Buck Down!

Very rarely does it happen where a plan comes together and works just right. Well, on November 11th of last week everything clicked and I was able to take down my first Iowa Buck! He came in chasing a doe, made a scrape, and moved into my shooting lane at 25 yards. I hit him well and he only went about 60 yards. The hard work and hours of sweating in the late summer to set up the stand definitely paid off!

He isn't the biggest buck, but I couldn't pass up the droptine. It was also taken on public land which made it that much sweeter. You can shoot decent bucks on public ground, just might have to move away from the pressure and do something others aren't willing to do :)

I'm heading back to Minnesota this weekend to bow and gun hunt up there up until Thanksgiving. I'll keep updates coming if I have any luck up there.

Here is a picture of mine and my buddies that he shot 2 days after I shot mine, it was an awesome week!

A year in review, recent happenings, and future plans....

The colder weather is beginning to set in and in a month or so our lakes in the upper Midwest will be covered with a large sheet of ice... awesome. I will be hanging up the rods for year now that my tournament season is over and bow hunting season is now in full swing. First, an update on how some of my recent fall tournaments went.

On October 11th we had our annual Big Ten tournament on on Lake St. Clair in Michigan. What a massive lake! It was definitely overwhelming to begin with but we ended up finding some fish in the end. The hard part about this tournament is that I brought my own boat to use while most other Big Ten schools had volunteer boaters for practice and tournament day. The volunteer boaters (locals) were able to help out the college anglers in practice while we were left on our own with no help whatsoever. Basically whatever we found in practice, all the locals knew about these spots. In hindsight I would have left my boat at home and gone with a volunteer boater, but that's just how it goes sometimes. Here is a smallie from practice, you can see how big the lake is in the background!

In the end my boat caught 13lbs for 3 fish and as a school we had 19lbs and took 6th place out of 8 boats. Here is a picture of a 4+lb and 5+lb smallmouth that I caught during the tournament day. We were on quality, just couldn't get the quantity.

On October 30th-November 1st my buddy Tyler and I fished in the FLW College Central Division Regional Tournament that we qualified for. It was held on the famous Kentucky Lake. In practice we found the topwater and rattle trap bite to be very good in the backs of the creeks where ever bass we busting and chasing shad. On day one we caught 25-30 fish, but only two that went over 15 inches. We caught all these fish on spooks and red eye shads. We were left in 16th place out of 20 boats and decided on day 2 to run all new water that neither Tyler or I had ever seen in our lives. We ended up getting onto some better fish in the northern part of the lake on rip rap transition areas. We didn't catch as many fish, but we had three keepers for 7lbs 8oz which moved us up to 10th place in the tournament. I was happy with how we were able to scrap everything and make our day fairly productive. If we had only 4 more pounds we would have cracked the top 5 and made it to nationals... so close, yet so far. I can't say enough about FLW outdoors and the National Guard for these awesome college events that they have put together this year. I had an absolute blast fishing these events and will definitely be back next year. Oh yeah, they also gave us Z520 Rangers to use for the event, how sweet is that!? Here are some pictures of the boat, a 4lb practice fish and some of the tournament fish from day 2....

When I look back at the year I had it's definitely had its ups and downs, I've had a blast through it all though. In the end it's just fishing and you can't beat that! I feel like I have gained a great amount of experience in terms of fishing other larger bodies of water throughout the nation because of the college tournaments that I have had the opportunity to fish during the season. The fact that most of the college events are non-entry fee tournaments makes it that much better. I have been able to fish some great bodies of water this year including Lake Dardanelle, AR; Lake Lewisville, TX; Brookville Lake, IN; Arkansas River, AR; Pool 19 Mississippi River, IA; Lake St Clair, MI; Lake of the Ozarks, MO; and Kentucky Lake, KY. I basically got a crash course of what it would be like to be on the tour as a pro. It's a grueling lifestyle, but it's something that I would like to try and pursue after college is done. Once again, I can't say enough about how well run the college events are. It gives us as students the experience we will eventually need down the road if we have aspirations of becoming a pro someday.

