Hey all,  I am back from a long week of fishing down at Clarks Hill.  I am going to wrap my practice into a single entry for the sake of keeping current. 

Saturday – November 10 – Pre-Practice Lake Hartwell
My buddy Billy Harris and I fished Hartwell the last day of off limits as we had read & heard that the lake fished similar to that of Clarks Hill and they both had healthy populations of Blueback Herring.  We also decided to have a friendly little tournament.  Weight of each of our best 5 fish, winner gets a bait out of the others boat at the end of the week.  We also wagered a similar bet for the Clarks Hill tournament, highest finisher gets to steal a bait as well.  Well fishing was tough at Hartwell for us, I managed on nice 2.2lb spot on a 3/8oz Tru-Tungsten Green Pumpkin Brown Jig under a dock in about 18ft of water.  Other then that, we each caught a few short spots.  I caught a handful of small spots on a Zappu Inchi Wacky Jig paired with a Jackall Flick Shake worm.
 
My winning 2.2lb Spotted Bass                                       Inchi Wacky Jigs

Sunday – November 11 – Official Practice Day 1
My dad & I fished together all week, as he was fishing as a non-boater.  I caught a quick keeper in the cove next to where we launched on a Vixen (Aurora Blue)  We started our endeavors in Gray’s & Little Creeks up the Little River on the GA side of Clarks Hill.  Based on our research, these seemed like reliable creeks that held good bass populations to help form a pattern. I caught one small keeper early on a Sebile Flatt Shad off a road bed.  We then hopped around, I started to notice healthy mats of hydrilla in the backs of some of these creeks and one in particular, I saw fish swimming on the edges going in & out of the mats.  So I started punching the mats with a 1oz Tru-Tungsten Flipping weight and Green Pumpkin Chigger Craw.  It did not take me long to catch a pickerel and then a nice keeper bass.  We then went to the next creek & found some similar water.  I flipped the mat, my dad started to catch some keepers on  wacky rigged green pumpkin salty sinker off the edge of the hydrilla and I caught one more bass flipping.  I then threw off the deeper edge and pulled on some fish.  This felt like a good area to get a limit.  We then finished out the day fishing some main lake rocky points with a variety of baits with no bites. 

Sebile Flatt Shad 77

Monday – November 12 – Official Practice Day 2
On this day we started out on some points near the Bussey recreation area, never got a bite until we moved into some creeks in that area.  I finally started getting bit on a Parrot DT6, which is what I use when I fish similar looking grass edges back home.  I caught 4 fish on that fairly quickly in 3 different areas as well as getting two other pretty good bites on it.  I then picked up my flipping rig to punch a some mats and ended up getting a 5lb+ fish on Gambler BB Cricket.  I was feeling pretty good about this pattern, so I decided I needed to see more of this giant lake.  We ran all the way up the Broad River which is about a 45 minute ride.  Water was a lot different up there, much dirtier and the banks flatter.  Had a few bites up there, but nothing to write home about.  Fished our way back a little bit, caught one small keeper off a bluff on a drop shot.  Lot of my fishing time was used up by running up the lake that afternoon.  I was excited about this flipping bite, it is probably only now viable with the low water creating the mats and most guys would not try it.

Tuesday – November 13 – Official Practice Day 3
Final day of practice.  Checked out a bunch of creeks near the dam.  Did not get any bites and did not see the kind of water I had been catching them on.  Did find some really good looking docks with brush all around them, no bites, but if it worked out, I would consider checking them in the tournament under the right conditions.  I then decided I would check out Keg & Wildwood creeks near take off to duplicate what we had found earlier in the week.  I found some water that looked just like what we had been fishing and was positive we would get bites there.  I was wrong, could not figure that out, the food was there and everything.  We ran around and fished a handful of other pockets, I ended up catching one small keeper and had one other hit, both on the DT6.  We hit a couple main lake rock points with no avail, then we had to call it a day to get our stuff together and make the meeting.

After that last day, I was concerned about the fish we found the first two days.  But with boat #49, I was sure I could get to one of my creeks up in the Little River without too much problem.  I figured those fish we caught in the afternoon should surely bite well in the morning.  My plan was to get 4 or 5 quick keepers, leave and run new water looking for bigger fish.   Well that was the plan, check back tomorrow to see how the plan panned out on day 1.