells Marina and fished with my good friend Ron and his son, that I’d met here a few years ago when I was here last.   Ron helped me quickly get a feel for the lake and more specifically, the tree bite.    The best trees tend to be deeper 2.5 to 4 feet of water, and have sparse grass around them, or just be on the ‘point’ or generally favorable position to feed from in a stack of trees.  However, it’s sort of like flipping at some level, where you just have to put your head down and make hundreds of perfect presentations time and time again, and eventually you get a bite.  And where you get one bite, you usually get more bites.   Little flurries, I love you so!   I tried to find good areas of trees in practice.  Which I did. I also tried to find a grass bite, which I did with some help from my man Bobby Wood and Ron Buck.  I practiced with them a day and really did some damage on Skinny Dippers and Swim Senkos around lilly pads, gator grass, and mixed stuff.    With the cool weather we had for the tournament, my grass bite died on the vine.  You just knew they were in the grass and biting for someone, but I had trees and grass to balance, and after starting each morning in the grass and coming up empty both days, I decided my grass bite was dead and didn’t try it afternoon of Day 2, just stuck out the trees, which helped because I got my 5th fish with 10 minutes left and helped me get a paycheck.  I caught all 8 of my keepers on the wacky rig and only missed one bite, but it was a big one.  Wacky rigging is a work in progress for me, and I love doing it.  I love super finesse and super big stuff, opposing poles, positives and negatives, north vs south/ east vs west, natural attractions and relationships between the two ends of any spectrum.  I love how it points out things to my bigbait fishing, because I think my success with bigbaits in a national tournament will be somehow directly or indirectly related to a super small bait bite or understanding of fish and fishing.   For example, keeping it simple, just throw a Senko or a Trick Worm, or just throw a Triple Trout or a Huddleston or Slammer, having the right tools narrowed down for your window and using the small baits to either quickly fill a limit or be there as backup to back fill a couple big ones.

Here’s the deal with Wacky Rigging:

Rod: Shimano Cumara 7’2″ Medium Heavy (CUS72MH)

Reel:   Shimano Stradic 1000 or CI4 Stradic 1000 (small spooled reels handle 10-15 pound braid really well, that line has super small diameter and although I like big spooled spinning reels, smaller spooled small spinning reels are good too. You can throw small and light baits really well, and manage you line nicely.  It all matches up, where you don’t have super thin line on a big spool.

Line:  15# Power Pro connected to a 2.5 foot leader of  10# Yamamoto Sugoi Florocarbon

Hook:  Owner Mosquito Hook, #1 or 1/0, get the 50 packs, because you use these things a lot and you do break off at times because of the exposed nose hook, trust me, this is a good investment.  Use bigger hook size in the wind

Bait:  Yamamoto Senko 5″  Or Zoom Trick Worm (watermelon seed, green pumpkin red, black neon, black blue, or junebug)

Rigging:  Wacky O Tool and O-Rings:  I put an O-Ring around my senko and slide the hook under the ring and just fish away.  Sometimes I criss cross two rings and put the hook under the X, but I a really like the way this one fishes and rigs, it’s not perfect, but I haven’t found one that is!

Braided line + floro leader, Owner Mosquito Hook, O-Ring. I will use 2 O-Rings and criss cross them and put the hook under the X at times, but then again, I will just slip the hook under a single ring and just go fishing. I catch a lot of fish on this rig, and slight variations of it anytime I’m around shallow grass, wood, and rock. Trick worms and Senkos are blue chip baits, make sure you own plenty in various colors black to green. Get a feel for skipping, floating, dragging and stalling side rigged baits. Bait control.

Here is the deal with the Grass Bite:

Swimming Baits:  Skinny Dippers or Swim Senkos or Gambler Big EZ  (black blue, watermelon/green pumpkins)

Frogs/Terrestrials:  Spro  BronzeEye Frogs or Poppin Frog or Paycheck Transporter Frog or Picasso Shad Walker  (natural colors/black)

Line: 65 or 50# Power Pro

Hooks:  Owner  Twistlock Open Gap (Swim Senko, 5/0 or 6/0 for Skinny Dipper), Owner Weighted Beast Hook (Big EZ, 6/0 w/ 1/4 oz weight)

Some really good fish were caught in the grass. You just had to have grass with bait or just fish in it.  The grass was like the trees, lots to choose from, but most does/do not hold fish and even if they do, you have to be good to catch them, especially for 2 days in a row.  Things change quickly on Santee Cooper.

