This past Saturday I had a window to get some fishing in, so I decided to get down to Pool 4 to start practicing for my next Bassamaster Weekend Series tourney.  Overall practice was hit and miss, found some fish in area that I practiced in for previous tournament, but its a long ways from Alma where we are launching from.

Chunky bass that fell fer a Game Hawg creature bait on 3/16oz TT Weight

Most of the other areas were hit and miss, but found one nice batch of fish relating to some grass, that was the bright spot of the day other then some ealry flipping and swim jig fish.  Other then that, it was an awesome weather day on the river and Lake Pepin, made it easy to get around other then the boat traffic.

I did catch some nice fish on a new bait that i just tried.  KVD Perfect Plastics Game Hawg seems like a really nice bait, its like a Baby Brush How, but just a little bigger and some fine ribbing, very soft and scent built in.  I would reccomend in trying a bag, I think you will like them.

I will get to practice just one more time, the day before the tournament.  Hopefully my best area will hold and I can expand on it.

RichLindgren.com 
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This past weekend, I had two Gopher Bassmasters club tournaments on Big & LIttle Green Lakes on Saturday, and Sunday we fished the Chisago/Lindstrom chain.  I was able to briefly practice the weekend before on Green.

My partner Art & I started in a little shallow water pocket that had lots of pads, wood & other grass.  We were both able to get a limit from this area by a little after 8am.  I caught 2 of my better sized fish on a frog and on Kizew Gill Super K swim jig, the rest of the limit was filled with a tube & a weightless Green Pumpkin Ring Fry.  Art caught all 5 of his fish on a 8″ Green Pumpkin Fork Worm on a 1/8oz texas rig.  The rest of the day, we pecked around docks, bluegill beds and other shallow cover, where I was able to cull 3 times, twice on the Ring Fry and once on a 3/8oz Tru-Tungsten Jig.  My final weight was 14.32lbs with a big fish of 3.82lbs.  It was good enough for 2nd place.  Art had around 7lbs and that put him in 6th out of the 28 anglers.  Final standings here.

Green Lake Largemouth

Sunday brought Chisago & Lindstrom, which is an excellent bass fishery.  Because of catch & release regulations, this tournament would be a paper/measurement tournament.  My partner Steve had a chance to briefly practice, we quickly discovered the two areas he found were places I had previously fished and intended to fish during the tournament.  After catching a few small keepers on our first weedline in Chisago, we moved and the 2nd spot produced nothing.  We decided to try a shallow stretch where I had caught several of my bigger fish 2 years ago in a club tournament.  I was able to quickly get a limit and Steve got two more fish all on Ring Fry’s and other soft plastics; but i was only able to get one good fish at 17″.  We jumped across the bay to look for more of the same, I saw one nice fish cruising and saw another on a bed.  I caught that fish which was almost 16″ pretty quickly on a drop shot.

Steve and I made a decision to go deep in hopes of finding some bigger fish, that is where we went wrong.  We never got on anything substantial, we both struggled to get one more keeper each.  Although the tourney was won deep, with 20.1lbs, we could not locate the fish in the short time of the tournament afternoon.  Turns out we should have stayed shallow, as most of the rest of the field recorded very solid catches 15-18lbs doing what we did early.  My final weight was 12.84lbs, which is good on many lakes, is not good on Chisago, finished 11th.  It bothers me that i left a shallow bite and missed out on it, that is usually my deal.  Oh well, lesson learned.  It’s good to learn these lessons in club tournaments, instead of money tournaments

Saturday I will be fishing Pool 4 for my next weekend series tournament…
RichLindgren.com 
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Based on my practice, I realized that winning this event would take some good fortune and the bass in my areas to grow, but I thought if I fished hard and fished clean I could put together a respectable finish and have chance to cash a check.   My practice had not been stellar, but I had found a couple of areas holding fish both on Lake Pepin and down in the top of Wabasha backwaters; plus a few back up spots if I needed a fish near Red Wing.  This tournament was a little unique, because I had never fished an event that launched out of Everts Resort on the north end of Pool 4 before.

After running south through the Wisconsin channel, I started on a rocky area of Lake Pepin, my partner had one fish on that looked to be a keeper on a spinnerbait, other then that we caught several close but short fish on finesse jigs and Fork Craws.  From there I went to my second spot on Pepin, my partner caught 1 on his spinnerbait and another on his jig.  I ended up catching 1 quality fish on a 3/8oz Tru-Tungsten PB&J jig tipped with a Green Pumpkin Rage Chunk, plus several other smaller fish.

