Champ188

In my experience, a warm winter like we had this year is rarely followed by really good spring/summer fishing. Hard winters may be tough to weather but I prefer them greatly over little or no winter at all.

Good to see ya back, Techo.

Good report, Bill. Thanks for keeping us up to date.

Gotta love seeing the little guys catch em. Congrats on some quality time.

Point well made and taken, abkeenan. There are certainly some good apples out there, yourself included. Was just chuckling to myself at your mention of the "positive reinforcement" theory of child raising. Hey, I am all for positive reinforcement when appropriate but when it is taken to the point of not keeping score at ballgames because God forbid someone should fail to WIN every time, it's pretty ridiculous to me. I wonder in 20 years or less if you attend a bass derby weigh-in, will everyone get a trophy at the end of the day so that no one cries or has to go home feeling any less of a person? LOL

Welcome back, rps. You'll get back in the swing of things quickly. If your struggles continue, I might start to wonder about a few of my "friends" here and their activities while you were gone. They may have put a beatdown on your fish. I'd never use their real names, of course, but their nicknames just miiiiiight be something like Denjac or the one we affectionately know as the moderator. Ain't accusin' no one of nothin' now, just sayin .... stuff happens. Seriously, though, neither one of them has been up that far to my knowledge. Denny's boat has been in the shop. Donna and I have threatened to go launch at Holiday Island a couple of times but have yet to make it.

Might try a 3/4-ounce football jig (PBJ with a green pumpkin double-tail trailer) off some of the slower-sloping points. Just drag it on the bottom 15-40 feet. Once you get a few bites, try to concentrate more on that particular depth. Good luck.

Let me try to really say this briefly without completely losing the message. People have no concern for anyone but themselves anymore. It starts in the home. I'm 51 now, and I believe that my generation was probably the last to be introduced at an early age to the fact that life ain't always about getting exactly what you want, when you want it. My parents knew the word "no" and I heard it frequently. I always had more than fair opportunity to accept it, but if I chose not to, then my backside paid the price. Many younger adults these days were raised completely different. They were not told "no" to anything and they sure never got their backsides warmed. For gosh sakes, that's child abuse and will scar a person for life! From birth, life has been all about them getting what they want, saying what they want and doing what they want, whenever they want, and that includes running their boat between you and the bank if they so choose. You don't matter, don't you see? Sadly, it ain't a gonna get no better — ever.

Ron White nailed it: You can't fix stupid. You also can't fix don't give a rat's azz. You guys were obviously dealing with one or the other — or both.

I don't doubt it, Jason. But there's a pretty much untapped deep cranking bite out there and I intend to try and find it this year. Been sayin that ever since that guy from Texas came up here several years ago and just waylayed em way up the White in that Stren Series championship. Some guy with a fat wallet hit both of the Hook Line & Sinker tackle shops down here and stripped the shelves of the DT16s in the new Ike's Ink colors. I did look at a DT10 in that Blueback Herring color and I'm not sure I've ever seen a prettier crank bait. As Bry said, the Disco Shad looks darn good too. Same for the Smash and Caribbean Shad colors. All of them seem just subtle enough to work well in clear water.

I used to partake heavily of intoxicants but gave that up going on 6 years ago.

Nice report; good day. Thanks!

Thanks clf989s. Keep saying I'm gonna try deep cranking some of the clearer water but not sure where to start with colors. The new DT16 colors were obviously created with clearer water in mind.

I wish you well, JB.

Jackpots and $200 entry fees don't mix. Say what you will, but a series of tournaments all on the same lake is a jackpot series regardless of the entry fee.

http://www.millcreekteamnighttournaments.com/

Glad you were able to catch some and have a good time. That's what it's all about. If I can ask, what color was that DT16?

It was the same around Baxter ... hardly another boat anywhere. One other truck/trailer at H ramp when we got there and only one or two when we left.

Denny, my dad always taught me not to borrow trouble. Gotta get em on before you can worry about gettin' em in the boat. It's the ultimate "we'll cross that bridge when we get there" situation.

LOL, hey Duck, I'm jealous. I'm normally the spinnerbait/Fin guru and I couldn't get either of those going down where we were. That's what I like about the Kings arm ... nearly always a blade bite somewhere, somehow. I did cast a longing look at it going and coming when we crossed it on 86.