I have already began planning for next year and have a few ideas of which tournaments I would like to fish. I know for sure that I am going to be fishing some more of the college events in the spring of the year and possible a couple in the summer. I will also be fishing with my bass club, Lakes Area Bassmasters, throughout the summer. In terms of larger events my goal is to fish some of the ABA events again, and if I can come up with the finances I would like to try my hand at the MN/WI Bassmaster Weekend Series. I like the looks of that schedule and its something that I have my sights set on if things fall into place.

Well, the deer are running like crazy in the woods right now. The rut is in full swing and I've passed on a couple opportunities to take some smaller bucks and does this past week. I'll be hunting hard for the next week or so to see if I can't put a big buck down. So stay tuned.

Finally, I'd like to thank everyone who takes the time to sit down and read these posts every so often. I enjoy sharing my trials and tribulations that make up a season of tournament fishing and it also helps me to really study and learn things from each event that I fish when I can go back and re-read my old posts. Thanks again and have a good rest of the fall and winter; spring can't come soon enough!

Quick Update - It's been awhile!

It has been awhile since my last post, with school starting up I've been a little bit more consumed in my studies rather than being on the water. However, even though the air temps are beginning to drop, my college tournament schedule is beginning to heat up again. I've got a full schedule of tournaments up until the first weekend in November and hope to write a little bit about each one. Here is an update of what has occured in the last month and what will take place in the month ahead.

During the last week of my summer, 3 of my college roommates flew up from Chicago to spend a couple days up north at my cabin. To say the least we had an absolute blast! They had some fishing experience before they got up there, but not a whole lot in terms of fishing "the way we do". It was really fun putting them on some fish, it was a trip I will soon not forget!

In late August I fished my first FLW college event on the Mississippi River out of Fort Madison, Iowa the weekend before school started. My tournament partner practiced for the event a couple weeks before the event and fared well. However, if you have ever fished rivers you know how fast they can change, and change it did. We didn't make the right adjustments and ended up with a big goose egg for the tournament. The fact that 21 other boats out of 40 zeroed as well made me feel a little better, but not a whole lot better,.

If you read my last post about Big Marine you know that my motor wasn't working after that event. Well, it ended up being that my starter went out on me. Thankfully I have an awesome Dad and he was able to replace it and install a new one himself! So, last weekend I went home to get my boat and do some fishing back in Minnesota. Friday the 25th was pretty good fishing on a south metro lake. My best 5 would have been 16+ mainly caught on jigs and frogs. On Saturday I went to visit my buddy in Winona. We spent the day fishing down there on the Mississippi River on Pool 5a. We fared alright, but it was a little slower than normal; swim jigs proved to be best that day.

This past weekend I fished in my second FLW college tournament down in Missouri on Lake of the Ozarks. This time we fared much better than the first tournament. Me and my teammate, Tyler, ended up using All Terrain finesse jigs, t-rigged baby paca craws, spro dawgs, and shakey heads to catch 5 keeper fish for 9lb 5oz. It proved well enough for a 5th place finish out of 40 boats and $1000 cash for the bass club here at the University of Iowa! Also, if you finish in the top 5 in any of the FLW college tournaments you qualify for the regional tournament. Therefore, we will be competing against 19 other regional qualifiers for a top prize of $50,000 on Kentucky Lake from Oct. 31st - Nov. 2nd. To say the least, I am absolutely jacked to fish this event!! I cannot wait! A big thanks goes out to Chuck Campbell for helping us get started on fishing Lake Oz! To follow these college tournaments, you can check it out at www.collegefishing.com

Coming up this weekend from Oct. 8th - Oct. 11th is our annual Big Ten Championship. This year it is going to be moved to the fall season and will be held on Lake St. Clair in Michigan. Both smallmouth and largemouth could come into play during the event. Whether or not the wind blows on this massive lake is really going to determine which species we will target.

So as you can see, I've been a little busy this past month and it won't slow down too soon. However, I wouldn't want it any other way. Be sure to check in frequently this fall on updates from the Big Ten Event and the FLW Central Regional tournament that will take place here at the end of the month. Also, I just purchased a new bow recently and am really looking forward to getting in the woods down here in Iowa once these tournaments are over and November rolls around. I may be giving some updates from my experiences in the woods so stay tuned!!

