Drum on Milford

I went pre-fishing for an upcoming tournament for the twins on Milford. I happened to run into a couple of drum on this cold day. Also, I was able to catch a nice spotted bass and lost a really good largemouth bass in a different area. Of course the camera wasn’t on. The tournament was postponed due to the weather. The weather has really been tough this year. We have had a lot of cold days and not very many warm days. I have a feeling the next week that it is warm, it is going to be crazy. The fish are waiting for the warm weather.

Melvern Sunflower Team Series Tournament

Sunflower Team Series had their first event; Kyle and I were ready. It was a cold morning as we waited at the ramp with the other 39 boats for take-off. The wind was going to blow hard out of the NW about 20 mph. That was going to make it hard to fish our best spot. But, we were going to go there and fish as long as we could. Kyle was throwing a finesse bait and I started with a Jerkbait. We fished two hours in the spot with only 1 bite, and we did watch another boat land a keeper in the area. I knew they were there, but something had changed. Kyle was also getting very cold, and it was hard to fish in the wind.

We decided to move to another spot out of the wind, so we could fish a little slower and maybe feel a bite. We moved to area that had a lot of secondary points as we could fish multiple spots out of the wind. Everyone else was there too, and there were probably 10 boats or more in the area. I looked at Kyle and said, “Lets do something crazy; go throw square bills in the back of these pockets.” The water temp was 49 to 50 degrees. We fished around in the back of a pocket when we came to a drain, and I hooked up. I had a good smallmouth on, and Kyle was fighting with getting the net out. I told him to take his time; he finally got it out and netted our first and only keeper of the day.  It weighted 2.34lb. We would catch 3 more fish on square bills in the pockets. Kyle would catch 1 smallmouth on a secondary point with a finesse bait to end the day. I thought we fished hard for the conditions, and was so proud of Kyle.  He never said anything negative about the weather and just kept fishing. We would end up 16th place out of 39 teams; not a bad start. There were about 20 boats that didn’t come in with a keeper. The next Sunflower Team series event will be at El Dorado April 14. Thanks to Rick and Kip for putting on a great event and letting me fish with my boys. Nick will fish the 3rd Event at Wilson with me.

March Bass fishing on Melvern

I had an upcoming tournament on Melvern, so the twins and I decided to go prefish. It was a cloudy day with a little bit of wind. It didn’t take very long to hook up on my first three casts. We caught 12, lost 4, and we had the best luck on finesse baits and Jerkbaits. There was only one area we could get a bite. It is funny to watch the video and notice how long I would let the jerkbait set. It was cool to have Kyle catch a jerkbait fish. We are hoping the fish will be there next week when Kyle and I fish the first Sunflower Team Series Tournament.

Youth Tournament on Big Hill

The boys had their Kansas Youth 3rd Qualifier Tournament on Big Hill this last Sunday. We headed down Saturday earlier to prefish while the high school tournament was going on. The high school had a great turnout with 35 boats, and it took about 11.79lbs to win.  There was one 7lb caught and multiple fish above 4 pounds. The weather was awesome. Boys and I had a hard time getting on any of the good spots, but were able to catch a couple of small bass and lost one fishing pole. Nick was snagged.  When I got it loose, I handed it too him. I thought he had it so I let go.  It fell, hit the boat, and went overboard. We tried to get it back for about 15 minutes; no luck.  As I was trying to get the rod, a drum hit my crankbait. So, we called it a day.  Also, we needed to get off the lake before the high school kids in order to be able watch the high school kids weigh-in.

