My Holiday on Round Lake 7-3-2017

[djkimmel]

Having only fished 1 day in the last 11!, and being 5 days since the short day on St. Clair breaking in cameraguy's new boat, I just couldn't take it anymore! Though I knew better - the weather looked hot but dry and calm for the Monday before the 4th so even knowing a lot of people might have the day off, and things have been more than a little different on the 'big' lake of Round I had to go!!

I did one smart thing in getting out super early, just before the crack of dawn. Wish I had gotten out there even earlier but I did have a couple hours of moderately quiet time though I was not alone for long - maybe 15 minutes - before the next angler launched a small boat. And shortly after, anglers just started trickling in until by maybe 7:30am there were already 5 or 6 angler boats out there.

I started with topwater though I can't remember now exactly what I did with what lure/technique...? I do believe I avoided casting inside or right over the thick weed edge I often start on because I didn't want to fight with big doggies first thing in the morning. I was seeing the typical small fish surface activity and some definite dogfish sign! Mostly doggies inside the weeds, or right over them but as usual some doggies were outside the weeds and even over fairly deep water. I usually don't catch those ones for some reason. Which is fine.

I do remember I switched from topwater within the first hour because I have pictorial proof... my day started out not the way I want it to start!!! 


Yup... for some reason I picked up the 'Pike Killer' and threw it along the outside milfoil edge where there's still some green, healthy weeds. I must have been seeing what looked like at least smaller bass chasing panfish and minnows just outside the weed edge so appearing to be hanging or moving fairly shallow and looking up, but not really going after my topwater choices. So this BIG gator is the result... I do remember it was the first few casts with the 'Pike Killer' that got hammered!! Maybe the 1st cast??

Boy! Do they love the green gizzard shad KVD 2.5 shallow square bill ripping through the tops of the milfoil with its erratic, wandering hard wobble and slight rattle. If it wasn't for so many bass liking the crankbait too I would just stop throwing it altogether!! I do know that this section of weedline is generally not as infused with pikeness as many other weedlines and structures in Round Lake.

But the sheer magnetic appeal of the fat Strike King crankbait is just too much of a draw for the pike I guess... I was throwing it on 20 pound Fluoro so the line didn't get too mangled. I think I retied anyway just to save a lure. I also believe I didn't make many more casts before I put it away again. I know I caught another darn pike but not sure if I caught it on the crank or something else now?

I do know that I finished the day with 2 more clean bite offs of expensive Tungsten sinkers by pike. Not braid this time but 15 pound test Fluorocarbon on one and 20 pound test on the either - cut clean as a hot knife through butter on the crushing ambush strike!! More on this one later... but I do mention now that I keep wondering how do they know when I'm using lead verses Tungsten?!? The 1st bite off was not even a shiny bullet sinker but a dark soft text Tungsten hybrid sinker?? Oh well, some things probably remain a mystery...

Again, I don't remember some of the day especially outside of my pictures and notes from the day on Facebook. I believe I delayed all of my social (Instagram @greatlakesbass, Twitter @GreatLakesBass, and Facebook my personal profile) posts until late that evening so I left out probably more details I may not ever remember now.

So, from my picture notes and what I can remember I apparently missed 3 keeper sized bass though I don't recall exactly what on now? May have been topwater in the morning, or maybe a mix of some wacky rig/Texas rig later in the day too? I landed the two pike, probably got away from some other pike which is pretty typical especially for this year, and caught a few dinks.

Sidebar: Supposedly, bigger pike are supposed to be HARDER to catch as summer progresses and gets hotter yet especially this year MY pike on Round Lake are getting BIGGER as the summer progresses!?! What's up with that?!?

I know I visited my 2nd hot spot weed line from the last trip later in the morning probably after fishing the couple points first. I think I had bites there but didn't land any keepers?? I also know that by mid-morning the 'locals' were already out tearing the lake up pretty good so it was getting complicated to fish a lot of spots with any safety and enjoyment... holidays just bring out the 'best' in some people...!?!

