TnRiver46

He said he was the first person to attempt getting there all week. Broke a trolling prop while trying to get back up to a big 5-6 lb smallie he had hooked and pinned in a tree. Then the smallie comes loose from the tree and breaks his line boatside . Here’s the video https://www.instagram.com/tv/CMuyDeDgO1R/?igshid=1lbcudo2tqkxe

Very exciting.......

Nawwwwww......... He** nawwww!! I can replace each and any of my rod/reel combos for $40 or less. And I can repair rods (mostly) and reels

I don’t need any pearls but mussels are quite tasty Lordy

I leave a ring around mine. Adds extra camouflage

For whatever strange reason I looked it up the other day and you can still get a commercial mussel license but I sure haven’t heard of anyone doing it lately

Congrats! Tennessee river, lake Fork, lake Toho and big platte lake (Michigan) are my favorites that I’ve fished

Electric fence wire or straighten out a coat hanger

A fine ship

Should be good shallow bite, my buddies did pretty good down there this weekend. Are you closer to Lenoir city or down river toward the dam?

Zaldain said he was catching them 10-20 feet. I believe the lake rose 6 feet before the day of the tourney so I think its probably more like 14-15 foot average under normal flows. It varies greatly and isn’t a uniform bottom, there are massive boulders everywhere (and of course plenty of things sticking above the water and some right below the surface. That’s where the original “mussel shoals” were located on the Tennessee river, which was the worst set of rapids on the entire river before they built dams. They say Knoxville was actually a ghost town before some guy from Cincinnati figured out how to get a boat up through those rapids in the early 1800s. How’d he do it? Drove upstream as far as he could and tied the boat off to trees on the bank and winched his way up. The shoals of course got their name from the all the mussels that were harvested from the river, in fact I think you can legally still harvest some but everything is a ways underwater now

The smallies that Brock Mosely is catching seem abnormally huge

Might count as Sight fishing??? Haha. He’s lost a couple more today. I thought largemouth didn’t like current???

Pre spawn is 3-4 months long so I use lots of things

Last tournament on TN river: gussy smashes smallies with light tackle in clearish water and they won’t eat Zaldains swimbait in the same area. This tournament on TN river: smallies are munching zaldains swimbait in muddy water and gussy didn’t get any keepers day 1.

He's like 007, shaken not stirred

Just a little bit of current . I think if I flush my toilet at home it may reach that spot before the tournament is over

I always have sponge, Taco Bell cup, and 5 gallon bucket haha

here’s what it looks like on a much slower current now Zaldain got a big smallie with a large swimbait, pretty awesome what he can do with those lures. Same river as the last tournament but vastly different fishery

There is a rip cord under the cowl of my merc but I’ve never attempted it.......

My shallow water rig was hand me down from papaw with a harbor freight motor so it’s inexpensive and of course the most reliable . Pull cord, who needs stators and alternators??? and I’ve always got the canoe ready to search and destroy

Praying for y’all

Koz would have to tell us to quit laughing out by the fire pit of his hotel

My bet is still on stator, haven’t tried replacing it yet . I’ve just been fishing out of my other boat and ignoring the problem. You know me ....... hopeless fishing junkie