TnRiver46

I’ll eat em any ole way but cut up into nuggets and fried is my favorite

My buddy met me at the boat launch after work and we start out about 6:00. The previous day had been slow action trying to find white bass but I was still marking some glued to the bottom so I figured let’s go to the same spot and rile them up today. On the way upstream, I stopped at a spot I had marked white bass before just to check, didn’t even really think about it. Sure enough the graph lights up with gobs of them. We start catching a few, nothing crazy and all of a sudden you can hear what sounds like a 26 lb largemouth blowing up a frog. Gadoosssshhhh gadoooosh!!! Holy crap where is that and where is my topwater?? We see what looks like a white shark eating a seal and slam the boat in gear headed that way. Methinks we have a large striped bass trying to eat a skipjack........... Just as we get about halfway to the frucus a bald eagle swoops in and takes the skipjack and flies away. Hmmmm. We had been seeing that bird already but that was still pretty cool. I’m wanting my buddy to hook up on this thing because I don’t think he has ever caught one but he’s got about 50 ft of line on his baitcaster armed with a spook. I also grab a cheap walking bait and we cast around to no avail. Back to jigging up white bass for about an hour and we hear it again, except about 15 or more consecutive times. And we can see it! Honestly there appeared to be maybe a few stripers but water is flying everywhere. This time I said to heck with stealth mode and slammed the throttle right toward everything. Sure enough a great blue heron is hovering above it all trying to get the skipjack. We try to scare him off and chuck the spooks all around the struggling skipjack while he is being nibbled constantly by the fish. No hits. How it this possible. We tried to catch the skipjack with plugs and bare hands as he swam by the boat several times, still nothing. I remembered I had some big cotton Cordell redfins under the deck in My jerkbait box. I tied on the “ghost of Christmas past” as my friend calls it and the striper blew it up on top a few casts later. I’m not sure how big this fish was but it may be the biggest of my life! Captured with 12 lb mono, regular clinch knot, dirt cheap 7’ rod, and a pflueger reel my buddy gave me! Hahaha. I’d rather be lucky than good any day. I also got a good screenshot of the white bass schools

Thanks man! It was quite the fish story, I may try to create a thread and type it out

Zoom trick worm is a staple in Florida, I like Junebug color . Weightless or with a bullet slip sinker.

I hate ticks. We have tons of them, luckily I always feel them either crawling on me or itching when I get bit. Heck I may have Lyme disease as many of them have bit me. I had a bit of the bullseye reaction once

Sweet

I think this may be the biggest fish I have ever caught . Got some halibut in Alaska that might have been bigger but who knows

We have channel blue and flathead and they all seem to taste the same

It is obviously true that bass don’t all spawn at the same time . But they spawn in the spring and therefore at least 1/3 of the fish are not biting in spring. Thus, why I ranked spring the hardest season to catch bass (with personal and local bias) Amen on that last part Or in my case I’ve never seen one

Spawn: the most used word yet useless part of bass fishing

Easy answer, spring spawn. It’s funny because that’s what everyone talks about and looks forward too, the toughest fishing of the entire year

You don’t even have to have a license in TN if it’s your pond or your family’s pond

I’ve caught them with everything also. One of the hardest hits I ever got was dragging a Texas rig zoom u tail up and over a limb that was on the surface. As soon as it climbed over and started sinking a flat head rocked it like a defensive end blindsiding a quarterback

Big girl scared of a little crappie???

Hahahah! Nah I’m already close to moving into my retirement lake house. I will just have to live there and still go to work.......

That’s spooky. I’ve seen more than a few chucky looking type baby dolls wedged up in log jams. I always paddle by and say “I didn’t just see that.....”

Theyll send you down to Florida if you keep up that behavior

We had one eat another in a livewell once and I saw a situation similar to the video another time at a golf course pond and both fish were dead

The craziest wads o gear I find are right below dams. I caught about 15-20 striper jig heads from 1/2 oz and up on one cast! All stuck in a ball of line with a bunch of egg sinkers too. The hooks snapped off but I kept the lead for “finders keepers” catfishing purposes

(Leans over the microphone)............... $1 Bob

Bout treeeeeee fiddy!!!

SHove an 1/8 round ball jig head in those bitsy tubes. Best rig going. Bring plenty of them because you will lose a lot

I got to use the improved ramp downtown twice before they started tearing it up again hahah. Now it’s back to the way it was before but at least it’s open Pretty awesome!!! I know I had a blast

The ratio is 1000 bass fishermen to 1 person against it here

You will in July