Club Tournament - Big Marine

My club tournament on Big Marine Lake a couple weeks ago was definitely one to remember and not necessarily because of the fishing. I would describe it as a crazy, frustrating, scary, yet still rewarding tournament. I didn’t pre-fish for the tournament since I helped my buddy move into his college house down in Winona the weekend before. We may have also taken a cast or two into the Mighty Mississip while we were down there… fishing wasn’t too stellar though.

In past years I have had decent success on Big Marine and figured that I would just fish this one by the seat of my pants. I got to my first spot pitching a jig into reeds and cattails. It took about 15 minutes to get the first fish in the well, but it was a peanut. About five minutes later some major storms were on the horizon; in no time they had cleared the horizon and were right overhead. It started pouring rain and a bolt of lightning struck what looked to be the lake about 500 yards away, only problem was that I couldn’t get my big motor started! Other club guys were able to make it back to the launch, but I was stuck. Lightning continued to strike overhead and by this time I was a bit freaked out to say the least. With no big motor I crawled up onto the front deck on my stomach, put the TM on high and pushed the power button with my hand leading me into a mess of cattails. I figured it was the closest and safest place until the lightning passed. I laid on the bottom of my boat for about 45 minutes until the lightning started to disappear. As I laid there with my head under the console of my boat I couldn’t help but laugh and think to myself, “man, what a way to spend a Saturday morning!”

After the first storm passed I was a little shaken and un focused, but was able to get back to fishing. After a little while more in the cattails with no success I moved to a deep weedline that has been good to me in the past (finally got the big motor started). I caught one keeper right away on a jigworm, another swimmer though. I continued down the weedline catching a small fish here, small fish there. This weedline usually has held better fish in the past and no longer did that day. Before I got to the end of the spot another storm full of lightning was approaching. I got off the lake in a hurry this time and watched it from the bank before a nice guy named Dan let me come in his house to wait it out. Lightning once again came crashing down for a good 30-45 minutes. So there I sat, watching the weather channel, with Dan. Dan was a good guy, we had a lot in common which made for good conversation. After this storm let up I returned to my weedline with no success. The clouds cleared and now it was getting hot and really windy (what a goofy day weather wise).

With my weedline not producing I moved to a point close to the island. It was tough getting the motor started, but eventually it fired. With no success on the point I was going to move to the south end of the lake to get out of the wind. Well, this time my motor didn’t start. Two lightning delays, only two dinks in the box, and now a motor that wouldn’t start… I was a little frustrated. What happened is I ended up running down my cranking battery therefore ruining my chances of starting the big motor. In hindsight, it was probably a godsend that I didn’t get it started because my plan was to run to the south end of the lake, opposite of the launch ramp. If I had done that and then had the motor not start on me I would have really had a problem getting back to the launch. Thankfully I was only about a 2.5 hour trolling motor ride away from the launch and would be able to fish my way back. With the wind behind me and my trolling motor on high I just took out a big crankbait and fished my way back. The best part about it was that I was able to put a limit in the livewell on the crankbait and even cull a couple times! They were still all small, but it made me feel a little better. I hardly ever fish cranks and it gave me some much needed confidence in them.

With our weigh-in sight being at a different location than the launch ramp I needed to call our tournament director to let him know I wouldn’t be at the weigh-in. However, with all the rain we got in the morning, my phone got wet while in my pocket and wouldn’t work! I couldn’t dial out, but I could receive calls. Knowing there was no way I could get to the weigh-in with my predicament I just weighed my fish in a bag with a hand scale. My total came to a whopping 6lbs 2oz!

As I was driving home a club member gave me call to see where I was. Told him what had happened and also told him what I had caught. To my surprise they counted my weight and even more surprising, I came in 3rd place!?!? I was very surprised. It was a tough fishing day with powerful storms in and out of the area all day, but I didn’t expect it to be that tough.