Santee Cooper Wacky Rigging a Senko
I was getting 1 or 2 fish in the 4-6 pound class a day fishing the trees slowly and thoroughly with wacky rigs. Scattered grass, access to deep water, shade all helped the cause. I figured I might be able to squeak out 15 or 20 pounds a day on the right days. I almost pulled it off, but not quite. No regrets, looking forward to getting back there sometime and getting back to work.  “Fine thanks……………………you?”

Fishing with the Kaenon Y35 (Yellow) Lens

Published: 11 April 2012
Written by Bait Bro
2 Comments
Categories: 2012 Tournament Fishing, 3:16 Lure Company, Big Hammer, Kaenon Polarized, Marine/Boating, Sight Fishing

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gD0M0X9jiCY&feature=youtu.be]

Kaenon is based in Newport Beach, CA and has a ‘waterman’ DNA, where they strive for excellence in eyewear that meet the demands of the surfing, sailing, boating, paddle boarding, swimming, and fishing lifestyle.  They make a family of stylish and functional frames, that can be fitted with excellent grey, copper or yellow polarized lenses.   The lenses are a high end SR-91 composite material, which is their own high tech composite material–not glass, which means they are light weight and durable, yet they are quality, extremely high quality  lenses, so they are awesome to look thru.   They are light weight and sporty, and are a great compromise of function and fashion.  They are fun to wear, especially on calm days, warming trend, somewhere between the North Shore and Indian Prairie!  There is no reason to not experiment and try new things with your sunglasses and lenses and see what works and what fits you best and see if you don’t find something you like or something that works better.   Kaenon’s are available in 3 vibrant and distinct color variations, that are polarized of course:  Yellow, Copper, and Grey. I show you how I use the yellow (Y35) lens in the above video.      I’m going to introduce you to my world viewed thru various Kaenon sunglasses with the various lenses in separate projects, starting with the yellow lens.  The Y35 Kaenon Hard Kores are my choice for fishing in the black water of Okeechobee.

To understand why the Yellow lens helps ‘add light’ and brighten up the dark water of Florida, and brighten up cloudy and grey days for sight fishing, you have to understand the basics of ‘light transmission control’. The simple is, Yellow lens technology allows more light thru the lens. It blocks less sunlight, so you are gaining light vs. grey or copper lens (with the exception of the C50 which has my curiousity!). Go ahead and get yourself some yellow lenses and try them out. I bet you don’t take them off all day (in Florida anyway).

The Y35 Lens is amazing what it does to brighten up and ‘electrify’ an otherwise grey and gloomy day.   When you mix in the black tannin water of Florida, the Y35 has a whole new meaning.  These things pierce thru that clear black water we all strain our eyes to just see a little further, a little deeper, and detect a fish or a bed that much further away.    Here are the advantages to a Yellow lens:

