If I didn't need to car-top my kayaks, I would have gotten a pedal drive too.

5 minutes ago, MIbassyaker said:

If I didn't need to car-top my kayaks, I would have gotten a pedal drive too.

 

If they made them, I'd buy a pedal canoe. I'd buy the boat below if I could drag it through the woods:

 

Tough day at the lake, bite window was short and ended abruptly. Had a couple swipes on the A rig first thing in the morning but nothing connected. Switched to a wacky senko and hooked 6, lost 3 pretty quick. After that the bite vanished.

11 hours ago, Pat Brown said:

magnum speed worms

Dam, I've got 382 packs of soft plastics and no magnum speed worms... DOWN! DOWN BAIT MONKEY DOWN! 

 

Thanks for the write up and encouragement bro

Amazing fish @Pat Brown! Congrats. I’d bet that sucker was longer than 24”!!!! 

Well.  I was going to start a new thread about our first fishing trip in our beautiful new boat.  But I was four paragraphs into complaining about our long winter, cold wet spring and new trolling motor woes (all fixed, Garmin support is good).  I decided that’s all behind us now… skip the negative, full speed ahead!

 

Wes and I have been looking forward to fishing our special zone 20 (Lake Ontario/ St. Lawrence River) early bass season.  Our new boat is a Lowe Stinger 195.  It’s so much more sea worthy than our little Bass Tracker 165, we’ve unlocked a whole new world on these bigger waters.  We got out Sunday, radar said rain but it never did so things finally went our way!  Water was too cold for smallies on the big lake (44F even in the shallows) so we focussed on largemouth.  Went up the river to a broad shallow flat, found 55F water and figured that’d be money.  It was and we caught about a dozen, fishing bridge pilings in 2-4ft. of water.  Each piling has a rock/gravel base and a solid wind was creating current around those.  We were into fish right away on a red bladed jig and a red/orange spinnerbait.  The reg’s say “immediate release” but we paused 2 seconds to snap a quick one of just our first fish each of 2025. 😎  Wes caught a nice est. 4# which I videod on my phone.  Turned out as a 3 second video of my feet. 🤦🏼‍♂️ 

 

Our early season ends Saturday, and Wes has his first football game so this might be our only outing.  Hoping the 3rd Saturday in June comes quickly and we have a good summer in the new boat.  She still needs a name!

That was an awesome read, @Pat Brown! Congrats on the monster! Extra fun to read because I think I know which body of water y'all were on, and can better visualize what it all looked like. Felt like I was in the boat with you. 

1 hour ago, MIbassyaker said:

 

!!!!!!!!!

This is the stuff we Michigan boys can only dream of. (Except I'm planning another trip to NC this summer, so maybe my dream can come true. 🤞🏻)

That's a heckuva boat, @The Baron, and Wes's four-pounder equals a six-pounder down south. Is Wes a lineman?

22 minutes ago, Swamp Girl said:

That's a heckuva boat, @The Baron, and Wes's four-pounder equals a six-pounder down south. Is Wes a lineman?

4# is solid.  We “should” catch a few each season, but over 5# is a lot tougher.  Once we figure them out… we might catch some of these plentiful 5# plus Lake Ontario smallies.🤞🏻

 

Yes, Wes is Defensive End for a local AAA team (Kingston Grenadiers).  Also the long snapper on the special teams for punt, field goals and point conversion.  

On 5/3/2025 at 7:29 PM, hokiehunter373 said:

PB only lasted 3 weeks 😁

 

Got out for an hour today. Started with the armajoint and caught a couple dinks barely bigger than the bait. Hilarious. Working around the pond and got a good swipe but she only got the tail. Gave a couple more casts in that spot and nothing so figured I’d continue my loop and come back with the wacky rig. 20 mins later I did just that. First cast was on the money and the line started swimming side ways. Tightened her up but as soon as slack was out she spit it. Cast back in and the line was over the dock post so the worm was barely in the water. Gave her a little jiggle and as soon as it got in the water I got to watch that awesome flash of green as she rolled on it and sucked the worm in. My light rod with 6# test and she put it to the limit. In and out of algae. Peeling drag. Splashing. She put on a show but she wasn’t going anywhere. 5.44# with the tail of her last meal still sticking out her throat. Tummied up beaut! 
 

 

 

Finally have more time so figured since I thanked @AlabamaSpothunter for the big girl I needed to thank him for these giants too 🤣 their appetites show they aspire to be future 5 pounders haha

 

 

 

 

I actually laughed at these jokers. Both of them hit instantaneously. It was clear the bait didn’t matter and just something entering the water, anything, everything, was gonna get bit. I admire their tenacity

 

 

And congrats Pat!!! Insane catch  

@Pat Brown Congrats on tying your PB. That sure read like a major battle getting her out of the wood. Sweet!

Congrats on the PB @Pat Brown! Beautiful fish!

 

Love the new boat @The Baron!

I finally joined the 2025 Five-Pounder Club! Fingers crossed that @The Baron joins too.