I do remember after that spot I decided to just work my way back up what was left of the breakline milfoil mats to give it another chance now into real summer, and because it wasn't getting torn up quite as much as most of the rest of the lake though they were crossing it fairly often to come in and out from their various home bases. You needed eyes in the back of your head this day for sure!!

The milfoil is definitely dying off steadily now. Hardly any real matted on the surface stuff anymore - mostly just in one small stretch now, but some of the long patches on the break are still fairly thick with some green down a few feet. Just shallow enough that you can pick out some of the holes and thicker clumps.


I've caught a bunch of bass dunking in the milfoil at Round this year with a 1 ounce Tungsten flipping sinker pegged on 65 pound test P-Line braid with a big Trokar flipping hook (4/0 but nice wide round bend!) attached to the line with a snell knot and baited with a 4" Power Chigger Craw (Crazy legs variety - green pumpkin candy mostly). I pretty quickly caught another 12 incher - the milfoil seems to be the home of 12 inchers on Round!! Of course, I saw a couple big doggies in the holes. I avoided them again - still not that desperate! Then, I pitched to a week point trailing out into the deeper water barely visible. Lifted up to more weight than there should be and finally hooked this really nice bass!! Felt great! Ripped out of the weeds towards deeper water and I flipped it shortly into the boat...

ONLY the 2nd keeper I've caught this year on Round dunking into the thick milfoil?? Don't know if I'm just not doing something right to be attractive to bigger bass in there, or if the bigger bass just don't find the feeding great in there... or maybe the big doggies are just not good company for them?!?

Took me awhile but I'm on the board now, and maybe I'm on to something?!? Not... I never had another bass bite and finally got tired of the wear and tear of dunking the heavy lumber... I still can't believe this approach isn't more productive for better bass like it is on many other lakes?? I'll keep taste-testing it, though as I've recently mentioned - the milfoil is thinning out quite a bite. No more real topped out mats anymore and some of the beds are getting really hard to see with the dark water of the lake and how stirred up it is getting so often by the relatively heavy boat traffic of 2017.

I tried a number of things for several hours, even sticking my neck out a ways at times more into the risky open water. It's hard to describe how crazy it is watching a bunch of jet skis, a jet boat full on shirtless younguns and various tuna boat, speed boats and many pontoons stirring the lake practically into foam while many just go around counter-clockwise (of course) in small 80 acre circles time after time after time, often while yelling something like 'whooo hoo' as they go noisily (and sometimes too close) by... by late afternoon the water was actually cloudy and there were small chunks of various floating swamp goo uniformly, though sparsely covering the entire surface of the lake!! Nuts...

Overall, most of them stayed more than 100 feet away but they really churned up some of the spots I would like to fish. There was the one tuna boat that plowed instead of planed a couple times really rocking me around with almost 2 foot waves!! There was guy in the old speed boat who I've seen already in the past isn't too bright who almost t-boned me while I was trying to head closer to shore as fast as my 30 pound thrust Minn Kota will carry me - I was passing between 2 sitting boats (probably reloading tubes and surf boards they were towing around and around the lake) and he decided he needed to run between them on plane! Unfortunately, I was filling that space at the time!?! EEEEeeeekkkk... he finally swerved less than 100 feet from to run close behind me squeezing between me and one of the sitting pontoons. They didn't mind but I sure did. I wonder if he reads lips...??

He didn't come that close again most of the afternoon though he remained one of the worst while he was out. The worst probably were my apparently foreign 'locals' (I say foreign because I spoke loud, clear English to them several times and they mostly stared at me confused though after about an hour they stopped coming super close) in an old beat up blue-white pontoon. They were trying to tow about 50 small screaming kids on some kind of surf board looking thing. Though they were actually going fairly slow (by standards of others out that day) most of the towees fell off fairly quick and often so they mostly went in lots of small circles.