  • Added light:  Great for seeing in black water, grey days, and cloudy conditions, especially when you are sight fishing.  Yellow lenses allow more light thru, and are a tool of serious sight fishermen.   Serious anglers have multiple sunglasses and lenses to approach certain situations, and these yellow lenses from Kaenon will be something you will appreciate and use regularly in your fishing.
  • Added contrast and detail:  You can detect beds further away (light spot in dark water) or dark fish tail against light spot better.  Or when it comes to detail, you can make out the shape and/or color of a fish better (vs. confusing it with grass or moss).   Think about competition skeet and trap shooting.  Those guys where yellow lenses, and I’m guessing it’s just for many of the same reasons.  I find even on the bright bluebird days of Okeechobee, yellow lenses work just fine middle of the day, not just the low light and grey days.   With the dark water of places like Okeechobee, the yellow lenses of my Y35 Kaenon Hardcores just work all day long, rain or shine, to give me added edge to see better.
  • Electrify your eyes:  I find the Kaenon Y35 lens a lot like being in a room with a black light.  Your eyes take a minute to adjust, but once you get the feel for them, the darks and lights really stand out and contrast each other. It’s like playing with the color levels of a digital photo editing tool.  Adding light or otherwise taking away/filtering out darkness, can make a photo come out great, whereas natively, it might have been really too dark to make out whatever you took the picture of.   Editing software makes it possible to make digital photos come out best.  Use this same mentality to choose colors of lenses to match the water and lighting of your fishing spot.  Yellow lenses electrify your vision and add contrast and detail you wouldn’t otherwise get.   Again, think sight fishing where you are looking for the black tails on the fish, lateral lines,  the white belly of a fish nosing down on your bait, looking for light spots out at the edge of your horizontal range, where you can best anchor down/setup on the bed to assess if a fish is there, and all the things you strive for perfection when sight fishing.   Yellow lenses are just an aid to help your vision to see more fish, beds and better see your bait and “the bed fishing theater” while sight fishing.
  • Seeing your bait:  It is no accident the colors of 5″ Big Hammer swimbaits (bright white, chartreuse/yellows really stick out with Y35 lenses on) I tend to throw at big bed fish ala the 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fish Rig, tend to contrast nicely and be highly visible with the Y35 lenses.
  • Boat Driving:  There are plenty of occassion to wear your Y35 Kaenon Hard Kores when operating your boat.  Morning take-off, and just any grey/cloudy dark conditions are ideal for using the Y35 lenses to add some light and just give you better visibility driving in the exposed outdoors at 65-70 MPH.
  • Hipster Alert:  You can wear your Y35 Kaenon’s out to nightclubs and trendy bars!!
Yellow? You hear me? Kaenon Hard Kores with the Y35 lens are a key tool to my bed fishing, especially in Florida. The fish, your bait, and the beds all tend to contrast in the dark water better with a yellow lens.

I definitely recommend getting yourself into a yellow lens for fishing the dark water of Florida and just to have as a tool in grey/cloudy conditions and perhaps for driving your boat.  I wear the Kaenon Hard Kore frame, because I find it incredibly light weight, sporty, and comfortable. I can wear them all day and don’t feel the fatigue of the nose or ear pieces on my head.   You have a few frames to choose from from Kaenon that offer the Y35 lens.  Here are the others frames that have the Y35 lens:  The Arlo, The Kanvas, and The Rhino.

FishStrong published a review of the Kaenon Kores with the C12 (Copper) lens.  Yellow lenses are a specialty thing, and definitely a tool to have, especially if you like “lookin’ at ’em” .  But copper lenses, as Hale White from FishStrong explains, are the most universally useful.  Take a look at  FishStrong’s write up HERE.    You can expect us to be back with our own take on the copper and grey lenses, and expect more collaboration with us and FishStrong too.

Sight fishing is like anything else, you need a system. Yellow lenses are part of my system and I encourage you to give it a try in the black water especially.

Shaye Baker’s 2012 Lake Seminole FLW Everstart Tournament Insights

Published: 3 April 2012
Written by Bait Bro
No comments
Categories: 2012 Tournament Fishing, Small Bait Fishing, Spinnerbaits

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWd7MTMjKPg]

The winning pattern on Lake Seminole was the shad spawn bite first thing in the morning.  Brandon McMillan capitalized on it for the win and so did a few others in the Top 10.  Shaye Baker, from Reeltown, AL, is no stranger to shad spawns and was thinking right with his approach to Lake Seminole.   The above video clip gives you some insights into how Shaye parlayed an early morning shad spawn bite into a topwater bite later in the day.    His shad spawn bite on Day 2 wasn’t so strong, but he had a back up game plan and it payed off and got him into the Top 10 cut.  He came back on Day 3 with another solid bag, anchored with shad spawn fish.  He had his first fish in the boat, a solid 4+ kicker,  four minutes after takeoff.  Think about that.  He wasn’t running 30-45 minutes in the morning.  He used that early morning time to fish and had a spot near the take off so he could be fishing while the shad were spawning up along hyacinth mats and the quality bass were feeding on ’em.   That is fishing smart, and having a back up gameplan (the Bowstick/top water bite) was insurance and helped him make the cut and ultimately finish 4th place.  Nice work Shaye.   Shaye is a success story from the world of FLW College Fishing, where he had a colored career fishing for the University of Auburn, and is part of a class of recent grads that are killing it at the Everstart and Tour levels.

