The weather was mostly bluebird skies with the water temperature starting out around 77 degrees and warmed up to over 80 in the day. Very little wind and few clouds made for a very hot day! The water level was at 67 feet with stained water. Sporadic busts here and there, mostly over there as the bust would come usually just after we vacated an area.
While it was another great fishing day, with many shoreline anglers as well lining the banks, the catching part was hard for many as only five members weighed in their three bag limit of fish. Other club members had a difficult time catching one or two fish. The anglers that caught their limits reported that they were also culling smaller fish so these guys were on the right pattern.
Over 20 bass and seven Tucs were weighed. The bass ran the usual 1-2 pounds with the Tucs again in the heavier range between 2-5 pounds. The largest Tuc weighed about 4 1/2 pounds. A few HFFA club members - Chris, Garey & Tom (thanks guys ) again stayed after the weigh-in to measure and take other fish information for the on-going lake management study.
In our last two tournaments, our boat has experienced many "murphy issues". While we had a working trolling motor this time, we had other things, mostly of the "operator/pilot error" kind. This was my third tournament in a row in which I was able to only catch a single fish. Caught it near BSI on a jig and then had my rod fall into the lake after I had removed the fish from the jig. (pilot error ). So if you catch a fishing rod/reel rig in the area, it's probably mine. Maybe I need to use a Tenkara rod instead.
My boat partner was more successful catching his limit but he missed a whole bunch more ( pilot error ). Most of his fish were caught worming although his last few were on a deep diving crankbait with some quick release fish ( more pilot error ).
Saw some big solitary Tucs cruising the shoreline but sorry that I can't give you a low down on what they were biting as some of us don't know how to catch them!!! . I think our boat needs to follow the guys in the club that seem to always catch the big Tucs to find out how and where they are catching them.
steve