After stewing about my disappointing finish at Deer Lake, I was fired up to get revenge on the fish and the rest of the club.  I knew from prefishing that Wapogasset would be a few degrees warmer and a little farther along in the seasonal pattern.  I had a plan to start fishing staging fish in some cabbage that was 3-8ft deep that was just outside of some spawning flats, but in the back of my mind I thought shallow fish could still play a big role.  The previous Sunday we caught several keepers on lipless cranks and spinnerbaits in this cabbage area.

Chong & I arrived first in this area only to have another boat shut down just a little ways down the cabbage line.  I started out with a Rayburn Red Xcalibur Xr50 Lipless Crankbait and Chong with his lucky chartreuse spinnerbait.  We had no luck, so I tried a Husky Jerk , Spinnerbait, & a Parrot DT4 with no luck.  The other boat had no action either and they even tried bouncing plastics on the bottom.  So I started easing up into the shallow flat and noticed several male bass cruising and actually positioned on beds.  I tried fishing them for a little while with a Baby Ring Fry , but only had one small pick-up and I do not think many of these fish would make the 14″ minimum.  So I decided to head to the north end of the lake where there is a bit more color to the water and the water is a little warmer.

We fished the cabbage line into the cove and only picked up one 12″ bass on a spinnerbait.  We started poking around the docks and the inside cabbage line with soft plastics.  I was throwing a weightless green-pumpkin Lake Fork Baby Ring Fry with a spinning rod with 10# Gamma Edge Flourocarbon and Chong has 4″ Black Senko .  I quickly spotted a few bass on beds and caught 1 keeper and a short, after the previous day I put that 14.25″ keeper right in the livewell.  We continued through these docks and sandy inside areas and I got two more keepers and we each missed a nice keeper that we had on.  As we fished down the docks, we met another club boat and he had one fish, so we turned around and fished back and I got a 15″ fish that I put in the livewell.  At this time I decided to switch to the full size Lake Fork Ring Fry on a baitcaster to try to get a bigger bite, because I only could keep one more fish and it was a no cull tournament.

I then caught a 15.75″ keeper that I reluctantly threw back at 11:10am, cause I had visions of getting a kicker at some point.  Shortly after that, I caught and threw back another 14″ and Chong got a nice keeper under a dock.  We decided to let this area rest and return in the afternoon.  We hit a set of docks across the way where I had nice fish that I missed because I did not realize the slack I had in my line as the fish swam through the weeds, probably around 3lbs.  I though I had missed my kicker opportunity.  We then hit other docks on the east side of the lake, things had slowed and we each caught a few short fish.

Finally we started coming up the docks that we had met the other boat on and I hooked a nice fish under a pontoon that was on a lift with a tail weighted Ring Fry, it was 4.5lbs and that finished out my limit.  I spent the rest of the time driving Chong around the docks and shallows trying to get him fish.  I spotted a few keepers on beds that he hooked, but they managed to get off.  Final weight was 11.4lbs, 1st place & big fish, could have been better if not for no cull rule as I threw back a nice fish to get the 4.5 and I stopped fishing 1.5 hrs early.  Only one other limit was brought to the scales, but nobody was skunked.  Unfortunately the other limit came from my father who took first on Deer.  So I sit in 2nd by about 3.2 after 2 tournaments with 6 to go, very manageable.

Now I need to concentrate on Le Homme Deu for the first Bassmasters Weekend Series Tournament…..
Rich
www.richlindgren.com
basstournament.blogspot.com

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