Shaye’s Weapons of Choice:

Jackall Bowstick

1/4 oz. Netbait Paca Swim Jig (Glimmer Shad) with a Baby Paca Craw Trailer

Homemade “Team Baker” (Shaye and his father make their own spinnerbaits) spinnerbait, tandem silver willow leaf  blades and blue glimmer skirt

The guys on the shad spawn bite got into some quality fish in a hurry. Here's is Shaye with two nice ones from Day 3, before most had even shut down their engines from their morning run.

The 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig

Published: 3 April 2012
Written by Bait Bro
1 Comment
Categories: 2012 Tournament Fishing, 3:16 Lure Company, Big Hammer, P-Line, Polarized Fishing Glasses, Rigging, Sight Fishing, Themes from our Southern Trout Eaters DVD
The Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig is part of a system. It's a system that involves using finesse baits and bigbaits to aggravate a fish into biting. The swimbait is fished as an 'intruder' and provides a power fishing approach to big fish, the female kind usually, but also good for the better than dink males you might need in a tournament situation.

We shared this rig in Southern Trout Eaters.  We have been getting asked a lot of questions about it, and Spring has sprung, so here goes.    Think of the 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig as a workhorse bed fishing bait, geared for ‘bigger’ fish.   The one rod you have rigged up in case you come up on or purposely hunt big fish on  beds.   We’ve had a few years to validate this rig, in the mountains, and in the grass of Okeechobee and Seminole.  I credit my friend and trophy bass hunter from the Bay Area, Rob Belloni, for sharing the fundamental of his Big Hammer Texas Rig with me. I’ve sorta dumbed it down since I’m usually not hunting double digit fish with it, most of my world, 4-9 pounders are king, with chances at double digits for sure though.    I’ve made my own adjustments and have made it a staple in my sight fishing system.   Rob has fooled giants, I have now fooled quite a few 4-9 pounders with it in multiple Southern States.   This is a great trophy and tournament style of sight fishing, and it points out the need for a knock out punch in your bed fishing arsenal.

The 5" Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig. 5" Big Hammer, rigged flat side up. Just bury your hook point enough to keep the bait weedless and free from snagging the fish, but able to sting one that just barely grabs it. Peg your weight, pitch and hop this thing around larger bed fish and see what happens.

The 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig:

Bait: 5″ Big Hammer Swimbait  (colors:  Pearl, Invader, Glowbug, Silver Phantom, Chartreuse, Fire tiger)

Sinker: 3/4 to 1 ounce Picasso Tungsten Weight or Pro-Metal Weights (since you just need ‘weight’ high performance tungsten not 100% necessary.)  (pegged)

Hook: 5/0 Owner Wide Gap Offset Worm Hook

Line: 25# P-Line CXX Xtra Strong w/ Palomar knot

Glasses:  Kaenon Hard Kore Y35 or C12 Lens

Reel: Shimano Curado CU200G6

Rods: Powell 7’10” MH (7105) Flipping Rod or Okuma Guide Select 7’6″ Heavy Casting (761H)

This 7'10" Powell Flipping Rod is a favorite all purpose 'heavy pitching' rod, for baits >1 ounce but not more than 1.5 or so. ie the Medlock Jig, 5" Big Hammer Rig, pitching 3/4 -1 ounce creature baits in grass, and light punching. The rod has guts. I think of it as a heavy pitching stick. I have whipped some nice fish with this rod. The short handle makes it handle and fish nicely, but long enough for leverage.