 

Got a couple suspending fish this evening in the rain

Didn't catch anything at the river, but had a good time with the boy.

 

Everybody's catching absolute monsters, and I caught possibly the smallest smallmouth of the year. But my 1 year old got to hold it, and he thought it was cool. 

 

9 hours ago, Swamp Girl said:

I finally joined the 2025 Five-Pounder Club! Fingers crossed that @The Baron joins too.

Nice one @Swamp Girl 😎  I hope your good wishes come true for Wes and me! 🙏🏻 😊

 

@Pat Brown … I finally went back and caught up on this thread.  Congratulations on another DD and personal best.  Great story about your thinking and the battle. 👍🏻

1 hour ago, The Baron said:

Great story about your thinking and the battle.

 

Yeah, Pat can write. I'm a mostly retired professional writer and I've done a fair share of outdoor writing. Pat could too. He pays attention, which the source of good writing, and he plays with words, which is key too.

 

@IcatchDinks: My friend, size does matter. See that little hand on your smallie? That's all that matters.

12 hours ago, Swamp Girl said:

I finally joined the 2025 Five-Pounder Club!

Hopefully the first of many!

@TnRiver46 - she was at least 25" based on the fact that she didn't fit in my 24" live well without mashing into the corners.

 

Absolutely insane fish.

 

@Dwight Hottle - it was one of those bites where USUALLY - historically it's on a day when I'm not catching much - it's usually in an area I rarely get bit - and I'm throwing into the heaviest cover and suddenly I feel a BIG thump and then I reel down and set the hook and my line comes right back to me and I am left wondering what could have been.  Glad this time I got to meet the offender!

 

@Swamp Girl - thanks - I try to remember the details because the details are the juice that helps you repeat your success.  🙂🙏🏼

 

Thanks to everyone again for all the kindness and encouragement - it's really great being a part of the bass fishing universe and trying to figure out the puzzle year after year.  

 

Bass fishing is never something that bores me because it's a playing field (big fish) that adapts to the opposition (us) both in miniscule ways day to day AND on a large scale  with every season that passes by.  And every year there are new big fish to catch that grew into monsters under our noses somewhere on the lake we don't know about.

 

It's all pretty exciting and I'm just glad to be a part of it.

5 minutes ago, bp_fowler said:

Hopefully the first of many!

 

I'll probably catch many four-pounders this year. Here's a nice four-pounder I caught yesterday:

 

 

However, five-pounders are rare this far north. Same with six and seven-pounders. 

Had a tournament Saturday. Roadrunner format which I’m learning I’m not a big fan of. I had never fished the lake I chose to go to, so I did a little prefishing on Friday. There lake was choked with invasive weeds, out past 10’ of water, not something we encounter often in Kansas. I had heard the grass was bad though so I had several rods rigged with braid in preparation. The Okuma X Series was rigged with 50lb Smackdown to a leader of 15lb Pounce with a weightless Boomba. I thought I was on something on practice day, had that braid singing in those weeds! The X Series was up to the challenge though.

Tournament day didn’t go quite as planned. We had several locals jump in and I couldn’t keep up with them and their cheaterboxes. I still managed a respectable 7th out of 37, which ends up being a 3rd place finish for AOY because only 2 people that finished in front of me were members of the club.

1 hour ago, Bluebasser86 said:

Had a tournament Saturday. Roadrunner format which I’m learning I’m not a big fan of. I had never fished the lake I chose to go to, so I did a little prefishing on Friday. There lake was choked with invasive weeds, out past 10’ of water, not something we encounter often in Kansas. I had heard the grass was bad though so I had several rods rigged with braid in preparation. The Okuma X Series was rigged with 50lb Smackdown to a leader of 15lb Pounce with a weightless Boomba. I thought I was on something on practice day, had that braid singing in those weeds! The X Series was up to the challenge though.

Tournament day didn’t go quite as planned. We had several locals jump in and I couldn’t keep up with them and their cheaterboxes. I still managed a respectable 7th out of 37, which ends up being a 3rd place finish for AOY because only 2 people that finished in front of me were members of the club.

Back on the schoolers today. These are mostly 14”-16” fish, but every so often I catch a good one in this area mixed in with the others. Believe I hooked it today, but it ran me under some old bridge pilings and hung the bait up and pulled off. Never saw it, but it was strong, whatever it was. Who knows 

 

 

 

 

Went to the pond after work with Jake and found 3 that wanted to bite - caught mine on the Neko Rig with a Mann's Jelly Worm 9" in grape fire tail!

 

Missed one that was bigger than these two that pulled me straight into the pads and then came off.  These two also pulled me into the pads - multiple times for the bigger of the two - but didn't come off - PHEW!

 

Jake got his on the old t rig D Bomb!

 

Fun times.  Missed a couple that hit the frog real quick.  Hoping that they start to commit to the frog here soon! 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼🐸🐸🐸🐖🐖🐖