Burt Mullet Co-angler advise

[skeeterman190]

My hats off to chad on having that bag and giving u the time u needed. i wouldve done the same thing but i kept getting baits flung over my shoulder when i was tryin to upgrade.. i didnt think it was right i said id get him 5 the night before but i needed my time to get what i wanted.. i lost my big fish to him and it made me scramble.. Congrats again Chad Pipkens.

[BigSmallie]

i wouldve done the same thing but i kept getting baits flung over my shoulder when i was tryin to upgrade.. i didnt think it was right i said id get him 5 the night before but i needed my time to get what i wanted.. i lost my big fish to him and it made me scramble..

I had the same thing happen last year.......I had a co take my fish after I told him I was coming back to get him and NOT to throw at him.   While on the trolling motor to another fish only a few yards away.....I hear the splashing of a large fish.     I told him..."thats my fish" and he said "no...i don't think it is".     After netting the fish for him.......I looked up and told him "Yes....that is my fish"   He then tried to act dumb as to where he was casting....so this just made things worse.   I then proceeded to tell my co angler " I told you I would get you a limit...didn't I..?....but you have GOT to let me have my fish that I NEED!!  This is NOT funny.....I spent a tremendous amount of time and gas to find these fish.   I can also make your fishing day a very long and miserable one at that.   Just be paitience and forget what your club member told you"

Things got much better after our little meeting.     I figured I was going to run into this kind of a problem once I seen my co angler talking to one of his club members just before we all launched, who was also a boater, giving him a "secret bait" and telling him..."remember what I said".     I thought to myself......great.........he's leading my co angler into thinking he's going to out fish me from the back of the boat and try to steal my fish.   It happened.........but only once.

I still let him get his limit.....which ended up getting him a check in the top 10.     

Honestly though....the more I festered and thought about it...if I ever have a co angler do this to me again.......it will be a very long day for that co angler.    I now COMPLETELY understand why B.A.S.S. did away with the co anglers.   

Either be paitient and listen to your boater......or pony up and bring your own boat, truck, lodging & gas money for the next tournament........

BS 

     

[TCook]

All i can say Phil is that your co-angler is class A jerk and it is beyond me how he didnt have to swim back to the weigh in. I spent 5 days with you searching for those fish and to have some punk show up the night before and cast over your shoulder all day to catch your fish really pees me off. Sticking your first fish a 5-7 was not enough for this guy he continues to cast to the front of the boat all day and get his line wrapped in the trolling motor numerous times, no boater should have to deal with that all day! All that $ and time to get a snipe job from that selfish guy.

[LAPORTE]

I got to fish with now two time winner Chad Pipkens and learned alot from Chad, he is a great fisherman who did his best to get me a limit of smallies, he had plenty of waypoints marked for the co to fish after he got his winning limit and I had plenty of time to get a limit but only managed four fish due to fact that beds were empty or fish came unbuttoned (my fault) and did not return to bed. In fact with ten minutes left before 3:00 p.m. Chad said he had one last waypoint in deeper water for me to fish and was sure no one had fished it, we pulled up and sure enough the fish was there, I drop shotted and was able to get the fish, a nice approx. three & half pounder. It was then off to the weigh-in.  where my weight was just over fourteen pounds for four fish. I made some mistakes and should have had a limit but thats fishing. I would like to thank Chad for giving me the chance to fish and even giving me the winning bait to use, in fact I had over four hours to fish after Chad got his limit where he did not pick up a pole just drove from spot to spot. Good Fishing and Good Luck to all Smallie 1

It sounds like you had a great time and learned allot from him. It's good to hear, I was fortunate to draw Derrick Cummings last year for the TBF state tourney the day after the BFL. Let me tell you it was an eye opening experience. There are some great fishermen that help someone willing and wanting to learn from the back of the boat.

Don L

[skeeterman190]

 Yeah its frustrating but nothing i can do about it now so.. Like i said let by gones be by gones. i told him about it so hopefully it doesnt happen again.

