Fishing Report for Guntersville 3/4/12

Early yesterday, even before we started fishing, I made the comment to Josh that I wondered if my lack of success this year was because I wasn't willing to adapt to the changing day to day circumstances of fishing. the only time I turned a bad day into a decent day this year was during the NATA open. Well, read on folks. Learn ya something.

Yes, yes. I know it was Sunday. And believe me, I felt real bad about not going to church. But, I don't get a lot calls to ask me to go fishing.

Josh and I decided to have a little fish off with Bertus and Jim. Recall last time that this happened, they stuck it to us. I also had had terrible luck so far this year. In fact, the most fish I caught in one day was during the NATA open, and that wasn't many. Sure, we caught 19 pounds for a solid (and non-winning) weight....but we didn't tear them up. The other days, I had blanked. That's right. I had 3 straight trips to the G with either 1 or none caught. Terrible. I was discouraged. Heck,  I still am!

We put in at Goose Pond and immediately fished the back of goose Pond, which had some decently clear and warm water. No luck. And that was the order of the day, really. Josh did catch some of the shortest bass I have seen on Guntersville. I didn't have a bite.

We ran as far upriver as Jones Creek, finding some awesome looking areas, but nothing. The wind was howling like crazy, so we couldn't slow down to fish with finesse baits.

On the way out of Jones Creek, we decided to try one more area, about 3 feet deep with hard bottom and lilly pads. We had found great success in the past by fishing super shallow with the Alabama Rig.

It wasn't the first cast...maybe the second, and Josh hung one. Before the words were out of his mouth, I had one SMASH mine. We horsed them in. Solid chunks. At least we had 2 measuring fish. I believe Josh had caught 4 dinks before that. Double your pleasure. Double your fun.

We made another cast after we threw them in the live well, but we immediately noticed that while we were in the same depth water, there were no pads. We pulled up and motored further up the stretch. We fished about 100 yards of that stretch without a hit, but as soon as we got back to that area, I snagged another one. Very next cast, pulled in another fish. Both measured. Now we had 4. the wind pushed us past the area, so we motored back up. Again, the same upriver stretch didn't produce, but as soon as we entered the right spot, both of us snagged one.....at the same time. Neither measured.

One more trip down the same spot, but not a hit. It was odd. We knew they were there...you don't have two doubles and back-to-backers in the same 20 yard stretch.

"Ah, I think we are too shallow". Josh said. Apparently, he was watching the GPS and noticed that the track we were currently on was too shallow as compared to the track we had been taking. We motored back out, pushed deeper, and were immediately rewarded. His fish measured and mine didn't. But we had 5. Which was infinitely better than where we were an hour ago. All the fish caught were in a 20 yard circle that was slightly different visually than the surrounding area. What was different? Don't know. But we do know they were all buck bass. They sure like something about that area.

Best five went 13.2. Not a banner day. Not even close. Bertus reported a similar weight as well. We caught 13 or so (8 for Josh and 5 for me, I believe). All but one were one the Bama rig. My Bama rig was rigged with one Money Minnow and 4 of my custom swimbaits, as found here:
http://best5zach.blogspot.com/p/zachs-custom-swim-baits.html

And Money Minnow:

The fish alternated between the Money Minnow and the custom baits.

My last cast of the day, however, I slung off my Bama Rig. Yup. 15 dollar lure. 5 dollars in hooks. 20 dollars in baits. Gone. So, word of advice, retie your line...even braid...every once in awhile. Ugg....

Maybe I learned something. I don't know. It's tough to judge. We didn't do anything terribly different than what we had been doing the rest of the day. I guess you could say that, if it ain't working, don't force it. Go looking somewhere else. And even if they aren't biting at one small spot, it doesn't mean they aren't 20 yards away, all bunched up and hungry.

Still waiting for that multiple fish hook-up on the Bama rig. I don't think it exists....

Bass Pro Shops Pro Lite Baitcast Reel Product Review

Follow me on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter!

Read about all of my Fishing Adventures!

This is a product review for the Bass Pro Shops Prolite bait cast reel.

Most of my friends and fishing buddies (oh yea, I have to separate them...J/K guys)know that I have been a HUGE Shimano man. Not just Shimano, but the Citica series. I currently use 6 of them. You cannot beat the price and performance. I have had one fail on me and it took 4 years of throwing frogs in the nastiest conditions...hundreds (no exaggeration here) of fish....with no maintenance. In fact, it is still salvageable...but that's not what this post is about.

My buddy gave me the opportunity to buy one of these for a decent deal. I looked them up and read the stats on them. 9+1 bearings. 6.3:1 ratio. Weighs 7.6 oz aluminum. Very low profile. But, would I live it more than my Shimanos? So, I stuck it on my new Boyd Duckett X-Heavy Bama Rig Rod. The price was about 40 dollars cheaper than a shimano...so I thought I would try it.

