I'm still confused

[Topwalker]

I fished the joe bass championship I don't post much on the forum usually but I enjoy reading the forum throughout the year. I had a descent first day with 9 1/2 lbs with a limit. Caught those on green pumkin orange finesse jig with a zoom super Chuck trailer green pumpkin. Had 4 in the boat by 10 am then didn't get another bite till 330 ish and caught 2 fish out of marina dock stalls in 35 to 25 ft of water on a drop shot 1 lm 1 ky the ky was a keeper then my buddy broke off a big one in the next stall. Thought that would we a good pattern on Sunday with them calling for slick and sunny. The wind actually seemed to hurt my bite on Saturday so I was excited. Sunday was a different story I had one bite all day and it was a keeper ky caught in 47 ft of water over 80 ft with timber present. Tried the jig on similar areas as day one ( chuncky rock points and bluff ends in 10 to 15 ft of water)and went back and tried the Marina's with no luck.  Alll fish caught with in 5 minutes of long creek marina. I get to come down to table rock about 2 times a year and I always seem to catch it when it's tough. I like a tough tournment but it was alot tougher than I expected compaired to how my home lake is fishing. Also had a 3.86 smallie in practice on Friday boy was that fun. 

Tight lines everyone

[abkeenan]

Welcome to the "here today, gone tomorrow" show that is Table Rock. It was struggle city for most of the guys in a very talented field for the BASS derby. Don't beat yourself up too bad. When the lake fishes like it does now with bites few and far between I turn into a chuck and winder hoping to play a #'s game (think Muskie fishing.....fish of 1000 casts). Which typically I am not, as I fish slower with a jig, jerkbait, worm or some other bait that soaks longer than power fishing a crank or blade. Eventually you might luck into one cruising in that 1-15 foot range. Gotta beat up a lot of spots to snag a few.

Looking at the BASS, it appeared as all the guys in the top 10 had a similar combination of baits they were using. A 4" swimbait on a jighead, a smaller profile jig and a mid-depth crankbait (wart, crawler, etc). Also looks like quite of few of them did pretty well on walking style baits to put a few in the boat.

[Topwalker]

I know it's a very conditional lake I tried the spinnerbait in the timber like the BASS guys were doing only catching one keeper in practice. I don't have the kentuckys on my lake like tablerock has I actually enjoy catching them deep but I found very few I looked on the gravel points and in the trees and seen some fish in the trees but they were very picky as I only caught 3 in 4 days. Our tournment looked to be won way up the James which I tried to find some fish past the bridge past cape fair but never found much guess I should have went further .

[Bill Babler]

4 key baits in the BASS. 

The bait that won the derby was a Spro Rock Crawler in Red Craw fished by Jared Lintner.  I believe he caught all his keepers on it.  Maybe one or two others on a jig or a WP.  Did not fish the same water any of the 3 days.  Jared is a very close friend of Mike McClelland's  I know they fished several days together during the allowed practice, and I spoke with Mike quite a bit.

That kind of help is what you need this time of the year to win here.    When you have the Table Rock Hammer helping you, and you listen probably enough said.

I try and keep a couple of colors in stock most of the time.

Drop shot with a 2.8 inch Keitech either on a jig head or a drop shot hook 3/8 to 1/2 0z. wt..  Best drop shot bite was 40' to 50' over trees in the creeks.

Whopper Plopper and a buzz bait early

3/4 oz. blade  fished deep in the cedars, not buzzed thru the tops.  If you were not losing spinner baits you were not fishing it correctly. 

Sumrall lost 8 blades the first day and I think 5 the second day so he lost 13 spinnerbaits in 2 days.  Remember I said I didn't not do what he was doing.  If I did that with guide clients I would have to do odd jobs to pay for the baits. or get a bank loan.

The blade pattern was completely over Friday and anyone throwing it Saturday got a very poor result.  Ie the Friday Leader.

For the last several days the bite of any kind is pretty much over by 9;30.  You don't have them by then, its tough going.  Yes you may get lucky, but best bet is to catch them early if you can. 

