Haven't posted in a while

Because I've been a little busy since the move from northern Wisconsin to
west Tennessee. Living six minutes from the Paris Landing State Park boat
ramp means it's easy to get on to Kentucky Lake, but with 160,000 acres,
it's not a lake easily learned. Plus, the water is a lot different than
back north, little weed fishing is done here. So when a friend invited me
to be his team partner on a tournament next month, I wasn't too comfortable
with the idea of putting money on the line based on my skills and knowledge
of the lake. And while "Lil Mule" has lived down here a year longer than I,
he hadn't fished the area in question either. But we decided to give it a
shot and signed up.

Yesterday we decided to go down there and at least see if we could gps some
decent looking spots and see if we could find any kind of pattern or decent
fish. You see, since I moved down here, I can catch short and chunky bass,
or I can catch long and lean bass, rarely managing to combine the two and
get a long and chunky bass.

It was raining when we put the boat in and continued to alternate between
hot and steamy or pouring rain, but by God, there were weeds in the water!
I thought it looked like a perfect spinnerbait morning and Lil Mule thought
more of a topwater bite. After he missed three strikes with a Spro frog, I
thought he might be on to something. When a 4.25 pound largemouth sucked
the frog down, my mind was made up.

I tied a black Zoom Horny Toad on to my pitching rod. I wanted something
similar to Mule's frog, but something that was also a little different and I
thought this might be the ticket. Less than fifty yards down the weed edge,
a good bass rocketed from the water with my frog firmly in his mouth. I
fought the fish to the side of the boat, only to have it dive under the boat
and wrap on the trolling motor! I managed to partially raise the motor,
brace it with my knee and thread the rod under and around the trolling motor
and still keep the fish on!

It ran to the opposite side of the boat, jumped, dove under the boat and as
I dragged it back up, Mule netted it! My first topwater Tennessee
largemouth and my biggest topwater largemouth to date. A nice healthy
looking bass that weighed in at six pounds even! We quickly snapped a
couple photos and released her. Here's a link to the photo.

http://www.outdoorfrontiers.com/phot...?album=3&pos=6

We continued to fish the weed edges and I caught another good keeper about
three pounds on the Horny Toad. Mule caught a keeper on the Spro frog as
well when the bite slowed down at noon. By then the storm front had moved
through and the sun was shining. We fished some other areas and managed to
get bass to bite on Secret Weapon spinnerbaits, flukes, wacky rigged stick
baits, walk the dog topwaters and shallow running crankbaits. But none of
those fish would have done us any good in a tournament.

We did find another cove that held keeper bass, so I'm feeling a little
better about our chances. We have enough time too that we can probably get
down there another time or two to practice and find more spots.

All in all, a reasonably productive day.
--
Steve Huber
Executive Producer/Editor in Chief
OutdoorFrontiers Multi-Media LLC
http://www.outdoorfrontiers.com

"Steve @ OutdoorFrontiers.com" wrote in message
...

http://www.outdoorfrontiers.com/phot...?album=3&pos=6

I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who smiles for fish pictures. Half the
guys you see look like they are bored or annoyed in fish pics.

What hook are you using with that Zoom horny toad? A screw in toad hook? I
quit fishing Horny Toads a while back before the screw in hooks became
popular, because I was missing more fish on them than on a regular frog. I
keep meaning to get some of those hooks and try them again, but the regular
frog does so well...

"Bob La Londe" wrote in message
...
"Steve @ OutdoorFrontiers.com" wrote in message
...

http://www.outdoorfrontiers.com/phot...?album=3&pos=6

I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who smiles for fish pictures. Half
the guys you see look like they are bored or annoyed in fish pics.

What hook are you using with that Zoom horny toad? A screw in toad hook?
I quit fishing Horny Toads a while back before the screw in hooks became
popular, because I was missing more fish on them than on a regular frog.
I keep meaning to get some of those hooks and try them again, but the
regular frog does so well...

I was using a 5/0 Gamakatsu EWG hook. I found with this hook, I can simply
hook the nose like a T-Rig and bend the body to fit inside the gap of the
hook. The point rides nicely between the legs, protected by the ribs on the
back and sticks fish well.
--
Steve Huber
Executive Producer/Editor in Chief
OutdoorFrontiers Multi-Media LLC
http://www.outdoorfrontiers.com