Tourney BW Report + hat tip to Travis/Striper Soup/Xtreme
Mar 23, 2016 8:27:28 GMT -5
seajay, Jason54, and 2 more like this
Post by coheasion on Mar 23, 2016 8:27:28 GMT -5
It was a very tough few days fishing on the upper BW.
I pulled in wednesday evening and had success getting bait and actually caught some mongos from my dock which was a new experience for me. Pulled those baits Thursday all up and down the BW trying to find fish and did not have any success. Only had one bite in a small creek in the Bull run area.
Started Friday needing to replenish bait and was having no luck whatsoever. I must have thrown that net a hundred times in different creeks and only had 4-5 inch gizzards and a some small alewives to show for it.
I threw and threw and threw and threw that net until my buddy called it quits about 1PM and decided he needed a nap - I wasn't having any of that though so I dropped him off and went and tried a small cove I had never tried to catch bait in, but it was the same old story...plenty of small flips and small baits but no biguns.
I motored out into the main cove and put the anchor feature on my TM on and grabbed a bottle of water and a snack and was just enjoying the nice weather looking at a long bank of rip-rap when I remembered reading a post on these forums about sayings Travis from Cats N Stripers used and one of those was throw that net up by those rocks! So that got me to thinking and then I also remembered a post from Striper Soup talking about pulling the net in slowly when throwing in real shallow water to keep the weights from hopping off the bottom. I wasn't seeing any tail flips or anything by that riprap but I thought what the heck - gotta try something different if you want different results.
So I loaded up the net and tossed it within about 2 feet of the riprap knowing I was going to get it hung up probably but not really caring at that point. Pulled it up slowly....and.....:
Mongolelujah!! I couldn't believe it!! Shot a quick picture and got those beauties in the tank!! Sent a quick text to Lund1 and jmr as I knew they were having trouble locating bait too. JMR redlined his motor and made it over there in record time as well
I ended up loading up about 18 of those beauties over the next 20 minutes or so. Luckily I had my new Xtreme Bait Systems tank and it was able to handle these guys with no problem. My old homemade tank would have been quickly over-loaded.
Unfortunately this was about the most success I had all weekend.
The next day for the tournament we only boated one 28.5 inch fish about 7:30 AM and didn't get another bite the rest of the day. But, we had fun and I learned a LOT. From never having caught a mongo just a few months ago to now netting a half dozen in one throw things are starting to look up.
Thanks again to all the advice put forth on this forum, you guys are a wonderful resource and you have my gratitude!
I pulled in wednesday evening and had success getting bait and actually caught some mongos from my dock which was a new experience for me. Pulled those baits Thursday all up and down the BW trying to find fish and did not have any success. Only had one bite in a small creek in the Bull run area.
Started Friday needing to replenish bait and was having no luck whatsoever. I must have thrown that net a hundred times in different creeks and only had 4-5 inch gizzards and a some small alewives to show for it.
I threw and threw and threw and threw that net until my buddy called it quits about 1PM and decided he needed a nap - I wasn't having any of that though so I dropped him off and went and tried a small cove I had never tried to catch bait in, but it was the same old story...plenty of small flips and small baits but no biguns.
I motored out into the main cove and put the anchor feature on my TM on and grabbed a bottle of water and a snack and was just enjoying the nice weather looking at a long bank of rip-rap when I remembered reading a post on these forums about sayings Travis from Cats N Stripers used and one of those was throw that net up by those rocks! So that got me to thinking and then I also remembered a post from Striper Soup talking about pulling the net in slowly when throwing in real shallow water to keep the weights from hopping off the bottom. I wasn't seeing any tail flips or anything by that riprap but I thought what the heck - gotta try something different if you want different results.
So I loaded up the net and tossed it within about 2 feet of the riprap knowing I was going to get it hung up probably but not really caring at that point. Pulled it up slowly....and.....:
Mongolelujah!! I couldn't believe it!! Shot a quick picture and got those beauties in the tank!! Sent a quick text to Lund1 and jmr as I knew they were having trouble locating bait too. JMR redlined his motor and made it over there in record time as well
I ended up loading up about 18 of those beauties over the next 20 minutes or so. Luckily I had my new Xtreme Bait Systems tank and it was able to handle these guys with no problem. My old homemade tank would have been quickly over-loaded.Unfortunately this was about the most success I had all weekend.
The next day for the tournament we only boated one 28.5 inch fish about 7:30 AM and didn't get another bite the rest of the day. But, we had fun and I learned a LOT. From never having caught a mongo just a few months ago to now netting a half dozen in one throw things are starting to look up.Thanks again to all the advice put forth on this forum, you guys are a wonderful resource and you have my gratitude!
But heck, I totally know what you mean about that feeling after throwing and throwing and throwing when you finally pull a few big baits up. Funny how when you're beat down and exhausted, but finally pull one up that all of a sudden you have that energy to throw more 