I set it up about like I would set up a shimano. Right out of the box it performed excellent. Smooth retrieve. I haven't had a backlash yet. I am throwing a 2 ounce bama rig on 65 pound braid with the aforementioned X-Heavy. I LOVE the low profile design. It fits me better than the shimano. It has extra soft and grippy grips which you would normally have to pay extra for.

So far, I am in love with it. But only time will tell how long it will last.

RANT! If yor aren't going to eat them, don't throw them away!

Before I forget....
I am never one to judge anyone for keeping fish or throwing them back. Do what you want. Personally, I love to eat fish.

But, while leaving the lake yesterday, I see this:

I mean, you are 100 yards from the water! You just pulled your boat out! If you can't or won't keep them, why even put them in the live well?

Furthermore, they are ALWAYS people fishing causeways that would LOVE to have your fish!

White bass fishing on Wheeler 2/17/12

Last Friday was so pretty that I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get out. Word was that the white bass were biting on the upper end of Wheeler. I figured it would be an awesome opportunity to throw the Bama rig and see what would happen.

I left work and put in on the Army Rec area and ran upriver. You can find these guys at the mouth of almost any creek entrance.

The first thing that I noticed was the amount of boats out. I probably counted 4-5 boats around the Rec area...which is VERY strange. As I passed Ditto Landing, the number kept increasing. I noticed that most of the boats sported matching jerseys. Turns out, the college guys were fishing Ditto. Oh boy. That's ok. I was fishing for white bass and I didn't figure it would be hard to get on one of the traditional white spot holes. I was wrong.

As I arrived at the Flint river entrance, there were boats about every 50 yards. Being the courteous fisherman, I idled up to one of the boats and asked which way they were fishing. When they told me, I pointed the boat in the opposite direction and started fishing. However, the lower point with all the rip rap wasn't producing. I bet it had been pounded. So, I scooted up to the up river boat. I essentially put the boat into the clay bottom and cast out to 19 feet.

I began throwing a red Xcalibur square bill. For about 4 casts, a white bass would follow it to the boat but wouldn't hit it. I thought that maybe I needed to rile up the school, so I started throwing the Bama rig.

However, it was only the little guys hitting it and they were having trouble getting the hooks of even the little Storm swimbaits in their mouths. So, I swapped the square bill to a Lucky Craft MR in Aurora.

That did the trick!
I proceeded to wear them out for the next hour. I had 3 streaks of catching them on 5 consecutive casts. I even managed to coax the bigger ones to start biting!

I only caught 5 of the larger ones, but I bet by best 5 went 10-11 pounds!


So, if you want to take your kids and get them hooked on fishing, you have to have a high success rate. Go find these guys and see how many you can catch! I caught about 50 in 2 hours. These guys are VERY depth dependent, so if you KNOW they are there and they aren't hitting, vary the depth. Color doesn't seem to matter as much as the depth. I usually catch them on a 7ft running crank. White works best. Keep this in mind.....they are feisty and have a lot of stickers on them. They will flat fin you, so watch out!

Also, while the kids are catching them, know that the spots normally are hanging out under them. Just to experiment, I threw a 6XD out there. First cast...2 pound spot.

Because my kids LOVE fishing, I brought some of the smaller ones home for them to play with.

The Yum "Yumbrella" Alabama Rig

As EVERYONE that knows anything about bass fishing is well aware, the Alabama Rig has taken the world by storm. Paul Ellias put up incredible nnumbers on an otherwise tough week on Guntersville some months back. I know this, because I fished it those few days and it was tough. He didn't even have the fish the last day.

Follow me on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter!

Read about all of my Fishing Adventures!

A week later, every boat you saw on the water was throwing this guy:

Suddenly a lure which had been around for years and most assumed was a gimic was in short supply. I didn't rush out and get one. Quite the contrary. I laughed it off and openly wished it would be banned.

I fished with partners who used it a lot. I guess I was bad luck because I only saw one fish caught on it, despite what all the fishing reports had been saying. Yet, they sang it's praises and part of me thought it was like "The Truman Show". There was just NO WAY this thing was catching the fish everyone said it would.

So, I was at Dick's one day, and guess what...Mann's was marketing their own as was Yum. For the low low price of $29.99 you too could have one. Add on to that $5 in hooks and $10 in swim baits and you were in business! Well, it was pay day...so I bought one, opting for the Yum.


I never really threw it the first few trips. Friday before the NATA, nothing seemed to be working so I thought I would try it out. I located some suspending fish, positioned the boat, let it sink to the depth and reeled it in. BAM! They would nail it!