When you look at the trends in where bed/sight fishing is going, you will notice certain swimbaits and softbaits have flat sides or can be rigged flat side up are doing the most damage out there.  More cutting edge, more geared towards targeting bigger fish or a better mouse trap for fooling weary pressured fish.   The Dean Rojas Warmouth,  and the Jackall Clone Gill 2.5 and the Mission Fish are all part of the big picture of modern sight fishing.  All have wild variations and secret rigging and tricks I’m sure. I know the Hammer and Mission Fish best, both part of my toolkit.  Believe me when I tell you I use a drop shot a lot when sight fishing.  You need a big knock out punch and you need finesse, so I use the Mission Fish and Hammer as my big knockout punches, and drop shot/wacky and light texas rigs like the Warmouth and Clone Gill as my finesse approach.  I thought it important to note flat side up  or just flat sided bed fishing baits, have something about their swagger.  Flat sides, square/boot/slight swallow tails, realism, perch/bluegill profiles, buoyancy, weedlessness, unique vortex, and big fish attraction.   The Lateral Perch from PowerTackle is a derivative here, and likely a bed fishing bait for someone out there, but too has the this flat side up profile and swim, and is worth noting. I cannot speak to how well the Lateral Perch catches fish, but all of the other named baits I’m 100% certain catch fish on beds really well, and have too much in common not to connect the dots.   They all fish differently, but in the grand scheme of sight fishing, you better have tools that can be drop shotted, pitched, weightless/wackied, hopped, swam, and texas rigged if you want to be competitive.   Don’t just limit yourself to white tubes, craws and creature baits.  Be thinking perch/bluegill too.

The Okuma 7'6" MH Rod getting it done too. You need some 7'6" and shorter than 8' rods for fishing baits like the Mission Fish. This is an even beefier style of pitching stick vs. the Powell, but it takes the conversation to more like 2-6 ounce baits no problem. I liked using it for the 5" Big Hammer rig too. Lots of power and fished very nicely. The rod still has good feel even though my rig was under weighted for the rod, and it just worked for me.

The 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig is an excellent sight fishing system.  You can see your bait very well in the black Florida water, and it shows up well fishing a bed fish in >8 feet of water in clear water.   The rig has ample weight involved, which means you can ‘rapid fire’ and harass a fish with the bait, pushing the fish around, and firing them up into biting.  The bait hops really well, and has the square tailed flap on the way back down to the bottom.  It’s more of a hop hop and slight drag and shake style of  bait.  The fish love to ‘catch’ the bait coming back down to the bottom, with a well placed and timed hop.  The 5″ Big Hammer gets bigger bed fish to bite and has an excellent hook-up and land ratio.  There is very little risk of foul hooking or snagging a fish, with the Texas rigged nature of the bait, which also opens up the ability to bounce the rig off of the side, head and tail of the fish, making them eat it.   You can expect to see a sight fishing production from us in the near future, highlighting this rig.  We gave a sneak peak of the bait underwater in our Lake Seminole FLW Evestart Preview video, in case you missed it.

2012 FLW Everstart Lake Seminole Recap

Published: 27 March 2012
Written by Bait Bro
No comments
Categories: 2012 Tournament Fishing, 3:16 Lure Company, Shimano, Small Bait Fishing, Triple Trout

Look closely. You see the light spots? Those are the beds. Beds in snot grass. This is ideal wacky rig stuff, because you can't fish too many baits around this stuff without mucking up. The Trick worm falls and stalls so slowly, it makes it the ideal bait to catch these kind of bedders

First off, huge congrats to Brandon McMillan.  That guy can fish and has the mental game to be a superstar.  Extremely impressed with Brandon’s fishing and ability to put it all together in win.   My 2012 Lake Seminole FLW Everstart was pretty decent, but nothing fantastic. I basically weighed in 12 pounds per day, had decent limits and finished 26th place.  We had strong wind and clouds during the tournament days, which had me off my game. I had hoped to get 13-15 pound limits by finesse fishing, and then hunting a big fish with a bigbait or sight fishing.  The wind just made me have to work twice as hard to get a fraction of the bites.  No excuses, my gameplan just wasn’t very well suited for the weather.   It took me way too long to catch a decent limit and I didn’t have the time to hunt the big ones as planned.  I kept at it, figuring I might be able to pull off 15 pounds or so both days with one bite. I broke off a fish on a wacky rig on Day 1 in the wind, and that hurt.   You have understand in super shallow stump fields, when the wind is blowing, you get pinned up against stumps, high centered and it’s pretty much complete chaos at times. I hooked a nice fish and the fish ran me around on spinning gear, and just basically whipped me where I got stuck on some stumps in the wind with the boat, and broke off where in any calmer conditions I could have avoided the catastrophe.  No big deal, but every pound counts and would have improved my overall standings significantly.