While doing this they repeatedly drove over the spots I was trying to cast too and generally just used my little rowboat as a turning buoy... apparently clueless to fishing and all it entails. It was well over an hour before my profusion of words finally appeared to have some effect, though it may have been coincidence too considering how often almost everyone fell off the board so they rarely went very far for fairly long... I've had my eye on them since and when they come out they have been staying a little further away since. Maybe just because, or maybe they've figured something out? I know on this day they several times turned so close to me I could have tossed some of my gear into their old creaky pontoon underhand... one more mention of them later.

I have so many fond memories of the 'strange things local boaters do' from this day and frankly, considering how ridiculously many floating crafts were out on such a tiny round lake this day it could have been a lot worse if more of them had been as dump, or just plain mean, and some boaters are on other lakes. It was mostly boating ignorance and lack of attention I saw.

But one pontoon I just couldn't figure out at all... it was another one with a load of kids on it. They were trying to cram a bunch of kids onto one or two towing implements. It would take them like 30-45 MINUTES each time to get everyone on and get going, the whole time while the alpha male was yelling 'STAY ON THE FLOAT!' over and over and over... meanwhile, a dastardly older girl continually would push all the other girls off the float almost as soon as they finally got going!?! Causing the alpha male figure to yell 'STAY ON THE FLOAT' even more times leading eventually to the other little girls yelling back that 'can't remember her name' keeps pushing us off... did alpha male make 'can't remember her name' get off the float and sit a time out...??

No, of course not. He just showed some kind of unknown before this time patience, albeit while continuing to yell 'STAY ON THE FLOAT' over and over, to reload the horde of kids on to the float finally starting off again only to have all the kids except one be knocked off the float causing the whole cycle to repeated, excruciatingly slowly all over again. And again. And again. I almost HAD to yell back take the @#%$!@ mean girl of the float for God's sake!! In the end, I decided to try to find the most quiet, least busy 'corner' of the lake instead. ...though on a holiday weekend the 'local' boaters are pretty creative in finding ways to have at least one of them stay fairly close to you no matter what...

Even though I found the 'quiet corner' finally (practically back at the boat launch) I had one pontoon tower crash land close by and for some reason it took them almost AN HOUR to get a few kids on a couple tubes they wanted to tow...?!? Now, I've never done this... but does it generally take an hour to tie a couple tubes to the boat and get the kids on it for a ride?? And what kind of... well, I don't think patience is the right word for it?!?... but what kind of whatever does it take to stand at the back of the pontoon giving the same instructions over and over to the kids... 'no, tie the rope there' 'no not that knot, the other knot' 'now get on the tube' 'no climb on' 'no, the other knot' 'tie it on there' 'no, not there' and on and on... I almost couldn't stop myself from going over there and just doing it myself!! I mean for the love of all that is holy...?? how hard can it be?!? Really!!

It was so hot this day and there were so many distractions... I was running out of ideas to pull some bass out of the hat that I truthfully admit that I blew it on a bunch of bites this day... some of them felt like they were probably good fish too! You know how some days they just seem to know right when that moment is that you've dropped you attention and whoosh, they pick up your lure and run with it!!


That's how this next keeper (finally) happened late afternoon after a long dry spell with no keepers landed - I believe I was watching the slow loading pontoon (probably with my mouth hanging open, and questioning look on my face), it was cooking hot with little wind, there was the dull roar of the many boat motors and it had been slow. Something made me turn my head back to my lure. I had cast it up close to some of the deepest lily pads on the lake in a little inside turn that also drops off steeper close to the pads. My line was now 2/3 of the way to the boat and picking up speed to head right under the boat. A combination of reeling up fast and the bass's own momentum set the hook!! Felt like a good one and it was pretty nice actually. I had switched to some old gaudy black-chartreuse Power Worms I used to use a lot in my earlier, inland largemouth formative days. This bass liked it.

