Spring Elite Tourney Resulting In Tough Fishing Now?

[AAD]

OK, hear me out... I have no evidence to back up my thoughts, but I figured I would put this out there, fresh off of my week at the Rock.

We all agree that the fishing this spring has been atypical. I only make it down there once a year, for a week, always near the last week of June. There have been many thoughts about why the fishing patterns most of us are use to are not happening, ranging from up and down temps, water levels, late shad spawn, and so on.

Here is my question: Is it possible that having the Elite tournament in April during prime spawn time would affect the fishing later on in that same year. I looked at the tournament results, and on days 1 and 2, 98 and 96 anglers (out of 108) weighed in a limit. Day 3, 48 out of 50 weighed in 5. And on day 4, all 12 weighed in 5 fish. That adds up to about 1300 fish that were re-located during their spawn.

That does not take into consideration the sheer numbers of bass that were caught and yanked off their beds/spawning areas during the week of practice and tournament. Not sure if there is any scientific backing that may suggest removing a fish from its reproduction area, either just by being caught, or being hauled to a weigh in would affect it ot not. I know that if you pressure a whitetail deer's home area, they will move on to other areas.

I looked back at the posts from April and there were numerous mentions about catching so many small K's. Where have all of those gone? On our week of fishing, we did boat 60 fish with 15 being 15"+, for 3 guys from one boat. Did have several K's in the 14 inch range, and a lot of them seemed to be either full of eggs or craws, hard to tell.

I am not sure of the date of the last spring Elite tourney before 2014 on TRL, maybe some of you can think back to the summer after it, and remember anything unique.

And I also realize that there are tourneys most weekends, so maybe this is a moot point.

Feel free to be as honest as you want in your reply. I have thick skin....

If nothing else, it will give us something to think about over this 4th of July weeknd.

God Bless America!!!!

[Old plug]

NO But with multiple Tournaments by armatures and multiple people flocking there to bass fish YEs it is possible.

[willyfish]

This topic has come up a lot, every year to be exact. This lake is full of fish no doubt. Would the fishing be better without all these tournaments? Is the spawn affected by relocating spawning fish? In my mind the answers are yes and yes, there is no way around it. The fact of the matter is it isn't going to change, its economics. These tournaments bring to much money to the area there being held whether its Kimberling, Branson, Guntersville, and so on. I think as an angler its just something you have to adjust to and learn from. Fishing is about "finding" them we just have to learn to find better.

[Old plug]

They have to be there.

[dtrs5kprs]

Think it is mostly due to the cold winter, and relatively wet late spring/early summer.

[crazy4fishin]

"on days 1 and 2, 98 and 96 anglers (out of 108) weighed in a limit. Day 3, 48 out of 50 weighed in 5. And on day 4, all 12 weighed in 5 fish.That adds up to about 1300 fish that were re-located during their spawn"

Carry the one....divide by 3....add in ?????? And here I thought I just plain sucked at fishing! Who knew - just having some fun.....have a safe fourth!

C4F

[GNSfishing]

Well no one tournament will affect the bass population. The combination of all of the tournaments can and I think they do affect the bass. There are several tournaments being held every week. As time has passed over the years the methods have changed to catch the bass today as it was 30 years ago. Of course the number of people has increased in pursuit of our green fish.

[Quillback]

Lots of fish getting stuck this spring, not just by the tourney folks either, and probably 80% are sub legal, so they are not going in live wells to be weighed. Maybe all the pressure wised them up a bit. I don't know. But as a counter argument, I'm just not seeing much feeding activity the last couple of weeks. I believe the bass are still there, just not very active. Now I just fish the White river channel, so can't speak for the lower lake.

[Ham]

No.

[steveearle]

Couple of things...I'm not in agreement, but have no proof, so I won't argue...but..The first things is, they were not on beds during the Elites..With the cold winter, they were still a ways off...but speaking of...I am somewhat convinced (although I am not sure why), that this winter had something to do with it...maybe.....the reason I say that, is that I fish Lake of the Ozarks quite a bit, and the fishing has been "off" in a lot of respects, this year...The winter weights were down somewhat, and the A-rig played hardly at all...The early Arpil funk was very weird..the spawn bite was somewhat normal, but hey, its the spawn..The post spawn/predictable deep-ish bite was also not very good at all...Just "off" is the best way to describe it..