So in the end it all ended up working out just fine and I was able to gain some confidence in another technique. I’ve come to the conclusion that sometimes it’s just not your day and when it rains, it pours…

Chisago/S. Lindstrom and Coon Lake Tourneys

This past weekend I had back-to-back tournaments on Saturday and Sunday. One good thing is that both tournaments were fairly close together; one on Chisago/S. Lindstrom and the other on Coon Lake. I was able to spend the night in the forest lake area in between tournaments which gave me a little extra time in bed before waking up on Sunday. I was able to also get out on Coon one last time the evening before the event after I had my club tourney on Chisago.

The club tournament on Chisago didn’t go nearly as well as my practice went one week earlier. On the Saturday before the tournament I had a total of 87 inches and fell much shorter than that on tournament day with a total of 75 inches. I was able to catch a lot of fish, probably close to 25, but any fish over 16” didn’t want any part of being in my boat. I fished deep the first 2 hours of the day and had one 14” fish to show for it. I resorted to moving shallow the rest of the day in about 3-5 ft of water. I caught 70% of my fish on an All Terrain swim jig just burning it over the top of milfoil patches on windy banks and also caught some other fish on an Argon jointed crankbait in a bluegill color and a t-rigged beaver. I took 7th for the day and was a little unhappy to say the least. I just couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong in terms of getting a bigger bite. Some of the guys who finished higher were fishing docks and buzzbaits around milfoil. It sounded like I was fishing the same type of stuff that the top guys were fishing, but just didn’t find bigger fish like the week before. I’ve come to the conclusion that when it’s not your time, it’s just not you time. My justification was that I was just saving my big bites for the ABA on Sunday.

After my club tournament I went straight to Coon Lake to practice for a couple more hours. I found one deep spot right away that I thought had great potential. I was pretty pumped when I found that spot because practice the week before had been real spotty and inconsistent.

One tournament morning I drew boat 15 out of 25; not great, but not terrible. My plan for the day was to start on the deep spot I found the day before and then go from there. Well… I got to my deep spot first thing in the morning to find two other boats right on it. I stuck around and casted around the sweet spot for about 20 minutes, I couldn’t get to where I needed to be without crowding the other boats. I decided that I needed to make a move. I needed to get away from that spot and go to my shallow water and fish my strengths.

I went into the canal between the two lakes and picked up a small fish in the pads on an AT jig. A small start, but a start nonetheless. From there I went to my matted milfoil bank only to find two other boats also on it. My initial thoughts were “man… not again!” I pulled in behind the guys and tried my best to pick up the sloppy thirds. My better mat was at the opposite end of the bank that I started on, but I didn’t pull in there because the other boats were moving towards it. To my surprise, after the boats got past the docks with matted milfoil, they just ignored the milfoil out past the docks about 200 yards; my better area.

Once they moved through the area I went to my better mat and stuck a solid 3.5lb fish right off the bat. In practice I caught one fish off this spot and had another bite, then moved on, not really knowing what was completely there. I pitched in there again and once my AT jig hit the bottom another good one sucked it up, a 4lb+ fish. The mat that I had found had deeper water in one spot, a drop from 3 to 5 or 6ft, and the bigger fish were loaded in there. The deeper area was only about as big as two boats sitting next to each other gunnel to gunnel. I sat on that spot for 4 hours and culled my way to a goo limit, left it for 1.5 hours to see if I could get a kicker, then came back and picked up two more 3lb+ fish in the last 1.5 hours. The big fish were just concentrated in the area, which made for quite a fun day. I basically just sat my boat in one spot and as long as you didn’t disturb the milfoil you would get a bite every so often. It was like fishing an offshore spot where you consistently get bites throughout the day, except this was a spot in shallow water.