We hit another area on the way down to Wabasha, caught several fish that were barely keepers or short on jigs & tubes, nothing we kept.  It did not take long flipping a steep bank with some wood on it in Wabasha that I caught a quality largemouth on Black/Blue Crazy Legs Chigger Craw rigged with a 3/8oz Tru-Tungsten Flipping Weight and 4/0 Super Strong Youvella Hook.  The bite was pretty slow, but when I got a fish it seemed to be decent.  I ended up catching 2 decent smallmouth on my TT jig and got a 3.71lb largemouth on a chatterbait that I had rigged up special the night before.

Tru-Tungsten Jig was my work horse & chatterbait score my kicker fish!

I had caught some decent fish on a regular chatterbait with the split tail in practice.  Because I felt I would need some bigger bites in the tournament, I upsized the trailer to a full white super fluke to give a bigger presence in the water.  Its nice when a plan pays off like that! It ended up being the 3rd biggest fish weighed on the boater side.  All my better fish came on baits that had a some moved a lot of water in the pretty dirty water that we had.

We spent some time around Red Wing trying to find my partner his 3rd fish, he had lost a couple earlier and could not get that last keeper bite at the end of the day, but we still had a great time!

I ended up with a mixed bag for 12.03lbs in 12th place out of 82 boaters, which got me a nice little check.  Kudos to my buddy Josh Douglas for winning the event with over 15lbs, by finding some really nice smallmouth!  Watch his blog for details.  I am anxious for the next tournament on June 28th, in the mean time i have a couple club tournaments to keep me busy!

Tight Lines,
RichLindgren.com 
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Yesterday for the most part was a struggle for my dad & I on pool 4, our first area produced two small keeper smallies and the next 4 areas had zero action.  Then on a hunch we decided to check  a two other areas and we actually found some keeper largemouth & smallmouth in those areas, nothing great, but much better then nothing.

Then with 5 minutes before we had to go, I caught this really nice 18.5″ smallie on a White Flash 1/4oz Super K swim jig.  This was probably the lone bright spot of my two days of prefishing thus far.  At least its another cull in the BP Bass Derby.

I will get out for a few hours on Saturday, but some of that time must be dedicated to finding Everts resort and best navigation route out of there.  On a positive note, I have not burned my fish……  A strong practice does not always mean a good tournament and Vice Versa.

RichLindgren.com 
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Memorial Day, my dad and I got out on Pool 4 to start preparing for the upcoming Bassmasters Weekend Series tournament on May 30th.  We decided to launch from Red wing and check some areas in Lake Pepin and stuff closer to the launch ramp.

The first two areas we checked produced some decent bites on a Secret Weapon Lures Quickstrike spinnerbait that I custom built for the water conditions, which were fairly muddy just about every where we fished.  I also picked up a few decent fish on a White Flash Super K Swim Jig.  The 3rd area produced one good smallie, the next handful of areas were spotty to say the least.

At the very end of the day we found two more areas where we got several bites, a few keepers but nothing over about 2lbs.  Again the spinnerbait & swim jig produced, I also finally got a few fish on my trusty 3/8oz PB&J Tru-Tungsten jig.

Overall, I think I got a few areas that can produce a check cashing bag, but on my next trip I plan to search out some other areas in search for some heftier fish to contend for a win.  The most impressive thing is my spinnerbait caught the most largemouth and smallies by far, as well as a pike and two walleyes, the biggest 23.5″

See you on the water!
Rich
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Sunday was my first club tournament of this year on Pool 2 of the Mississippi River.  Because this is a special regulation continuous catch & release body of water, our tournament is a paper tournament, where we measure the length of the fish, have our partners verify the length and then convert to pounds back at the landing.  It was only about 45 degrees when we launched in the morning, I am really learning to appreciate my new Akinetix Gear (Beanie, Gloves & Long Sleeve Shirt) to keep me confortable no matter the conditions.

My partner John Haynes and I were able to get out prefishing, so we have a pretty good idea of where we wanted to start and fish during the tournament.  The first area we started was a small pocket not very far off the main river.  Two other boats also started in and around this cut, John managed to catch 2 largemouth pretty quickly on a 3/8oz Sunfish Tru-Tungsten jig, and I launched a 12″ bass over the boat on the hookset, which came off.  After that, the bite slowed.  We continued to fish this cut and fish behind other anglers and as the sun came up, we picked up a few fish, my first fish was a 12″ smallmouth on 3/8oz PB&J Tru-Tungsten Jig tipped with a green pumpkin chunk.  About the time the last boat left, we got into a couple flurry where we each boated fish on jigs as well as a tube.  Including a very chunky 18.5″ smallmouth on my jig.  On the way out of the pocket John nabbed his limit fish on a Sexy Shad Swimbait and I caught a small keeper smallie on an Ima Flit Jerkbait.  On to different water to look for some bigger bites.