A mystery to me is I faced towards the high sun with my back to the lake and took the quick picture but only 1 speeding pontoon is visible in the background...?!? I must have caught them in a cycle of loading kids on floats and being in the outer legs of their counter-clockwise circles... There really was a lot of boat traffic!! Crazy busy for a small round lake!!

To be continued...

[djkimmel]

And now... the Rest of the story...

I can't be 100% sure now if it was this day or the next day I visited Round Lake, but one of them anyway I did my good animal deed for the week! I'll assume it was this day because I was trying to get away from the crazy.

More than half of Round Lake is surrounded by mostly shallow lily pads. Frankly, I don't fish them much. Other than during the spawn, my experience has been lots of fishing for a few dink bites and once in a while a small keeper right up in them. I may fish the deepest  parts of them that stick out the farthest sometimes in the evening on my way in, but even that hasn't produced much lately.

I find after the spawn that my odds are much higher out along and off the breaks outside of the shallower flats early and late in the day. Yes, this can be a good way to fish for bass on many lakes - get right up in the shallow stuff and do some froggin' or something similar. Or docks... there are some docks on Round. I haven't fished them a ton but when I have I've only caught 1 nice keeper so far from one. Again, outside the spawn - there's lots of bass of all sizes roaming around shallow during the spawn.

I have seen a number of boats come out to Round this year, generally in the afternoon and evening, fish right along the shore, which is mostly really shallow with limited cover. I've kept my eye on them and so far I've caught way more and better bass out in the lake while watching them than I've seen them catch - mostly I've seen them catch a few dinks from the shallow, developed and partially clear stretches of shoreline with a few blow ups now and then in the undeveloped pad stretches.

Believe me, I really enjoy frogging! Just not so much when my few bites are generally dinks too small to usually get the hooks, or the occasional shy, tentative dogfish. There are a fair number of dogfish up in the pads, even some big ones. I've seen them. Sometimes I've had them attack my stuff too but I can also catch plenty of dogfish when I want out in the more open, deeper waters too, or early in the day from weeds close to the drop.

But you've got to check it. Especially when the fishing is slow, it's hot out and the holiday boat traffic is getting nuts... so I took some time to drift up into the wildest, least developed stretch of pads where I've caught a few good bass in the past. There's some big open lanes, some points, some small, floating bogs, roots, even a small amount of wood in the water in this stretch. I've also found an opening back in there that has some BIG old beds dotted in it that I intend to check next May (though I'm starting to wonder if some of them aren't dogfish beds?? - They will bed just like a bass at times.).

I didn't have my push pole but I could use an oar to try to push myself as quietly as possible into the pads. There is a stretch there that has some pretty good depth in them though again I haven't caught many from even that stretch. I wasn't in there long when I saw what appeared to be a couple bass of unknown size blow up under a couple spots in the pads. Then, I saw what appeared to be a BIG fish hump up the pads in the same little area 3 times... but, it had the definite indicators of being a dogfish not a bass. If you're around dogfish fairly often you'll know what I mean... they have fooled me a few times so I did both throw my frog around that area a bunch of times AND pitched the big flipping rig in there a number of times.

Nothing... all goes quiet. I throw the frog where I've seen the unknown sized splats. Again, nothing... Sometimes they just don't seem to want to cooperate, or even though you're trying to be stealthy, things are so close and personal in the shallow water that you put them off. I also fished the inside edge of the pads in some of the inner openings with a popper and a fluke-type lure - both presentations that have worked in there for me in the  past, occasionally for keeper bass even. Again nothing.

I could hear plenty of gills popping at bugs on the pad though so I moved along doing my next type of approach - trying to sneak up on and spot a bass sitting back there in ambush mode, distracted just enough that I can spot it and pitch something past it to catch it - slop hole sight fishing... I didn't go more than 30-40 feet before I spotted a dark, horizontal shape sitting along the edge of some pads but in the open. Darn... dogfish. The right size, but the wrong kind. Maybe 2 - 2 1/2 pounds.