Kyle, Boy, not sure I'm the guy you want drop-shotting advice from. I do know a thing or two about dock fishing though, so I'll give it a quick try. Not every dock holds fish. For my money, the best ones are the bigger docks with 10-20 slips on each side that have 50-60 feet of water under the deep end. If they sit on a point or in a creek channel swing, all the better. If you catch fish on a dock one time, chances are they'll be there again. If you fish one a couple of times and don't catch anything, I'd write that one off. For the most part, I pitch a finesse jig or shaky head worm into the shallower slips ... the ones from 8 to 25 feet. I catch 75 percent of my dock fish in the slips that have 15-25 feet of water in them. In the really hot summer, that depth range may change to 20-30 feet. When I get out to about 25 feet, I go to a drop shot and really watch my front graph for balls of bait and/or hooks representing bass. You don't need a really expensive graph for this ... just one that will show bait and fish. Also, don't be afraid to pitch that drop shot way back into the slips. You don't have to fish it straight up and down. Pitch it back as close to the walkway as you can and let it fall with the bail on your spinning reel open. When you see your line go slack meaning it's on the bottom, pick it up carefully and check for a fish. Lots of times they'll be on there immediately. I might also add that whether you're pitching a jig, shaky head or drop shot into these slips, you can't be afraid to lose your junk. If there's a lift in a slip with a boat on it and enough of a crack for me to pitch my bait in, I'm going in. That's not to advocate harming anyone's property. Practice your pitching technique so that you don't bang your bait off people's boats. That's just not nice. But the tighter the places you get into, the better your chances of catching fish. The twofold reason for that is (1) bass and especially big bass seek out the darkest, shadiest places they can find to hang out and (2) not many people even attempt to get a bait into these places. Hope this helps. You might also want to search for old posts on here about drop-shotting and see what turns up. Should be some really good stuff from folks who are far more proficient at it than me.

Donna and I got to the "H" ramp at Baxter around 7:30. A bit later than we'd have liked but had to doctor sick cats before leaving. Nothing like a 4 a.m. cat rodeo to start the day. At any rate, it was cloudy with a light breeze for most of the morning, putting me in a major topwater frame of mind. It was not to be. I threw a Fin for nearly two hours while Donna followed with a Spook and neither of us ever got so much as a single bite. Fished some prime places, they just weren't feeding "up" on this day. So, to borrow a favorite phrase of workplace consulting firms, we "redeployed" and visited a favorite dock, where a dropshot in 25 feet of water produced a 3.5-pound LM. Lost another apparent keeper, then moved around the corner to another good-sized dock, where we found a school of keeper K's and scored three or four of them and lost a couple more on the same green pumpkin drop-shot worm. Next stop was a main-lake chunk-rock point that gave up a couple of easily keeper LM's on a football jig and hula grub, and the pattern was set. From then til 6 p.m., we visited about two dozen more chunk-rock points and bluff ends, along with a few choice docks, and were in fish all day. In fact, I commented to Donna near the end of the day that nothing is quite as rewarding for the "guide" as catching fish off every place you visit. We ended the day with around 35 fish total, of which 18 were keepers. Best five would go about 17 pounds and included the darn fine smallmouth pictured below that Donna wrangled on a football jig. On the windy areas, the fish were 8-15 feet. In calmer water and when the sun busted through in the afternoon, they were 15-25. Best football jig color was PB&J with a green pumpkin double-tail trailer. Best hula grub color was green pumpkin/purple and it was fished on the new 5/8-ounce Yum Pumpkin Ed stand-up head. Gotta say I really like that head ... doesn't hang bad in the rocks and has a helluva hook in it. Dock jig was a 5/16ths Bass-X in Beaver Craw Purple (see bassxlures.com) dressed with a green pumpkin Lil Critter Craw. Have fun out there.

Boobie, you are exactly right. Best just to move on and I'm only repeating my previous message here, but it's so darn hard not to give these jerks a piece of your mind sometimes. As I said earlier, ignorance is one thing. I can overlook that. It's the "screw you, I want to fish there and you're in my way" attitude that makes me want to throttle people. But again, you're exactly right. It will accomplish nothing because no amount of reason will work on unreasonable people.

I like the Mikey myself but nothing quite like a good Redfin that's been worked over with all of the right modifications.

I've had smallmouth change color drastically in my livewell in less than an hour. Seems like if you catch a light-colored one and put it in the livewell, it will turn darker. Really nice fish, Phil, but how'd you get Babler to fish a bank? Last I heard from him, the only purpose that Table Rock's banks serve is to hold the water in.