The next two areas did not produce for us, they both areas that we had really not fished before, sometimes when you swing for the fence you strike out.  From there, we decided to make the run into Moore Lake.  We each caught a couple upgrade fish in Moores, John on a CreatureX and I on a 4″ Black Blue Yum Tube with 3/8oz Tru-Tungsten Flipping Weight and 3/0 Youvella EWG hook.

Time was running out, so we figured we should hit a few areas in Grey Cloud soon.  The first area we wanted to hit was covered up by another club member’s boat and he was measuring a 17″ largemouth as we went by.  In the next area, John culled two fish on his CreatureX texas rig.

No fish pics, but here are the actual tubes & jigs that I caught all my fish on.

We then decided to make the long idle to the very back of Grey Cloud, and I was rewarded with a nice 17.5″ largemouth on the same tube rig, but now with a 1/4oz weight.  We caught a few more fish and missed a couple chances, we wanted to spend more time in the area, but had to get going.

We did hit a couple more areas on the way back to the ramp, had a couple taps, but no hook-ups.  Both John & I had some opportunities that we did not convert on, but sometimes that is fishing.

My best 5 measured out to 14.99lbs for 3rd place and John had a respectable 10.82lb limit.  I wished I could have fished a little cleaner, had plenty of chances to catch the fish to take 2nd, but I do not think i was on the fish to win this tournament, as it took 5 smallies for over 18lbs.  Most of the better bags were caught on soft plastics and jigs in this tournament.  All in all, I am very impressed with Pool 2 as a bass fishery, I will be back for more!.

RichLindgren.com 
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A complete 180 occurred this past Saturday on Pool 2.  In short, John Haynes & I were each able to bag a nice limit on the very same body of water that skunked me the weekend before.  I personally believe it had to do with location, we fished many of the same lures & techniques, conditions were pretty similar but the scenery had changed.  It was cool in the morning, but between my Akinetix Long Sleeve Shirt and Multi-Sport gloves kept me very comfortable on our morning run down the river.

We started off fishing some rocks on the mouth of a backwater, where John quickly tempted some nice smallmouth with a 3/8oz Sunfish Tru-Tungsten Jig.  Those same fish, showed no interest in my Reaction Innovations Method Crank that I was trying to make work.  When John caught a nice chunky largemouth on that same jig further back in a backwater pocket, I picked up my Black Neon 3″ Yum Tube, rigged with 3/16oz Tungsten Sinker and Smart peg, and quickly caught a 12″ keeper.  A few pitches later I swung a 19″ sow into John’s lap while he was re-tying his texas rig.

Nice 19″ Pool 2 Bass!
After proving to myself that the tube would work, I switched to a green pumpkin chatterbait and caught a nice 16″ bass and John then caught a matching fish on a Watermelon Red CreatureX bait.  We quickly got out of that area knowing there were plenty more bass to be had. 

We checked run-off pipe on the way down river, the water was cooler then the river water, so we got out of there.  We then worked out way back into a large back water area farther down the pool.  We spent quite a bit of time down there, catching several nice largemouths on tubes, chigger craws and 3/8oz PB&J TT Jigs, many of the fish positioned around rock & wood.  One thing to note, is this was my first chance to use my new Youvella EWG hooks, and they kept all my fish well pegged on my tube, looks to be a very good hook.

On the way back up the river, we found two more areas with some smallmouth positioned on them, that may be very nice back up areas.  I hope to get back out on Pool 2 to check about 3 more areas that I found on Google Maps this Saturday.  It looks like this tournament could shape up to be a very good tournament.  The key is putting in the practice time to learn to get back to the productive areas.  For fun we bumped all our fish, so we could calculate our catch like we would in the tournament.  I would have had 15.5lbs & Haynes would have had 11lbs.

Here is what John & I learned:
Found a handful of baits that were producing
Identified several areas to target during the tournament
Learned how to safely navigate these areas
Learned I need a longer ruler for this tournament, 18″ board is not enough.

RichLindgren.com 
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