Post by fishon1219 on Sept 26, 2005 15:55:47 GMT -5
The Wayne county bass anglers held their classic on orchard lake this past Sunday. I won the title of angler of the year so I really wanted to win the classic. The day was supposed to have scattered thundershowers with 10-20 mph winds increasing to 15-30 by noon. When we took off there was not a breath of air. I hit my first area a sand flat with scattered rock in 3 ft of water fishing a pop-r and immediately caught a 13 incher. This was to be followed by at least 80 more of that size through out the day. (This is no exaggeration I was counting up until noon and I had 60) Worked the flat until it started to get good light about 9:00 with no keepers. I moved out to the inside weed edge and started throwing rattle traps and spinner baits, but still no keepers. My back was getting sore from measuring all these fish that were 1/2 inch to short. The wind finally started to blow about 10:30 and the rattle trap bit died so I stuck with the spinner bait. I was covering lots of water zig-zagging from the inside edge about 5 ft deep to the outside weed edge about 20 feet and still only catching 13 1/2 inchers. Then I saw a 3lb smallie come up and swipe at the bait and miss. I already had 1 trailer hook on so I added another. Now I have 3 hooks on this spinner bait. Next cast to the same inside weed point another smallie not as big moves the bait about 2 ft sideways and never opened his mouth on the bait. I sat in that same area fighting the wind for 2 hours throwing every thing I could think of and could not get them to bit again. I had 2 hours left in the tournament by now and decided to move to a little hole I found on the west side of the island. I throw my tube and 1st cast there I get a solid 2 lb largemouth. Next cast I caught one that just touched the 14 inch mark. I sat there for the next 20 minuets catching cookie cutter largemouth that wanted to be 14" but I just couldn't get them to touch. I did keep 3 that were so close I thought they may relax a little and stretch the 32nd of inch I needed. Then the spot dried up. I change to a different color tube, tried a worm, a crank bait a jig-n-pig pretty much everything I had tied on all 10 rods that were laying all over my 16' boat. Buy now it is 2:45 and the weigh in is at 3:15. The thunderstorm they promised was rolling in and it was just starting to rain. I decided to spend the time remaining were the smallies missed my bait. I added a red soft plastic trailer to the spinner bait with the trailer hooks and started fishing. Again a nice smallie about 2 lbs swiped at the spinner bait and missed a few more casts and nothing. I threw the fluke I had tied on and when it got almost back to the boat there were 3 smallies all going 3 lbs or better following it. I sped it up and they stayed the same distance away. I then killed it and let it sink to the bottom and sit there. One of them put his nose to it but wouldn't eat it. and then they were gone. I fished around there with my remaining time and managed 3 more short fish. At the weigh in I asked for a courtesy measure on the 3 short ones, So close yet so far. The guy who won the tournament had 5 solid keepers he caught using a carolina rigged senko on the inside weed edge in 5 ft of water. He as well as every one else in the tournament caught several bass that were 131/2" long. @nd place had 2 fish for 3 lbs 3rd had 2 fish for 2.9 lbs I had 4th with 2 fish at 2.5 lbs and that was it. 10 guys and 11 keepers between us. Next year should be a killer year out there if the just under sized fish population grows another 1/2 inch.
Fish on
Fish on