we went out yesterday to pre fish for the tournament i had today and got out there about 8 am. water temp was anywhere between 48 to 50 degrees. i checked the pockect that i caught fish in last sunday and caught 1 keeper in three casts. we decided to leave it alone and try other spots. we struck out. we marked fish on the graph deep in the creek channels, but didnt catch anything else.
so it gets me today. i want to start off by saying we had a great turn out today fishing the riverside tournament. we had 93 boats at blast off. we were boat 38. we get to the pockect i pre fished in and there was already a boat on the right side, so we started on the left. water temp was 49 degrees and we arrived at 815. we fished up and down the pocket and only ended up with one fish, a keeper. we had boat all over us. one guy caught 2 fish right in front of us on a jig. we decided to leave. we went to another pocket were those fish were deep in the creek channel. we were hoping those fish would atleast pull up to the channel edge, boy did they ever! we arrived at this pocket at 945 and the water temp was 49 degrees. it didnt take long before we started catching fish. at first they were non keepers, but then they just started getting bigger and bigger. we just kept going back and forth in this pockect. it was like they just kept coming in. we ended up catching 35 to 40 fish. we had 12 keepers and culled 7 times. we had a big smallmouth and a even bigger largemouth. one of the best days i have ever had on the water. we had blast! like a dream come true! it was about time to start heading back. i covinced my patner to stop at a cove that was out of the wind on the back to get a bite to eat and take some pics of the fish for you guys and try throwing something different on a shallow bank before we weighed in. didnt catch nothing there, but did get some pics for ya'll. we headed to weigh in and ended up with 16.33 pounds of fish. largemouth weighed 5.94 and smallmouth was 4 pounds! ended up winning first place and second big fish. another great day on the water!
the advice i have for everyone is to look for spawning banks. you need some kind of rocks for the fish to spawn. fish different depth and change up baits till you can figure out what they want to eat. take you time! instead of covering alot of water, cover the same water alot! good luck to everyone! its only going to get better, so hang in there if your not catching them yet!
3-11-11 and 3-12-11 old hickory
Nothing worse than killing them during your pre-fishing, only to produce diddly squat when it counts..lol
