Royal Blue

Honestly the heavier bait in the wind was the main factor, but there was a lot less visibility and I thought that the Firecracker was a good color out on that point. Also, the bigger profile, bigger blades and bigger trailer gave them more to key in on. Second cast with it was the biggest smallmouth and I knew it was a good fish, but I thought it was a big LM. It felt really heavy. It's funny because I really thought I was moving the bait pretty quickly and everyone else has said that they were slow rolling it. I definitely let it sink before moving it faster though. I also wasn't using a trailer hook and I almost always do. I decided not to because of all of the stuff in the water and was trying to avoid hang ups. I missed 3-4 and one good one and I'd say 100% because I wasn't using a trailer hook.

I've got some heavy gear and some Hudd 68 swimbaits in shad and bluegill colors. I may have to start dragging them around.

I was told that Mill Creek was fully operational. I would never try what we did by myself. I'd say you'll be good to go at Mill Creek.

Got pretty creative and launched off of the upper parking lot road at Baxter. Saw one boat go by in the first 2 hours. Water temp was 70 at 8:00 am. Found fish halfway back in a pocket and caught a handful of shorts all on the War Eagle finesse spinner baits in chartreuse and white. 5/16 was the size on those with a small sight flash Keitech trailer. We tried flipping bushes and getting behind trees with zero luck. All of our bites came just outside the tree line. Kinda like they're on the old bank line! We hit a few more spots found some nicer fish on main lake points relating to oak trees in the water, but all of them were on the outside of the trees again. Here I threw a 1/2 oz War Eagle in firecracker with a 3.3 inch Keitech trailer in sight flash. Last spot of the day produced the biggest bite of the day and it was a 4.62 LM right on the bank, bloody tail and all. Had a great day and for what it's worth, every single fish was on a blade of some kind. There was no doubt about it when they hit it either. They were hammering it. Ended up with 22 total and 6 keeps. The keeps were 3 SM and 3 LM. Had the boat on the trailer by 2:00 and WT was as high as 75 in places.

I'm not sure about that. I caught a LM yesterday that went 4.62 and it hadn't completed the spawn yet. We were between Baxter and Shell Knob. She did have a bloody tail, but hammered my spinnerbait in less than 2 feet of water.

I almost tried that yesterday and thought better of it. I just stuck to the blade bite.

So Baxter is definitely closed, but we launched off of the road and had the place to ourselves.

I'd hit the bridge pilings. I've caught some by accident and even had a pretty good one last fall out there.

I know Mill Creek is open, but I was also wondering about Baxter?

Anyone know if Baxter is open to launch and retrieve?

That's kind of what I thought. I assume parking will take creativity too...

Any way to launch at K-dock right now?

I called and it's canceled. They're not rescheduling it this year either from what I was told.

Time to stock up on Hudds.

Too bad. I was really looking forward to this one.

Aren't Stephen Browning and David Walker Z-Man guys?

I hope we still fish. I just don't want it canceled. I already scored an extremely rare Saturday off and high water at Bull Shoals is never a bad thing. Chocolate milk sucks to fish in, but having all of that cover in play could be awesome. And I've become a get off my lawn old man, I'll never be confused for a millennial.

We're supposed to fish next Saturday in a big derby on Bull. I'm now wondering if it'll even happen a week later.

Have you ever done much floating on the James? I've caught some toad smallmouth from Delaware Town all the way down stream over the years. Not sure if you meant actual creek/river or river arm of the lake.

That's a great story. That had to really shock you guys!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I just told a buddy yesterday that we should go check that area out.

I doubt that they're all the way to the backs of the creeks yet. They definitely weren't on Sunday.

We even laughed about how it never seems to happen that way once you pay a tournament entry fee. All of our keeps were within a few hundred yards of the same bank. I kinda think we just got lucky by getting one at that spot right away and just sticking with the blade with the wind the way it was.

That's funny, because once I caught the first one I said there was no way I'd put it down and thought of him immediately.