Bassin' Begins

I haven't been out chasing bass since my re-entry to minnesota but that all changed since the opener this last saturday.  We had a little local tournament going so it added to the fun of the opening day.  Earlier in the week I was cruising around in the deep reeds trying to find a bed or too.  Well I found a bed or too but that all changed come opening day.  The water temp was hovering around 75 which started putting the bass out deeper.  Obviously I haven't been able to do any pre-fishing with it being opener but my plan was to get into the deep reeds and try to grind out a few fish that were left in the shallows.  I had a feeling that we would really have to work to find some big fish and work we did.  Josh was my partner for the day and we had a plan that we were going to stick to come hell or high water.

 Also I haven't been able to get out as much as I have wanted to chasing around walleyes being in-between boats, but not to fear I am back on the water.  I will be running with Tuffy Boats a smaller company out of Lake Mills Wisconsin.  So far it has been nothing but amazing and muskie fishing hasn't even began.  I am still getting everything rigged up and ready to rock but soon enough it will be running like a top!

 Back to fishing...We started out deep in the pencil grass throwing soft plastics.  5 minutes on the first spot Josh connected with an absolute hog that had his rod nearly flying out of his grasp.  As it turned out, a carp found it's way into the line of his hook and gave him quite a ride.  Josh then horsed out the first bass from way deep in the long stuff and that instantly brought up the confidence level.  We continued to grind and grind and grind the thick weeds pulling out a lot of 2.5 pounders out but they were lacking the fat we were looking for.  We tallied up 15 or so bass in the first hour and then started to work some of the edges in search for a big bite.  Josh was working the spinnerbait and I was just pitching some of the pockets.  The trick was not getting a bite, it was pulling them out of the weeds.  As soon as we would get a bite, that fish would have to be winched to the boat or else your hook would be buried in the weeds.  I set the hook into a nice bass and it had my heavy action rod almost doubled over.  It ended up being a fat 4 lber.  We hit a few more similar weed beds with similar results...a lot of 2.5 pounders.  We moved out to the edges and worked some large swim baits in search of a mega bite and were rewarded with some fish that we could upgrade our bag with.  We ended up with a 14 lb. bag and a win in the tournament.  I am not too much of a tournament angler but one idea that stuck out in my head was confidence is the greatest lure in your tackle box, it ups your odds before you even drop your boat in the water!

Muskie fishing is so close, the smell is in the air, I will be in Wisconsin sometime this week trying to slap a band-aid on my toothy fishing disease.  After that Minnesota opens and hopefully some fresh slime to go with it.  From bucket-mouth's of Minnesota.....Keep Livin' the Dream!