I ended up with 17.90lbs and took 4th place for the day. This tournament on Coon was different and a little more satisfying than past years when I could run to my old faithful shallow pads and cattails. With the water being down quite a bit I had to re-learn the entire lake this year. It felt good to have “fished the moment” and to find new areas that were holding fish which led to another good finish on Coon. Not sure why I seem to do well on that lake, but I really like it! First place had 22lbs and a 6lb+ fish doing the same thing that other top finishers and I were doing. 22lbs!! Talk about fun…

Under Armour College Bass National Championship - AR River - Little Rock

On July 5th I left my cabin up north in northern Minnesota and drove 7 hours to Iowa to pick up Tyler for the Under Armour College Bass National Championship. We left for the Arkansas River at Little Rock on the morning of the 6th and 10.5 hours later we finally arrived. We made a quick stop into an awesome tackle shop called “fish N stuff” owned by Vince Miller. It’s probably the best small tackle shop I’ve ever been to, they had everything! Not to mention the fact that Vince was letting us borrow his boat for the week of the tournament, what a guy! It was awesome not having to worry about towing a boat down to the tournament.

As one can imagine, it is much easier writing about a good finish in a tournament than a bad one, so I’m going to keep this one kinda short and sweet…foreshadowing? You betcha.

The first evening we got down there we put the boat in and took a quick stroll down the river to the areas that Tyler fished when they took 4th two years ago on the same pools. Pools 5, 6, & 7 were the tournament waters. After seeing similar grass still in the areas, we felt confident going into practice. First day we went north of little rock, and the 2nd and 3rd day we went south. We stayed in the Little Rock pools all three days of practice, found some stuff, but it would be a grind.

We faced 95-100 degree days without much wind all 5 days we were down there with water temps anywhere from 85-92 degrees. It was steamy... Complaining? Yes and No. That’s just AR in mid-summer, and it resulted in the most difficult fishing conditions I’ve ever fished in; ever… It was a grind everyday, but everyone had to face the same conditions.

The most difficult thing that I found about that river is that it was hard to run a solid pattern that produces bigger fish. You could go down the bank and pitch wood and grass all day long and catch fish, but they had to be 15 inches to keep, which was a back breaker for us. The river was full of grass and wood, but you had to put your trolling motor on high and cover a bunch of water in practice hoping to fall upon better fish. Its kind of like fishing milfoil clumps and mats back home in Minnesota, you can go a long time without a bite and then happen upon a pack of fish, why they are grouped up their? Who knows. Unless to came across said pack of fish, you were hurting (at least we were).

We tried the same weed clumps where Tyler did well two years ago and came up empty handed for keepers. We ended up catching 16 fish on day one with none over 15 inches and had less bites on day 2 with the same results. Teams that did well found small sweet spots in the backwaters and a couple teams found fish along the many rock and wood jetties on the main river.

If I were to fish the tournament all over again I would do a couple things different. We went into the event thinking it was going to be tough, so we didn’t set the hook on anything, unless we couldn’t help it with moving baits. I would set the hook until we caught a keeper fish. We stayed in the Little Rock pool the whole time; I would lock through next time. Not sure if those things would have made a difference, but who knows.

It was a long week in Arkansas, but if I can fish it again next year, I probably will. Even though the fishing was tough, these events are always fun in terms of the many perks the college anglers receive. We had a cool Q & A session with Scott Rook, Kevin Short, Mike McClelland, and James Niggmeyer. Also got to talk with k-pink a little bit about his win in the mighty mississip, which was very cool. Our banquet was in the “fish factory” where they film “The Bassmasters” TV show for the elite series, also very cool.

As you can possibly imagine, I was eager to get back to Minnesota and catch some fish. I’ve been out quite a bit since I’ve been back, fishing lakes such as orchard, chisago, and coon. I’ve got a clubber on chisago this Saturday and an ABA on Coon on Sunday. Coon has been very good to me in the past, but practice wasn’t to stellar, water is down quite a bit and has left my better areas too shallow, we’ll see how it goes, I’ll be sure to give reports. Until then, may your line be tight!

ABA - North South Center - June 28th

This past weekend I fished my first money tournament as a boater in an ABA event on North South Center. I was able to practice on Friday afternoon after work for a half day and found some fish that left me feeling somewhat confident for the tournaments. I wasn’t getting a lot of bites, but the ones I did get were better fish. Looking at past results from other ABA tournament on North South Center it looked like it usually took 11-13 pounds to either win or finish in the money. I thought if I worked at it I would have the potential of catching that weight.