Wacky Rigged Trick worms are pretty darn finesse. Trick worms fall and stall much more than even a senko. Add a #1 Owner Mosquito hook and loosen up your drag and get to work. Braid mainline with floro leader recommended.

So, if you want to catch fish on Lake Seminole right now, here are some insights.  The fish are on beds, up shallow, and can be found along the shallow sand bars, points, humps and hard bottom places in Spring Creek big time.   You are either catching fish on beds, getting ready to bed, or just coming off the bed/guarding fry.   The water in Spring Creek is getting back to its normal clear self and things are getting right in Spring Creek again.  We had weeks of muddy water caused by some heavy rains that sorta screwed up the creek for a while.   There is also a shad spawn happening early in the morning.  So, first thing in the morning, guys had areas with hyacynth edges and/or rock where they were able to power fish their way to good 17+ pound limits in the first hour.  I missed this bite pretty much completely, but beware shad spawn fish are winning fish, as per Mr. McMillan, Shaye Baker, etc.  Find shad spawn and throw spinnerbaits, topwaters, and swim jigs.

Lake Seminole Conditions as of 3/25/2012

Lake Level: -.05 feet

Water Temp: 72 in the am, 78 in the afternoon

Grass:  Mediocre grass at best, hasn’t grown up much in most places.

Finesse Fishing on Sandbars/Points/Humps:

1) Wacky Rigging:

Zoom Trick Worm Or 5″ Senko (in the wind) in Watermelon Seed, Watermelon Candy, or June Bug

#1 Owner Mosquito Hook

15# PowerPro Braid main line connect to a 10# Suguoi Floroleader (2 foot leader)

7′ 2″ M (CUS72M) Shimano Cumara Spinning Rod

Shimano Stradic CI4 (STCI42500F) Spinning Reel

Wacky Rigging is a perfect blend of Rate of Stall and Rate of Fall.  So much so, that when done properly, you can literally ‘float’ your bait in place, suspending it in the water column exactly where you want it.  Cast your bait a little bit past your targets.  Your targets should be any light spots (beds) you see from a distance, stumps, trees, grass line, isolated patched of lily pads, or just randomly on good high percentage flats.  Dead stick the bait to the bottom on the initial fall.  Just let it fall to the bottom, pick it up and shake it a couple times.   Then let it settle to the bottom.  I only fished the wacky rig 5-10 feet in most cases back toward the boat, and then would reel in and make another cast.  The wacky rig is death on Seminole and the fish there really react well to a slow fall and slow stall.

2) Light Texas Rigging

Swim Senko

Speed Worm

Zoom Trick Worm

1/8 oz. Picasso Tungsten Worm Weight

4/0 or 5/0 Owner Wide Gap Offset Worm Hook

17-20 # P-Line Halo florocarbon or 30 Pound Power Pro Braid

The light texas rig was a better bait for casting and dragging around in the wind.  It was just easier to fish in the wind and many guys who did well were finesse fishing. Seminole is not like Okeechobee. You have to approach the bedding fish with much more care and they don’t kill anything you throw over a bed.  You have to slow down, finesse and work them into biting more than on the Big O.   You could just drag the bait, or do a slight pull and swim.  If you came thru the sparse grass, you could rip it or give it some swim, but when on barren bottom, the drag retrieve seemed to be the better deal.  Fishing for the same fish as the wacky deal, just less finesse than wacky, but much better for fishing in any kind of wind.

