Due to health and weather I’ve not been fishing in too long. I still have my ear to the ground even though I have been trying, with limited success, to get some venison for Christmas. My friend Tom called me today with the news that he and his son in law had been to Lake Enterprise Saturday and caught 13.  The smallest was 2 1/2 and the largest was over 5. This photo was in his text. The cell service at my hunting club is nonexistent so I did not get the message until later.

He did not say what he caught them on but I know he loves a jerk bait this time of year.

I have not been fishing or anything else fun since Mickey and I went to Lake Guntersville. A whole month of bow season has passed without me spending a single day or part thereof in a stand. Needless to say I have wanted to, but some health issues have prevented it. I had a procedure done,nice wording for operation, that has fixed the issue but I have to take it easy for a week or so. I think the main problem was having to spend four days in bed flat on my back. Going to be back fishing and hunting very soon.

Mickey and I left for Lake Guntersville Friday morning early with hopes of getting there in time to fish that afternoon. We arrived on time but where we usually start in Brown’s Creek was white capping. If we put in on the lee side of the highway we reasoned  there might be some fishing to  be had. We could fish there but it was not easy due to the wind. Since conditions were terrible, we punted and decided to go elsewhere. We loaded the boat and drove to Siebold  Creek. There was a crowd there around each plot of grass. We got with the program and came out slinging a Ribbit. It took a little time, but we finally had one to blast to Ribbit.

We ended up catching 6 that afternoon, the hottest place, that we named the “Dead Fish Hole” was close to a big, dead, floating buffalo. It was in a place where the margin of the grass had a place where the margin sunk in. The time to go fishing is when you can but the “day rating” on my phone Friday was 70% but declining in the afternoon. The next day it was 42%, and the next was 16%, not a particularly good trend. We returned to Siebold the following morning and caught one before the rain started. Back to the ramp we went since we were so close to it. We returned to our cabin, studied the radar map, and decided it was going to rain for a while. We would get fired if we worked for the Weather Channel because when we awakened from our nap the weather was pleasant. Miss. State was playing Auburn and afterward Ole Miss was playing A & M so we opted to watch those two good football games. Brown’s Creek was the destination the next morning. There was lots of good grass and more shad than I’ve ever seen, and that includes Lake Ferguson. The fish were moving a little bit, with some 3 pounders jumping all the way out of the water chasing shad. After seeing one close by you could NOT get them to bite. We were frustrated and also watching the weather on the phone radar and it was showing some approaching storms. The timing was perfect because just as we got the boat tied down the sprinkle started. We drove to the Siebold landing to eat our lunch and watch the weather. There were some guys sitting there waiting for the weather to clear, as we were. The sporadic rains, some heavy, kept coming through but every now and then one of those guys couldn’t stand it and would cast off. Soon the bottom would fall out and they would return, soaked, to go sit in their truck. Went the rain would slack up they would return to the lake only to be drenched and again high tail it for the truck. All of this was highly entertaining to us. We even gave them names, bowlegs (even worse than mine), Auburn man, the skeeter man, and two of large size, whose name I will not reveal in an effort to keep the site clean.  On the way back to our cabin we revisited the dump we stayed the first year.

  

It was around 4:30 when we left the landing with a straight down rain. It was another day of 6 fish and probably 6 inched of rain.

I went to the private hole this afternoon and at 1:00 started fishing. The water was six inches lower than it was the last time I was there. I made it almost half way around before getting a bite. I saw some fish chasing bait and threw a 3XD in among them. The fish hit the bait when it hit the water. When I reeled it in there were five others following. There was one other time some were schooling but it took me a little more time to reach them and I could not raise a bite.  The fish were stingy. All the best places were barren. They were probably down there just watching the bait go by. To start two actually made boils at a spook but would not commit to eat it. I managed to catch one bass and a crappie on a worm. In desperation a 6XD was pulled out of the tackle box. Going for a long cast with it the line broke and a doozy of a backlash resulted. I am quite patient and can usually get them out but this one made me get the scissors out and cut it out

Just before 4:00, as I was preparing to leave, one hit a 5XD. Figuring it was the “old Indian trick”, I stayed a little longer and them left to go find some spots to bowhunt next week. Three bass and a crappie for the 3 hours this afternoon.