[Buckeye]

Smallie 1, we didn't talk much, but it was nice to run into you on the lake.  I was in the blue and silver Skeeter that ponied up close to see what in God's name Chad was up to to catch his fish.  I'm glad he got you on fish; he defintiely seemed like a class act in talking to him briefly.  I think he cursed me because I'm a Penguins/Ohio State fan.   

Eric 

[Smallie 1]

Buckeye, It was just before you pulled up that Chad got his forth fish of the limit he brought in, and after reading the posts I don't understand why some co's have to go and cast at the boater's fish, we the co's have the entire area behind the boat to fan cast whatever you want jerk, crank, tube, carolina rig and so forth while the boater is working his bedder and believe me I cast everything while Chad worked his fish never would think about casting to his fish or to the front of the boat. I guess that everyone is different. Coming from Chicago and having been in many tournaments I think the Michigan BFL is great I would rather drive the 6 or 7 hours to get to Michigan than fish the Illini Div. just because I like fishing Smallies and big water. By far the first one Burt-Mullet is the hardest to fish for a co but after that the other ones are all even scale. I guess I have been lucky with who I have drawn all good fisherman and a little conversation goes a long way as to what your boater is going to do during the tournament. This is my second year and we now have a group of seven from Chicagoland area that fish and I think 5 out of 7 of us were in the top 20 at Burt and were all looking forward to the rest of the season. Good Fishing to all Smallie 1

[Buckeye]

I can vouch for Smallie.  He was casting away while Chad was fishing.  Glad you had a good toruney and good luck the rest of the way.  Me, well I'll have to have a good showing at Erie to continue I think.  Which is possible since it is more of my home lake than any.  I have cashed two checks there in 2 events, so hopefully my streak continues.

Eric

[rufus]

That darn Pipkens did it again  . He worked his butt off to get the fish he did. As many of you that saw where he was knows that the water was a little off colored and very hard to see in the depth that he was catching them. He, as all of us did, on our team (www.teamsilverstrike.com) used the little orange cone device to catch our fish. It was an improvement over the swimming mask he used last year. We prefished around each other all week and I told him after the second day he could have those fish they were wayyy toooo hard to find. It took me 6 hours to find 4 fish. Chad literally spent an entire 12-13 hours on Tuesday in one area to find around 10 fish. I told him I could take no more and went on to find fish shallower than the 8 foot that we could see. He did his homework and whacked 'em. It helps a lot that the big fish bed in the same exact area every year and if you could find the bed through that brown cast you could catch that fish.
I ended up finding the same fish my teammate Ryan Said found and we ended up hop skotching each other and bothe weighed in respectable limits and both just out of the money. I had 22'8" and Ryan had 21'14". I had a 5'10" and he had a 5'12". I did have one fish that evacuated the area that was the biggest one I had found at 6'9". This was the only fish that I or Ryan did not catch that we found other than a few 5's I checked that I figured would be gone if I did not start on them. I had all my fish in the boat by 8:10. My coangler never made a single cast until I had my fish. I promised him I would get him his 5 if he gave me a little time. I just didn't know that I would get them so quick. I arrived at Burt at 7:15 so 55 minutes wasn't too bad. My co simply stayed on the front deck and held the net while I worked on each fish. He was an awesome individual and was the ultimate draw. We both ended up catching 9 keepers. He would not fish for a fish that I tried to give him 3 different times that he thought would help me. Only one of them did help me and it was only about 3 ounces. He weighed in 5 for 16'9" and got 15th, but if he would have caught 3 of the fish that did not help me he would have easily been in the top 10 and probably around 3rd or 4th. It was a fun tourney once again at the most awesome big smallie fishery in the world. A little disappointing to be first out of the money. Hopefully the rest of the season will be a little better money wise. See you guys at Sandusky!!!

[djkimmel]

I thought orange cones meant beware... stay away?? When are you guys going to market with those orange cones? I imagine you'll have something new by next year anyway