3) Carolina Rigging

8″ Zoom Lizard (watermelon red/cotton candy/june bug)

Zoom Brush Hog  (watermelon seed/green pumpkin blue)

3/4-1 ounce Precision Brass Weights

The Carolina Rig is a good bait on Seminole for a few reasons.  It can be fished nicely in the wind first and foremost.  The fish on and around beds seem to eat Carolina rigs, don’t ask my why, but they do.  Just ask Lloyd Picket Jr about that.  He catches solid sacks of bedding fish, by blind casting Carolina rigs in the Spring time, I’ve seen it a couple times.   Anywho, the Carolina rig also helps you probe the deeper and transitions sides of the sandbars, points and humps.  So you can probe the deeper 6+ foot range of the sandbars.  Sometimes the fish move out or are sitting deeper due to whatever reasons, and a Carolina rig is a great compromise of finesse and power because it can be fished down to 15+ feet and across a 2 foot deep hump in the same cast.  Many good bags were caught on the C-Rig, lizards and creature baits on stump flats, sandbars, and humps in and around the Spring Creek and Fish Pond Drain area.

#4) Bigbaits

3:16 Sunfish with 1/0 ST-41 Owner Treble Hook on 65# Power Pro and Calcutta 300 TE and G-Loomis 965

8″ Triple Trout, two ST-36 Owner Treble Hooks in 1/0, #5 Owner Hyper Split Rings,  65# Power Pro, Calcutta 300 TE, and G-Loomis 965

The bigbait bite on Seminole was nothing spectacular, but there.  You have to fish around the bedding fish, or around the standing timber, grass or docks directly adjacent to the spawning areas.  That was the key, but Seminole just wasn’t a great time for moving baits.  Finesse baits dominated, but I got the occassional bigbait bite.

I've been learning some basics of bigbaits in non trout fed lakes this year. Bluegill and sunfish baits are an excellent choice around spawning time. Bigger fish don't like the bluegills/sunnys swimming near their beds. They tend to bite with purpose and you can feel it.

The Lake Seminole 2012 FLW Everstart Preview

Published: 21 March 2012
Written by Bait Bro
1 Comment
Categories: 2012 Tournament Fishing, 3:16 Lure Company, Big Hammer, Small Bait Fishing, Triple Trout

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnjCK-lidBk]

Tournament time again.  I’m unusually optimistic about stringing together a good tournament.  I have been catching fish, not in great numbers or size, but I think the fishing is generally pretty tough out there.  Guys who I know can catch them are struggling, which I’m not suprised.  This leg of the journey has been tough.  Yes, there is a shad spawn, and yes the bass are bedding, but Seminole is a different animal than most lakes.  This year, the grass on Seminole has not grown up and it’s relatively barren compared to the other times I’ve fished here.  What that means is you cannot go pound the grass and milk fish out of it.  Grass lakes without grass can be confusing.  Keeping it consistent and being able to have solid sacks of fish for 3 days is the goal.

My gameplan:  Fishing Small, getting a good solid limit, and then breaking out and fishing Big.   I have various areas where I can fan cast finesse style baits and get it done.  I have areas that are in danger of being ruined by muddy water coming down Spring Creek, however, I think I can adjust and fish the moment and conditions.   We have relatively strong winds and thunderstormy type day forecasted for tomorrow.   That means the bed fishing will be tough for the most part.   Not game over, but the bed fishing on Seminole that I’ve experienced is pretty fickle.  The fish are really smart, trolling motor aware, and require extreme stealth and skills to get to bite (the big fish anyway).   Ideally, I get a good limit with enough time to go have some free time to go hunt some big ones. I am hunting them with Triple Trouts, 3:16 Sunfish/Bluegills and the 5″ Big Hammer sight fish rig (bed fish).    The big swimmer bite has been tough, but it’s out there.  I need a good 2-3 hours of chunking and winding to get a bite, and that assumes muddy water and muck haven’t messed with my water.  Muddy water and muck (ie, floating grass niblets the ducks pull up, or snot grass pieces, or just wind blown garbage are the doom of the swimbait at times).

I’m fishing for a Top 10 and God willing, am able to pull off a Top 5 or better.  I think I can be consistent.  Worst case, I get 10-12 pounds per day, but best case, I think I can get 15+ a day, and sustain it for 3 days in a row.  I think 28- 30 pounds, two day total, will make the Top 10 cut or slightly less. Guys are going to have some big sacks, but I don’t believe they can do it 3 days in a row, let alone 2 days in a row.  We shall see.  I feel good about catching some fish and competing.

Music from the above video clip:

“Preying Mantis”

Album: The Left Hand Side

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/lefthandside

Usage Courtesy:  Body Deep Music