Since I did not sleep well last night, this morning I cut the alarm off and rolled back over for another couple of hours sleep. When I finally arose and made it to Lake Chicot I found the ramp in downtown Lake Village too shallow for me to use. The ramp at Connerly Bayou was shallow but usable. I had to use the “old folks” launching method where you tie a rope to the front of the boat and one end to the trailer. You back down until the boat floats off and then use the truck to pull the boat back to the bank. After I reached the main lake I ran aground and had to use the trolling motor to get off. As I ran down the lake I made my first observation, the only boat on the lake was sitting where I wanted to fish. It was a little after 9 when I stopped close by. The lake was slick on the lee side where I was fishing so I started with a super spook junior. The other boat was within view so I was again observing when they only caught one fish. I caught 2 along a slick sandy bank with a few more halfhearted strikes, indicating the fish really didn’t want the top water. Recently I procured some 1/4 oz Red Eye Shads that are just the size of the minnows that were everywhere so I put one on. I caught a couple more there but I was slow. I moved farther down that same bank. Observing again that whenever the shad would “flinch” you could cast to that spot and catch a fish usually. Since it was working well I started bearing down on the observation. Every now and then the fish would start hitting on the surface with shad going everywhere. By this time I had put a Yozuri on another rod hoping to get a comparison to the Red Eye as far as effectiveness was concerned. At the end of the day they were judged to be equal. The water was relatively shallow and I observed that the schooling fish were usually in the vicinity of a piece of brush sitting out by itself. When a spot would get burned out I would go riding looking for brush and was successful in finding fish by doing that. Many times when my bait would hit the water a shad would run and a bass would hit the shad rather than my bait. Can you imagine that? I quit about 3:30 with 27 bass . They were not that big but I am thankful for every one. The FOD was 2 -15. I tried to shake the scales to get it to 3 but no dice. A lot of the fish were just under the size of the FOD. PS: My new Millennium Boat seats were great. Today is the first time I have fished with them.

The rivets in the floor of my boat have become loose after the 9+ years I have owned it. In preparation for a trip to Lake Guntersville next month I decided to drill out the rivets and lift the floor to see what treasures lie underneath after 9 years. After drilling the rivets and finally getting the floor up, I found something I did not want to find, cracks in two ribs and in a few welds.  This is what it looked like when the dirt, hooks, wrappers, leaves, and other junk had been washed out. If you click on the photo you can see one of the cracks running over the rib right by the dry box.

I can’t be too disappointed with a few cracks after 9 years. The boat has an appointment with a welder Monday morning to fix all the problems.

NEW SEATS:  I have had some new seats for three weeks but have not had time to try them out. That’s sort of pitiful. They are made by Millennium and are like the ones on their tree stands. They were extremely comfortable when Gayden Bishop and I took them out on the river the other day. In this photo the closest one is opened to the sitting position and the  one behind it is closed.. The seat is extremely light.

Driving to Beaverdam this morning I was treated to a beautiful full moon. Upon arrival the parking lot was packed. Richard assured me that most, if not all, of the boat owners would be crappie fishing. Sure enough the spider webs were still in place between the cypress knees indicating no visitors. As we went down the bank we picked up some “grass bass” or fish caught on the edge of the saw grass. We were using the same craw type plastic as before. Richard did try a spinnerbait for a short time but went back to the plastic. It’s a good thing he did because he came up with this 6 3/4 FOD.

Fish bit for a while but then the lull came. We caught a few more but they started getting off after a short time. Richards plastic balled up on a few and I got caught asleep at the switch on a couple of bites. The fish seemed to be in cypress tree forts. They seemed to favor the middle of circles of trees and were quick to hit anything that landed in their spot. The trouble was, by hook or by crook, they were getting away. To make matters even worse I developed a bad case of the hangups. Poor Richard having to deal with that. Even so,we had a good time. We ended up catching a smooth dozen bass.