It didn't appear to be aware of me or at least it wasn't worried about me. Happens all the time with dogfish. Often, if I don't do something odd to spook them, I can drift right up to them and drop something straight down on their nose upon which a high percentage of them will often engulf it right there!! This appeared to be one of those fish.

I guess I was getting to the point because at about a rod length away I lowered my flipping craw right down on its nose. Didn't even flinch. I bumped its nose - that sometimes spooks them but often causes them to reactively inhale the lure! It moved a half inch out of the way... hmmm... a little odd. So I expected this one to spook as a little breeze kicked up and pushed my rowboat right at it. I kept off the trolling motor - a sudden noise like that might spook everything with 50-100 feet! Even trying to stop myself with the oar might spook some fish - probably this doggie for sure.

I was actually thinking this fish appeared like it sit still if I slowly and steadily drifted right over top of it as long as I didn't do anything else. I was right because maybe 30 seconds later I cleared the spot it was on and it was still there in about the same spot. Now, it's maybe 18 inches deep right here - maybe 2 feet at the most, but I don't think so.

You might think maybe the doggie is actually dead but its tale fins were rhythmically undulating to hold the doggie in place as doggies often do when sitting only in rest. When the fins stop moving they are either getting ready to swim away slow to fast depending on the fish, or they are thinking they might get to eat something in a moment. Since this fish was moving its fins quite steady and fast, I started to wonder about it, even for a doggie this was a little weird in clear water this shallow??

I took my lure and dropped it to bump it on the back and then the problem revealed itself. The little dogfish kicked its tale, jerked its head up and tried to swim quickly away from me - not down into the moss or into the pads to hide, but away and back across the long, narrow opening... it didn't get more than a couple feet because it was dragging a wad of moss/sand grass bigger by 2 than itself!! I saw something flashing below its jaw from the corner of its mouth and a line trailing from the big hook back to the big, heavy wad of weeds... Ah ha... someone had hooked this little doggie and it had broke them off but was now trailing something that was hooking a growing anchor of weeds.

The poor doggie couldn't move more than 1 to 2 feet at a time no matter how hard it tried, and each time I paddled back into the breeze towards it, it would give a mighty kick shooting up to yank the weed wad off the bottom and move ahead a foot or so. I don't know how long this had been going on but the doggie seemed to still have a lot of effort left in it though it started to tire fairly soon. Dogfish are more short distance sprinters anyways than long distance runners...

Despite major effort is only moved about 10 feet from in our short chase. Some of its jerks and jolts didn't even move the weed wad off the bottom... it seemed to give in to its impending doom, or just got too tired to keep trying - hard to say with dogfish. Like pike, they generally don't ever completely give up so another jerk, jump or jolt can happen at anytime but doggies do often use the freeze method of 'hiding' too... the fish sunk closer to the bottom and froze.

I dipped my oar into the water a few times behind the fish but ahead of the big weed wad. About the third try I caught the line on the wooden oar and lifted it up. When I pulled it clear of the water the doggie flopped around a little at first but then gave up again. Hard to say what's going through the primitive mind of a doggie - it could be giving up to its fate, or waiting until you move close enough to try to bite you with its handful of sharp, pointy teeth!! I got my pliers on the hook and popped it out of the corner of the poor fish's mouth! Plop into the water and it slowly swam away from me across the opening kind of watching me over its 'shoulder.' Not sure if I saw a thank you in there either...

You know... some of the rigs the average angler comes up with just leave me shaking my head, and partially thinking I would like a chance to ask, "Why??" This was one of those rigs...


The work of fishing genius...?? Or an angler nightmare?? You be the judge. I'm still shaking my head in wonder, mostly because why would you put a 3/4 oz egg sinker on a rig you intended to throw up in the slop?!? Assuming this angling oddity all started up in the stuff where I found it!?!