Good Luck

 

[Guest]

 If you were not losing spinner baits you were not fishing it correctly.

or, you might need to using a better spinner bait.  i fished all summer out in the timber with two.  lost one in a trot line and still fishing with the other one.

bo

 

 

[Bill Babler]

Kid had won $135,000.00 so far this year, so I didn't question what he was doing or what he was doing it with.  Thought it was great of him to tell me how and where.

 He caught the majority of his fish in Big and Little Cow and Spring Branch.  Said he would throw it as far as he could right in the middle of the cedar clumps, count it down and reel it back.  If it got hung up he would not go get it for fear of scaring fish, he would break it off.  He was fishing it on 20 pound carbon the first day and switched to 50 pound braid the second day.

If you have a bait that you can throw in that mess in a National Championship during tournament conditions where the Classic is on the line and fish it using the technique he was using  and never lose one you indeed are special and have something special.

Good Luck

[bobby b.]

Got out this afternoon (after being stuck at home repairing the deck for the last few days) but after reading Bill's post didn't have much hope, but thought just a boat ride with my new lab pup would be nice.  Tried the Wart on some chuck rock secondary points, then the A-rig around some cedars in a couple spots.  Saw some a little surface activity in the middle of a pocket that I was working the cedars thus trying the Rig there, nada.  Found fish suspended in the middle of the pocket and caught this nice SM on a slab spoon but had to leave shortly thereafter. 

[Bgctrading]

That looks like on the finder that it could be a home run spot....

[bobby b.]

2 hours ago, Bgctrading said:

That looks like on the finder that it could be a home run spot....

Unfortunately, I had to leave just shortly after I found them - they won't be there tomorrow, they probably left before I got back to my dock. 

[Guest]

On 10/23/2018 at 6:16 PM, Bill Babler said:

Kid had won $135,000.00 so far this year, so I didn't question what he was doing or what he was doing it with.  Thought it was great of him to tell me how and where.

 He caught the majority of his fish in Big and Little Cow and Spring Branch.  Said he would throw it as far as he could right in the middle of the cedar clumps, count it down and reel it back.  If it got hung up he would not go get it for fear of scaring fish, he would break it off.  He was fishing it on 20 pound carbon the first day and switched to 50 pound braid the second day.

If you have a bait that you can throw in that mess in a National Championship during tournament conditions where the Classic is on the line and fish it using the technique he was using  and never lose one you indeed are special and have something special.

Good Luck

i hear what you are saying bill, but was trying to make the point that we really need to start taking a look at the foot print we are leaving in the lake.  this might be why there are those that are trying to ban lead from fishing because we just keep using something that hangs up very often and just break it off instead of 1: try to get it loose, 2: use better fishing tools that do not hang up as easily, or 3: both.

let's say that 500 fisherman each day fishing table rock lose five lead baits each day into the lake and that happens 7 days a week.  in a years time, that is 910,000 lead lures.  add to that all the string attached.  i know most lure manufactures and tackle retailers want folks to lose a lure every time they throw it in the water, but we really need to start changing our ways.  that means manufactures and fisherman alike.  manufactures need to design lures that not only not hang up much, but also hook better at the same time.  it can be done as i have spent lots of hours doing just that.  we the fisherman need to make more effort in retrieving snagged lures.  even if it takes getting over the bait and using a lure knocker.

i will close with the fact that knocking a lure lose with a lure retriever does not spook the fish, but breaking the line off does.  how do i know this?  way back mike sowders and i were both wondering the same thing because we fished tournaments all the time.  he dived at the time so we spent several days of experimentation and observation.  bottom line was when you broke your line off the bass spooked from the area.  the lure retriever actually would draw bass over to see what was going on.  i could not tell you how many bass i have caught by dropping straight back down into the tree that i was hung up in.  a lot of them, and many of them big ones.

there are more and more folks fishing with each passing year.  just as with catch and release, we need to start taking a more concerted effort to not leave as many lures behind in the water.  my numbers of lead lures left really does not touch what is really left when you start thinking about how many slip sinkers or crappie jigs that are broken off.

bo