Hawaiibassfishing Forum

Went with 2 friends from 12-4:30. We each landed three on jerkbaits, rattle traps and spinnerbaits. I lost probably lost 6 fish, I didn't land my first until about 3...needless to say I was getting a little irritated. Maybe I need to sharpen all the hooks on my jerkbaits. But we had two fish of note.....1 really nice smallie with a spinnerbait on the kam side before the dam, I was really suprised, first by its size and second location. The other nice fish was a Tuc I caught. I didn't weigh or measure him but I'm guessing he was somewhere around 5lbs, caught him on a jerkbait(he fought like a sack of potatoes until my buddy tried to grab him). Caught quite a few small LGMB. The "fingerlings" are starting to get fat! There was a decent amount of schooling and busting around BSI, the bait they were chasing was really small. I wanted to break out the fly rod but it was a little too windy for my 4wt and it's kind of a pain with 3 people in the boat. I'm sure I would have caught more on the fly.

I couldn't believe how tall this fish was.


A nice smallie.


Caught this one around 4lbs two weeks ago, finally uploaded pics.

now im jealous!! am i the only guy out there that hasnt gotten a smallmouth this year!! very nice size on that one too! hey that big tuc didnt have half a spinnerbait hanging off the lip did he hahahaha

Glad you had a camera... nice fish.
Thanks for sharing.
Hay RW, I think he was fishing in the same spot as that
"one other boat on the lake" was fishing on Sunday.

I see you've found my "secret cove" in that 1st pic! Very nice Tuc.

Hey, I know that tree !

Hahaha no spinnerbait. I didn't see any previous punctures in, near or around his mouth either

I guess this "secret cove" isn't too secret after all. I know I've been fishing it for the last 5 years but lately it has been packed with shore fisherman, but there was only 1 Monday. A couple of years ago during the spawn that cove was LOADED with tucs that were bitting...it was the only place on the lake I could catch fish that wasn't spawning for about a month.

I finally am going to invest in those vulga or bulga grips, my hand and thumb got torn up!! It's not news to me but I just can't get it in my head that tucs don't stay still when you have them by the mouth.

Sounds like you got a good case of Tuc Thumb. I usually wet my hand, then belly scoop them. This method really seems to relax the fish. A wet hand help keep their slime coat in tact. Of course the Boca grips has a certifiable scale built in, so its not a bad item to keep handy.

I use to catch a lot bigger fish before I got my Boga-grip (with built in scale) Yea, I use to catch a lot of 5, 6, and 7 pound fish...

Now days I only catch 2 and 3 pounders...
Should never have got that scale

LOL @ Stan....when I first started fishing the lake awhile back I was catching quite a few larger fish. I was mainly using standard largemouth lures like spinnerbaits and crankbait the lipless ones as well. I wouldn't catch a lot of fish but they were usually no smaller than 2 pounds. Then I did what a lot of people seem to do at the lake and down sized and I started catching many more fish but I think the largest with the small lures that I can recall anyway was a 3.something I caught at a HFFA tournament. Recently I've been going back to the larger lures and I've been consistantly catching better quality fish. The plus about this now is all the smaller largemouth will still wack the big baits where as the smaller tucs don't seem to as much for me.

I have a couple large 5 or 6 inch talapia swim baits made by matt lures and I also have a few that look like large 5 spot chiclids or baby tucs. I've probably only commited about 20 minutes to throwing these previously but sometime soon I'm going to commit a whole day to throwing nothing but big swim baits. I've been wanting to try this for a while at wilson but its hard when I know I catch fish with other techniques.


Has anyone had any luck with large swimbaits at wilson?

Stan when I get my Boga-grip I'll start zooming in on the weight

i have commited to swimbaits on several occasions and have had great success with the smaller 3-4in versions of soft plastic and hard baits.usually quality over quanity for sure. tucs and bass and some snakeheads and catfish too boot. i have a few mid sized baits in the 6-8in range and have tried them for an hour here and an hour there but never have caught anything or had a strike on one, keep telling myself ill commit to one for a day but after an hour or 2 of relling its just too easy to give up.im almost positive them huge 14-20 in swimbaits are out but then who knows whats down there right.

Several years ago Kahuna Bass and I went out one afternoon and used live bait larger than 5 inches in size.
The smallest fish we caught was 3 1/2 pounds.