The homemade dogfish killer (I mean, it could be someone's homemade deep pike trolling killer but it's odd enough that I can imagine one of the local anglers designing it particularly go after the lake's many dogfish - I've heard a few of the locals talk about fishing from their shore property at night to catch and remove dogfish from the lake...) is about 2 feet long from main line to the interesting attractor end. It's a fairly heavy black steel leader. Maybe you can buy some semblance of this rig somewhere?? (Where??)

But I'm thinking some love and personal tender care was put into this amazing rig because it appears they uncrimped one end. Put another crimp on the wire a third of the way down. Slid on the 2 beads with the big egg sinker between them! Recrimped the barrel swivel on the end. Then crimped on a snap and the odd Mann's double-jointed spoon to the other end of the wire, then adding the ~4/0 wide gap offset Gamakatsu (that part really gets me?!?) worm hook to the snap.

This whole conglomeration was attached to a main line of some kind of braid though it's probably only about 15, maybe 12 pound braid...?? Why would you create this big meat rig and then attach it to somewhat wimpy braid?? That part alone has me wishing I had someone to ask... The final crazy part is the braid actually broke about 3 feet about the 'rig!!'

Knowing dogfish like I do (I admit it!) I can't hardly picture this little basically baby doggie hitting this rig out over open water while it was trolled, and then being able to snap braid?!? More likely, I picture, as odd as it seems, this rig was cast up into the shallow stuff where many baby dogfish hide and the line broke because it was pretty wimpy for hooking an initially wiggly, flopping, twisting, jumping little doggie that wound itself up into a heavy wad of weeds as dogfish will do if you give them half a chance... that makes the most sense though it also begs the original question - WHY?!?

In reality, my many questions will likely go unanswered just adding this 'rig' as another of the many angling oddities I've picked up over the years of fishing right alongside the Carolina-rigged 5/8 oz black Jitterbug I snagged years ago off the bottom of the downtown Lansing Grand River... (yes, I'm not making that up!!) Or... maybe I will one day gift this rig to one of you as a big prize in a contest or event...?? Who knows...

Meanwhile, though it was just a dogfish, I did feel warmer and fuzzy inside from sparing the poor little fish from a slow, horrible, tortuous death. ...though my reward may be some day losing another popper to this same dogfish when it has grown big and gnarly, and eats my popper then burying itself deep under 100 pounds of weeds before I can pull it in... that's just as likely! Oh well... that's fishing for ya!

After I got through drying up my tears of happiness and patting myself on the back for being a good and kind human, I went back to trying to stick sharp hooks into more fish... I went a little farther along the inside opening spooking a couple more jumpy dogfish and not seeing or getting any bites from any bass so I rowed myself back through the thicker patch of pads and into open water to decide my future fate.

Would I pull up and leave a little early?? Or would I pull up my big boy pants and head back out into the crazy holidays boaters to see if any tough bass were taking advantage of the churned up lake to eat some little fish?? Despite being really hot, I did have more water, I wasn't too hungry yet and I wanted... no NEEDED... to catch another bass!!

So I headed right into the teeth of the perfect storm of water churning holiday crazed boaters! I actually went all the way across to the opposite corner of the lake hoping my new hot spot had a few more bass wanting to bite without the companion pike. Not much happened there so I turned back into the teeth of the holiday boaters and fished the trough-like depression leading to the big point. I went for broke too. I had tied on a 12 INCH black grape Power Worm that I originally bought for trips to Mexico and Florida. If I'm not going to catch bass... I'm not going to catch GIANT bass!!!

I was approaching the base of the big, shallow point in probably only about 4 feet of water just pitching the big worm rig with a sharp, expensive 6/0 Gamakatsu worm hook, a more expensive 3/8 oz shiny Tungsten sinker and a brass knot protector on 20 pound P-Line Halo just maybe 10 feet ahead of the boat to little weed patches, holes, lanes, whatever looked a little different... when I felt the familiar hard, sharp fast thump I know all too well. By the time I even started to lift up on the rod my whole expensive rig and 12 inch Power Worm was completely gone?!?!?! @#$%@#$^&%@% pike!! The water was so churned up and colored now, and just deep enough I saw nothing... for all I know it wasn't even a big pike... just a hammer handle the nailed the nice, shiny bullet sinker... or, knowing how odd fish can be at times, especially on darkwater Round Lake, maybe it was a big gator sitting right on the bottom?!? All I know is that I was out about $5 in one snap, and had to sit down in a vulnerable position to retie the whole rig... which I stubbornly did.