The next day that the NATA Open, late in the day, my partner Josh started throwing it. We culled up 3 times in less than an hour to 18.6 pounds. both of us caught multiple fish on it.

Of course, my main concern with this lure is the over all weight. If you put weighted hooks on it, it can easily get up to 3 ounces. That will wear on you.

Almost every 3rd cast you will foul it up someway. Whether the baits get tangled or even the whole lure get's wrapped up.

I cannot see how 3 ounces hitting the water doesn't drive every fish within 100 yards away. But Josh and I got to thinking about it. We think the sudden splash, plus a wad of bait swimming quickly away my simulate a feeding frenzy.


I will say this. It is a versatile bait. I have caught fish deep. I have caught fish shallow. I have bumped it off the bottom in 20 feet and I have BURNED it in 3 feet. You just have to know how they want it.

you better have at least a 7 foot med heavy. In fact, do yourself a favor and get a 7 to 7''3' X-heavy.

Throw it on NOT LESS than 50lb BRAID.

Despite my reservations, it catches fish. My only hang up is just how high the dollar per fish is with it. But you can't look at that. All fishing is, is a money put anyway.

NATA Open on Guntersville 2/4/12

Many of you may remember my gloomy story about this from last year. Long story short, I prefished the day before the tournament last year catching a 7.2 among other nice fish only to have the boat refuse to start the next day.

I can't quite remember what it took to win last year, but I BELIEVE it was 18 pounds or so. A nice sack, don't get me wrong, but not unobtainable.

Josh and I started prefishing once a week for about 3 weeks before the tournament, and each day the fishing got harder. Our friend Bertus would also prefish with us. We concentrated mostly on deep structure, 45 degree banks and the like. But about the only thing we could catch were small scrapers and crappie.one thing in abundance were tall waves, whipping wind and cold weather!

On the second of 4 prefishing days, Bertus did land this solid fish on a XR75 in royal purple off of a 4 foot flat.

The 3rd of 4 days, Josh and I had a little fish off against Bertus and his friend Jim. After almost an entire days worth of fishing, the only thing we could come up with was one solid scrapper caught on a square bill.

While Bertus called and swore they didn't have anything, we knew that wasn't the case. When we weighed in, they produced a solid 6 pound fish with another 5 and 4 pounder to boot.

My friend TJ and I fished the day before the NATA Open, but it was the same result. I did manage to catch a fish on the Alabama Rig.

So, that wasn't a total 30 dollar waste. I was starting to wonder as Josh had thrown if for 2 weeks straight without a bump!

I did manage to hop around that day and mark some fish on drop offs.

So, Josh and I met the night before and put together a game plan. Included in this was essentially fishing only mid lake. If things got dicey, we labeled the BB Comer bridge as our "Alamo."

Boats poured in to Goosepond. But, NATA did a FABULOUS job of setting it up and we easily signed in and launched the boat.

Our first stop was a bust, so we headed to Preston Island and fished a 45 degree bank. Josh threw the Bama rig and I threw a Silent Strike King 6XD. The white bass were running bait, but we knew if there was white bass, there were large mouth to be had. Josh did catch a white bass on the Bama rig, which, to that point...made his day. We pushed on to some submerged boulders in 14 feet of water. josh had a hit but the fish let go and one SMACKED my Strike King. I assume it was the same fish. It was a solid 2.5 fish but it barely measured. But MAN was it fat. Next cast, struck the underwater boulder, caught another clone. We caught a few more short fish but couldn't get any more.

We ran into Bertus and Jim, who said they had a small limit. So we assumed it was a tough day. From the very beginning, we thought if we could just catch a limit we could do well. From the looks of it, that might actually be the case. Now we only had to CATCH those 3 more fish.

After a few more hours without luck, we headed to the Alamo, which is to say, fish shallow. We had about 1 hour until weigh in and 3 fish weighing MAYBE 7 pounds.

We pulled into a little creek channel among old lilly pad stickups and Josh smoked one on the Bama lure. It was a nice chunk. Almost on the next cast, he snagged a 4-5 pounder. I immediately picked up the Bama rig and started throwing it. we caught several more and even culled up 2-3 times! We figured we had between 18-20 pounds..which made us feel REALLY good about our chances. We just needed to find that lunker. Unfortunately, we never found him and had to run full speed back to the ramp.

Upon reaching the dock, we found that MANY people said the day had been rough.
As I got out onto the dock, a dude FELL IN THE WATER trying to get off the boat and get his truck. I mean, he ATE it. I hate to laugh at his expense, but it was one of those times when he had NO change of making it, but tried it anyway. I helped him up while we all got a good laugh. Him included.