Next day was the youth tournament.  The wind was blowing out of the northeast about 11 miles per hour when we started, and was supposed to get up to 18 mph. The temperature was about 38 degrees to start, and was going to get up to 47. The tournament director decided to move the takeoff to another ramp so we could unload and loaded easier. I wasn’t sure where to start with the upper lake 48-51 degrees and the lower end 45-49 degrees. We decided to start down by the other boat ramp near where the high school had released fish the day before. We couldn’t stay there for very long with the wind. We then moved to some main lake points throwing jerkbaits. After about an hour, we decided to go up past the bridge where the water was warmer, and had a little more color to it.  We threw soft plastic, jerkbaits and spinnerbaits. We fished up past the bridge until the scheduled break at 10 am. Not much was going on, and we heard from another team they had not caught anything either. So, we decided to go fish the lower end of the lake in the trees. The day before at practice, we had caught two non-keepers in the trees on plastics. We were fishing down the bank  where we lost the pole. One of the boys had gotten hung up. I looked down, and there it was! I lowered a lipless crankbait, and snagged the pole. Nick was happy to have has pole back, and he started fishing with it. He said “Dad the pole is so cold.” Kyle was like “It has been in the cold lake all night.” It was getting about noon, and we had only 1 hour left to fish.  We headed back towards the ramp area to fish. There were already a couple of boats loading up calling it a day and a few still fishing in the area. We decided to move up to the next little pocket, which was out of the cold wind. We started fishing down the bank when Nick got hooked up next to standing timber on finesse plastic. We finally caught one at 12:15pm!  We were very excited.  It was just a small keeper, but on this cold day, we were going to the stage. Kyle then was so excited he messed up his spinning reel. I told him to grab Nick’s other rod that we had retrieved from the lake earlier that was now in the rod locker in the boat. Kyle grabbed the rod and was trying to get it out of the rod locker when the door fell on the rod.  It broke in half! I guess we were not supposed to have the pole anymore. We had only 30 minute left, so fished down the bank.  We came to a small secondary point that had standing timber out in front of it. I pulled the boat out in deeper water, and the boys were throwing at the timber with no luck. I decided to pull up shallow and fish back down were we had caught the keeper.  There was another team coming down the same bank. Just then Nick got hooked up.  I was trying to get the net out, but he just swung the fish in the boat.  It was just another small keeper. We were really pumped up; if we could just get another. Then Kyle threw up by a little stick and his line started to move to the right. He set the hook and was hooked up for a second. Then his line went slack.  We had just lost the fish with 15 minutes to go. With the two poles down that were medium action, he was throwing the finesse bait on a medium heavy rod. The pressure from the hook set ripped the hook right out of the fish’s mouth. I am sure it was another small fish, but on this cold day, every fish could count. The day was over, and we headed back to the ramp to see how we would finish. We knew someone else probably caught them. There were 10 boats that headed out that cold and windy day, and only 4 boats caught any keepers. First place had two good three pounders for 6.5 lbs that they had caught before 9:30am. We would end up 3rd place with two small keepers gaining some good points in the standing. Great job to all the kids that toughed it out in the conditions this weekend. I was very proud of the boys fishing until the end.

15 Minutes of Greatness

We decided to fish a little lake in central Kansas that I have caught a lot of fish on this time of year. Of course with the water temperature about 41 when we started, we couldn’t get a bite on any of the deep spots after two hours. So we decided to move shallow, and the water temperature was 45 degrees.  It didn’t take us very long to get hooked up. The bite only really lasted 15 minutes, but the twins were able to catch a couple of good bass.

1st Trip of 2018 Coffey County

It felt really good to get the boat out for the first trip of the year. We decided to go to Coffey County to fish the hot water. It was a beautiful February day in Kansas with light wind and partly cloudy. I told the boys there would be alot of boats out fishing. Yes, there were when we showed up.  We had a little hard time getting on any of the good spots. Kyle hooked up on his third cast with a really nice bass on a Ned Rig. About 10 minutes later, Nick hooked up with a small bass, but lost it at the boat. We would fish for a couple more hours only catching 4 white bass. We watched a lot fish be caught by other people; I think they were mostly white bass. We left the hot water area and fished main lake riprap. We were able to catch two white bass on suspended jerkbait on the main lake with a water temp at 46 degrees and the hot water was 66 degrees. It was just really nice to go fishing today.

Kansas Early Spring Bass Fishing

Kansas early spring fishing can be awesome across the state on any of the small State Fishing Lakes in April. Usually in April the bass start moving shallow looking to feed and spawn. It is a great time to fish and catch some big bass. I always try to hit as many small lakes across the state as I can to catch some big fish. I usually try to start with moving baits like Spinnerbaits and Lipless Crankbaits, then move to slower baits like Senko and Jigs.  The last three years on a local lake we have caught some really big fish. In 2015, the twins and I had about 19lbs for our best 5. Then last year during a Kids Fishing Club only a couple of kids showed up so I decided to take them fishing off the boat. It was a really tough day they were only able to catch two big fish that would weigh about 10lbs. We also lost a really good fish we never saw. I ready plan on hitting the lake this year at the same time. So this spring go to some of the states smaller lakes around April and you can catch some of the state’s big bass.