So the club fished a tourney on Pocomoonshine lake here in Maine last Sunday. The day was mostly cloudy, cold, and breezy. The lake temp was pretty much all at 49 or 50 degrees. Me and my partner fished all the right spots for this time of year... or so we thought.

The lake holds largies and smallies so we fished main lake points, secondary points, drop-offs, humps, and all that business. Well he caught one and I got absolutely SKUNKED. We threw everything and had only a minimal amount of interest on some suspending jerks.

Well at the end of the day two of the boats came in with full livewells and they were culling fish all day. They were throwing mostly chatterbaits and senkos and caught all of their fish in less that ONE FOOT of water- right up against the shore! I can't say I'm a super experienced bass fisherman, but this day humiliated me. It never even occured to me or my partner (who is probably the best in the club) to fish that shallow this time of year. Everything I read and know, or thought I know, tells me that those fish should have been in deeper water. At least as deep as 5 of 6 feet.

How many of you would have been fishing like that this time of year in this kind of environment? Like I said I just feel stupid for it not even occuring to me to fish that shallow. Maybe this will give some one a heads up if nothing else.

Bummer.  I feel for ya, man.

But Pocomoonshine lake...now that's a great name!  ;D

Who knows how we would have fished the lake?  It is always a crap shoot.

We would have tried a few things in your tourny, such as:

1.  Fish exactly as you did if the bass were in pre-spawn and ready to move onto the beds.

2.  Fish shallow and bring the crankbait or C-Rigged lizzard from the shore back to the boat.

3.  Fish both shallow and deep if the bass were off the beds and roaming using topwaters, tubes, finesse worms, a spinnerbait and a crankbait to try to find out what they wanted.

First club tourney this year my friend won it as we caught the largemouth bass 15 to 20 feet from the shoreline in 5 to 7 feet of water and along the weedlines in five feet of water using Bomber 300s in shad and crawfish colors.

Second club tourney my partner caught 5 (I missed one; landed three; and let my buddy keep the front of the boat where he caught two more that would have been mine) by fishing the grass lines in 1, 2 and 3 feet of water as they were still on the beds or starting to roam.  We were throwing a topwater shad colored RICO all day, altough I did throw a few frogs and he tried a Chuggbug.  Those RICOs are worth the $20 price tag.

So you did nothing wrong.  In the first tournament we had to stay in the creek as the lake was too rough and we just lucked into a pattern that worked.  In the second tourney we caught all fish by Noon and then the bite stopped for us.

First tournament my buddy placed first; I was 7th. Second tourney my friend placed 5th and I was 15th.

I still have dreams about the ones that got away, six in all.  

Just remember that Ike and Kevin don't win all of their tournaments,either!

And bass fishing can be a very humbling experience.  A lot of fun but humbling, too.