But with a change... I remembered a while back, being very tired of frequent bite offs on some lakes in particular, I had bought some fine, braided Tyger nylon-coated steel leader in 15 pound (pretty thin) and 30 pound (not to much thicker than 30 pound braid. They advertise it as tieable. It was about time I put the stuff to good use! I used a lower number of wraps in a Crazy Alberto knot to attach a 20 inch leader of steel leader to my 20 pound Fluorocarbon, and used a 3-wrap (they actually recommend only 2) double loop Trilene knot to attach another big 6/0 hook after pegging another 3/8 oz Tungsten sinker and knot protecting brass knocker below. I put on another big snaky 12 inch black grape Power Worm and went back to pitching it off the good side of the big point fishing all the way out to the tip.

The 'locals' overall stopped tearing up the point running either past the end on the other side of the lake or along the shore at the base of it (other than my wonderful blue-white pontoon for Eastern Europeans - that how I see them anyway...) who hadn't gotten the message at that point yet... they were towing their kiddies back and forth over the shallow top of the point behind me...


I perked up more than a little when I tossed the giant worm straight off the tip into 9-11 foot and felt that familiar mush with a little extra weight. At the same time I checked the blue-white pontoon to be sure they wouldn't t-bone me, I did an awesome Bassmaster hookset and the 7' MH Grandt C10 rod doubled over with a more than pleasing feeling of solid resistance... BIG 'UN!!! YES!!! The big ole bass - my best of the day easily - came half out of the water with a big mouth, gill-rattling jump - the kind that is permanently etched in your memories of the good moments - trailing the big snake of a worm out its maw!! I fought it for a couple minutes in to the boat and my hand for the picture. I momentarily forgot everything else and basked in the glory that is bass fishing!!

Without really thinking about it I automatically dropped the anchor tying it off quickly so I could land the bass and be right in the exact spot to make a follow up cast minutes later when I finished with my picture, released the big girl and straightened out the big 12 inch worm that I've suddenly grown very fond of!! My revelry was broken about that time as I looked up to see the puttering blue-white pontoon drive right over the spot I just caught the big bass from all while one of them questioningly waved to me... sheesh... some people... I 'waved' too... that was the last time they came that close to me... I might have said some things too as I 'waved' (not the finger... Mom would be sad but something that might be considering Italian sign language I guess... maybe they're Italian?!?).

Anyway, can't change stupid and I had to go on as if I might catch some more big girls traveling together using the holiday roar to ambush smaller fish that are good to eat!! It was funny, but as I took my picture I heard one of the cute shirtless boys in the jet boat say, 'that dude just caught that big fish right out in the middle of the lake??' Cute... At least at the moment they were just sitting on the little hump instead of ripping back and forth across the lake...

I quickly got myself straightened out and cast the big worm back out about the same place I just caught the big one. I counted it down to the bottom - 10-11 count. I jiggled it a little. Small-hopped it once. Felt a tick. Swing and a miss!! Whatever it was, it let go about as fast as I could set the hook. Rats! That was probably another toad!!

Try as I may, I couldn't get another bite after that. I sat there a good 20 minutes trying closer, farther, different angles, and a few different lures hoping to whack another nice bass but that was all she wrote...

I actually worked may way back down the point without any good bites or even a dink (or pike) to show for it, and then decided I had fished literally all day on a hot, crazy day, and I was hungry. So I went home.

Not an awesome day but a few nice bass, and I think I added a little knowledge to my bass fishing know-how - always a win if you can do that! Until next time...