When Richard and I fished in the private hole Friday we caught several fish with a sunken belly. I went looking for another one this afternoon to send off for a necropsy  to find out what is causing the problem. Fishing started just before 3. For the first time in a long time I carried an ice chest to take a fish out. Of course I started where Richard and I had the best luck Friday and of course there were not many fish there because we had cleaned them out pretty well. I started out with a 5-XD , a 3-XD, a shaky head and a grub on a jig head. I have not thrown out the DT-6 but the 3-XD goes a little deeper and also is an excellent bait. All baits caught fish but the 3-XD caught 2 on one cast when a school broke out. Richard and I saw one such school Friday but I saw three today in different places . One had 5 fish following the hooked two, another had 6 or 7, and one had 12 to 15 following. I thought I was going to sit right there and load the boat but caught no more in that spot. The schools were moving fast. When you come prepared for something it usually doesn’t happen and that’s what happened today, no skinny fish. Finally fish number 14 had a definite sunken belly. In the box it went. I quit shortly after 6 and rushed to town to drop the fish off at Terry’s house. He is going to see that it gets to the vet school for the autopsy. Stay tuned for the results.

Richard came down to visit and fish in the Private Hole this morning. I would have forgotten my behind if it had not been tied on. After advertising eggs for breakfast, they were forgotten,  I forgot the trolling motor battery and had to turn around and go back to get it, and forgot the depthfinder and did not go back and get it. We got started on time regardless of the forgetting. The fish were cooperative from the start with Richard getting a strike on the first cast with a topwater. After that we started catching on DT-6’s and XD-5’s. The fish were not giants but each one stretched our line. Some had the sunken belly syndrome and some were just plain skinny. Some were just fine. I’m going to go back soon and try to catch a couple of the sunken bellied ones and take them to Terry who said he could get a scientist to tell what the problem was .  Here is one that Richard caught that had a 4 to 5 pound head and a 3 pound behind. It was the FOD.

When things slowed, Richard pulled out a black and blue jig with a blue trailer and really started to put fish in the boat. I was using a shaky head with a trick worm and had a hard time getting a bite for a while. A few fell prey to the curly tail grub on a jig head especially in shallow water.

In shallow water the bass hit it as soon as it hit the water. In one spot, Richard caught one on a worm and 3 or 4 of the fish’s buddies were trying to take the worm out of it’s mouth. I dropped mine down and caught one too but there were still a couple of fish swarming down under Richard’s fish.  A few more fell to the 5-XD  . The sun then came out from behind the clouds and started to sizzle. We then took our leave with 24 fish, 12 and 12, and it was 12 o’clock. It was a good day.

This morning I went to Beaverdam with Richard. We didn’t even crank the motor, starting fishing right from the dock. One of the first things Richard said was he liked seeing the spiderwebs between the cypress knees because it showed no one had been along casting to knock them down. It just shows, if you pay attention you can learn something every day. It was a great observation. We were fishing with a baby Paca Craw with the claws dipped in garlic dye, his was Texas rigged and mine was on a screw on shaky head.  It was not far before we caught our first fish. They bit pretty evenly all morning. Casting was short range. Richard uses all spinning gear and is adept at putting it close, especially with a backhand snap cast. I on the other hand was not as accurate as I should have been but the fish helped me out by following the bait out almost to the boat, many times hitting almost right under the boat. The boat seemed not to bother them although the water was only 2 or 3 feet deep, but not very clear. I also was using a short spinning rod and yellow 15 pound Power Pro which was good for setting the hook.  Fishing along, we saw a wasp nest 8 to 10 inches in diameter just covered with those big black wasps. I shuddered to think about running into the limb with that nest. We were weaving in and out of the cypress trees bumping trees and brushing limbs. I became hung right next to a tree and as we moved in to free the bait a couple of wasps came from nowhere. Then I saw the nest.  I took off my hat for anti aircraft protection and it worked until we were out of range. When I tried to figure out how I was going to retrieve my bait, it was already free. In the brushes with the trees we acquired a hitch hiker.

A big fat preying mantis riding on Richard’s hat.  They eat wasps. Where was he when we needed him. It was a good day with a breeze most of the day, good conversation, and steady action.  We ended up with 20 bass, no biggies but each one stretched our line.