After walking to the weigh in, we QUICKLY found out that even if HALF the boats had a tough day, there were still 30+ boats that either did ok, or owned it. In fact, the first weigh in I saw was 21 pounds and I knew we were in trouble.

We weighed in at 18.6. Bertus and Jim had around 21 with a 7 pounder. It took 29 to win it. Yes. 29 pounds. 28 pounds for second! And the boat with 28 pounds also had a 8 pound fish! Could you imagine loosing with 28 pounds and an 8 pounder! I sure can't!

So, we ended up in 15th or so. we didn't really look to see how bad it was. Bertus and Jim came in 6th.

However, I am super proud of us for adapting and overcoming. Josh carried us, really...so props to him. Sucks to loose, but we learned a little something something. When you fish tournaments with guranteed money...the local pros will beat you almost every time. I guess I didn't realize that when I fished with Uncle Tony....since he IS the local pro.

It's only been 2 months.....

...since my last post. I know, right? Don't lie. Yall barely noticed.

Not too much to report. Since I (we) learned that we are expecting another little one, I have really put fishing on the back burner. Turns out, fishing costs money....and lots of it. In fact, I would venture to say that it costs between 50-100 dollars to fish Guntersville.

My last few trips to Guntersville haven't  produced much. In fact, I have probably been there 4 times since my last post and haven't caught anything worth writing about.

Add in a boat that is really showing it's age....
We rebuilt the carbs back in early December, and that was no small feat...to the tune of $200. And that didn't fix the problem. That may not be much to most fishermen, but it was to me. Especially since I knew it needed something else. I was in no hurry to spend more money, and neither was my dad. I pretty much became dependent on other fishermen to fish and it turns out that nobody really needs a back boater these days.

But then the flyer for the NATA Open came (or was posted on the internet). I sent in a check real quick, before I really thought it through. But, Josh had told me he would be down. We agreed that we needed to prefish it pretty heavily. So, starting last weekend (13th) we (Josh, Bertus, and I) decided that we would fish out of Goosepond. We had consulted the map and highlighted areas that we thought would be good. Obviously, there were some community holes in the mix, so we decided to fish those just to see what would happen.

It was windy and cold. Water was stained. Probably the worst combination for fishing, but all of us were itching to fish, especially since Josh finally had his boat back together from a failed Motorguide trolling motor.

Fishing a submerged rock pile, I had a bite on a Strike King 6XD on the first or second cast. The fish loaded up but popped off. Good sign! Maybe we would wear them out. Next cast, pumped the rock pile, snagged another.

A moment of hope was dashed pretty quick. Having caught enough drum in my life, I knew within 5-10 seconds what I was dealing with.

Sadly, that was the only real bite we had, aside from a nice fish Bertus caught late in the day.

However, it was the first time I had been on the water in a month, and it was with two of my best friends. To be honest, I barely noticed that we didn't catch anything. In fact, I think we had more fun braving the waves than we did fishing.

Not exactly a great data point for prefishing....but we took it in stride. This past Sunday, we gave it another try....by fishing all new spots from Waterfront to goosepond. We had very high hopes. Two of the guides fished together the day before and posted on the bass fishing homepage:
http://www.wmi.org/bassfish/reports/alabama/index.html

They reported that they had just wore them out. The day seemed to be prefect. But, we quickly found out we were in for a long day.

A little aside here....the water was pretty congested, so we saw a lot of boats. It's real easy to tell what they are throwing too....the Ole (or new?) A-ring. Yep. EVERYONE was throwing it. I just kind of laugh at it. I have seen 1 fish caught on it, personally. I am sure it works...just not while I am in the boat.

Sorry about that....I admit. I went out and bought one...so who am I to laugh. I can't even throw it.....

So, if you do have a report on it...please...comment and let me know!

Ok...back to the last trip. It started out slow, but it was absolutely gorgeous and the company wasn't too bad. For those that read just for the fishing report, you can go ahead and quit reading, cause we only caught 4 bass.

For those that read for the story, we moved around a good bit, trying a little of this and a little of that. We got in the very back of Preston Island and noticed that there was a TON of bait. Bertus snagged a fish on an XR75

NO, it wasn't a bass. But it was a HECK of a crappie!

I backed that up with catching two fish at the same time....too bad they were minnows.

The next place we ran was to one of my secret spots (as in, I don't see others fishing it, so it MUST be secret!) We fished it for 30 minutes and caught 3 keepers. I caught two of them on an Xcalibur square bill

Well, that pretty much wraps that up! Slow year so far. I plan on prefishing at least 3 more times before the NATA Open.
http://natabass.com/NATA%20FEBRUARY%20OPEN%202012.pdf