In practice I was catching post-spawn/early summertime fish anywhere from 3-12ft of water. The area needed to have either rock or weeds to hold fish. Some fish were up shallow under matted weeds that had been uprooted while others were offshore or on steep sloping banks. As some may know, our lakes here in the metro part of the state are under a drought . The boat launch at North Center was ridiculously shallow which made for quite a sight during the launching and loading for our tournament. Someone should have had a video camera… some good footage to be had. Definitely a lack of water in that lake.

We launched at 7:00am on tournament day under bluebird skies with a decent amount of wind already churning up the lake. I drew boat 13 and took off towards the north end of the lake. On about my third pitch to a deeper weedline I stuck my first keeper of the day on a blk/blue t-rigged tube. Next pitch, same thing, another good one. This was a decent surprise, didn’t even have a sniff on this weedline in practice. I moved down the bank to a spot where I caught a good one in practice and put two more in the boat; one good one and one swimmer. I worked my way back to my starting weedline and put another good fish in the boat. I had my limit by 8:00am and had about 11 pounds in the boat; not great for most lakes, but for NSC I felt good about it. All these fish came on the blk/blue t-rig tube. At this point I felt that if I could get a 4lb bite and maybe one more solid fish I would have a chance at the money.

After I caught that quick limit I proceeded to run around the lake for about 3 hours with only smaller keepers to show for it. In practice I had fished a long, deeper point in NC that came way out into the lake, hooked up on my first two casts, and left. At the beginning of the tournament there was about 4 boats on the spot already so I decided not to fish it right away. After running around the lake catching a bunch of runts I decided to finally fish it. There were still 4 boats on it when I pulled up, but it’s long enough that many boats can fish it and have their own space. On about my third cast with my all terrain finesse jig I hooked up with a good fish. I was able to cull out the small one from the morning and now had at least 12lbs. This point was loaded with fish. You could literally watch other guys on the point catch fish after fish. Once you got the school fired up they really bit. However, I wasn’t able to get many over that 2.5lb mark. I was forced to fish the shallow part of the point with the other boats out on the deeper end.

After my trolling motor batteries just about died from trying to stay on the windy point I had to move off it and go try my other starting spot. I didn’t get another bite there and had to end the day with what I had. After pulling up to the weigh-in I found out that the guys that were deeper on the points really caught them good… 19lbs good. Wow, I was a little disheartened after hearing that and soon found out that I probably didn’t have enough to be in the money. I weighed in with 12.94lbs, which on any other year at NSC would have been a money finish. However, the fish bit pretty good that day and many guys brought in 14-15lb bags. I think the fact that we had some really warm weather the week prior to the tournament finally got the fish schooled up on deeper summertime spots. It looked like most of the fish out deep had just got out there (empty bellies). You couple that with a lake that hasn’t got fished much this year because of low water and its going to kick out better than normal weights. The standings have yet to come out, but I think I’ll finish in at least the top 10 out of 26 guys so I can’t complain too much.

After having time to think about this one, I definitely have learned a lot:

#1: never be satisfied with what you have. I didn’t feel like I had the fish to win, but with past results I thought I would be in the money.
#2: start on your best spots and stay there. I should have started on that point and fished it all day long. Those deep fish seem to turn on at random times and you need to be there when they do.
#3: I have a lot to learn. I realized that I had a lot to learn before the event started (if you know everything about bass you’d be a millionaire), but now I realize that I have a LOT more to learn, primarily about fishing deep water.

These guys are good and I’ll have to step up my ‘game’ if I want to try and contend with them. I’m glad I fished the event and will hopefully be back for more!

Be sure to stay tuned. I’m heading down to Little Rock, Arkansas on Monday to fish the Under Armour National Collegiate Bass Championship on the Arkansas River. This is another one of our National Championships for college fishing. My partner took a top five on the same pools were fishing two years ago and so I feel a little confident going into the event. It will probably be a very tough bite, basically like every other lake they put us on for college events, so I’ll try to stay “cautiously” confident. As we all have experienced, this sport sure can humble a fella pretty good.