Innholdsfortegnelse for July - August 2016 i Bassmaster

Elite Series pro Aaron Martens is a neat freak. He believes that tackle organization is key for time management, and time management is key to winning derbies. One way he accomplishes all three is by adding a panel of foam to the inside of his boat’s tackle storage hatch. Here, he keeps all the hooks and hardbaits he anticipates using during a day so he doesn’t have to dig through storage trays. Plus, he uses this system to dry baits and keep them from rattling around in the boat. You also can add a piece of this foam to a garage wall for loose-bait storage. 1 After measuring the inside of your boat’s tackle hatch, cut the foam to fit. (We used Soft Linking Mats from Lowe’s. You get four…

Takahiro Omori Birthday: Sept. 4, 1970 Hometown: Emory, Texas How did it feel to win the Elite Series event on Wheeler, your first win in more than a decade? It’s been a while, to be honest. It feels good. In the last 10 years, I went to the Classic seven times, so I have been consistent, but I just had not won. It gives me a lot more confidence to be able to compete at this level. What made you decide to leave your home in Japan and come to the U.S. to try to make it as a bass pro? I saw pictures of George Cochran when he won the 1987 Classic, and I didn’t know the money side, but I thought about having sponsors and winning money for…

July 4 Independence Day. Happy birthday, America! 21 National Junk Food Day. Because fishing and junk food go together like peas and carrots — or peanuts and Coke. 24 National Tequila Day. Meet you at the dock for margaritas? August 5 Summer Olympics begin in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. When will bass fishing become an Olympic sport? 7 National Lighthouse Day. Here’s to finding a safe harbor. 13 Left Handers Day. The crank is on the wrong side of your reel.…

The designer of a new watercraft hopes his creation will revolutionize fishing, duck hunting and other single-person boat applications. The Ultraskiff 360 from designer Jeff Lizzio looks like a floating satellite TV dish. Constructed of polyethylene, it weighs 110 pounds and fits in the back of a pickup. Lizzio says the craft’s ergonomic design makes fishing more comfortable, comparing it to sitting in a pedestal-mounted swivel chair in a bass boat. Although the company is a small startup that can’t yet ship its products, Lizzio predicts the boat’s design will lead to larger-scale production. The Ultraskiff 360 is designed to be propelled by a trolling motor but also can be paddled. It features multiple storage compartments that can be used as a cooler and livewell, as well as rod holders.…

Mercury Marine is touting a new outboard motor feature that gives boaters one less thing to worry about while on the water. Press materials for Active Trim describe it as an automatic system that trims the motor without the need for the boat operator to touch the trim switch. The system has been compared to moving from standard to automatic transmission in an automobile. Mercury officials say Active Trim simplifies boat operation while improving engine performance and decreasing fuel costs. It also eliminates the need to monitor and adjust trim with changes to speed or during turns. “It’s speed based,” said Bret Martin, Mercury Marine Manager of Sterndrive Integration. “There’s actually a GPS chip built in, so it knows how fast you’re going based off your speed.” Active Trim is…

National Top 10 Lakes 1. Lake Erie, New York 2. Lake St. Clair, Michigan 3. Lake Erie, Ohio [30-mile radius from Sandusky] Limits of smallmouth bass that exceed 20 pounds are as common here as in the New York portion of Lake Erie. The difference is that you won’t catch as many bass in the 3-pound class. A Bassmaster Northern Open was won here in September 2015 with 65-1. The second- and third-place finishers caught over 64 pounds of smallies. Dozens of 20-plus-pound limits of brown bass strained the scales over the three-day event. 4. Thousand Islands (St. Lawrence River), New York [50-mile stretch] This picturesque bass fishery has 1,864 islands, teems with smallmouth bass and has excellent largemouth fishing, as well. The smallmouth have the greatest trophy potential. The…

Congratulations to the newest members of the Bassmaster Lunker Club™. Membership in the club is free and open to any B.A.S.S. member who catches a largemouth bass weighing 10 pounds or more, a spotted bass weighing 5 pounds or more, or a smallmouth bass weighing 6 pounds or more, from Jan. 1, 2015, to the present. New Lunker Club members will receive an official certificate with holder and a Minn Kota hat. Rosemary White Florida 10-2 Lake Bellevue, Florida ◆ Charlie’s worms 8-inch swimming worm (junebug) ◆ Water clarity: stained ◆ Depth: 4 to 5 feet ◆ Weather: clear Neal Westbrook Arkansas 12-0 Cedar Lake, Oklahoma Strike King KVD 5XD deep diving crankbait (sexy shad) Carol Chelette North Carolina 12-12 private lake, North Carolina Strike King 5-inch worm (red shad)…

‘This goes right at the heart of the consumer choice. The EPA . . . is truly denying consumers a choice at the pump.’ SUPPOSEDLY, BOOTLEGGERS TRYING to outrun the law during Prohibition filled their gas tanks with “white lightning.” That may have been the earliest misuse of “biofuel.” Boaters today who make a similar mistake of trying to burn another biofuel — ethanol — might not run afoul of the law, but they do risk fouling their engines, and much more. “The EPA has just announced its plans to further increase the country’s ethanol mandates, surpassing the current record high levels finalized less than one year ago,” according to Boating United, the advocacy arm of the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA). “By next year, the EPA is requiring the…

We take a moment to celebrate the efforts of states and communities that place a great deal of value on the visitation of bass anglers. TWENTY YEARS AGO, Lake Trafford was little more than a glorified mudhole. In an attempt to clear the south Florida lake of hydrilla in the early 1990s, officials sprayed the vegetation, which then sank to the bottom and created a layer of muck so thick (6 feet in some areas) that native plants died from a lack of sun penetration and oxygen in the water. A massive fish kill in 1996 put an exclamation point on the headstone of this fishery. Fast-forward to now. Lake Trafford narrowly missed inclusion in the 2016 rankings of our nation’s 100 Best Bass Lakes. Actually, it was the last…

Arizona boat users are better prepared for the boating season after exchanging their old life jackets for new ones through the Arizona Game and Fish Department’s exchange program. Levels of a toxic chemical are declining in most species of Great Lakes fish, but smallmouth bass seem to be the exception, according to scientists at the State University of New York-Buffalo. Seven Indiana counties will fix sediment and logjam problems in lakes thanks to $554,000 in grant funding from the state’s Department of Natural Resources.…

Toyota has been an important sponsor of B.A.S.S. competition for many years, including its title sponsorship of the Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year Award and the company’s popular bass tournament contingency program. But there’s an even better reason to pull a bass boat with a qualifying Toyota vehicle. According to the New York Daily News, a Louisiana man recently topped 1 million miles in his Toyota Tundra. Victor Sheppard of Houma, La., reached seven figures on his 2007 Tundra’s odometer and kept going until Toyota engineers found out about it. Toyota officials traded Sheppard a 2016 Tundra for his nine-year-old truck so they could tear it apart and study it for clues to its longevity. The 2007 Tundra was one of the first trucks to come off the assembly…

A Florida tournament angler was knocked unconscious and treated for non-life-threatening injuries after being struck by a leaping sturgeon in Florida’s Suwannee River in early May. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) reported that 62-year-old Ronald Dick was in a boat with his son, traveling about 30 mph just upriver from Manatee Springs, when a 4- to 5-foot sturgeon leaped from the water and collided with the boat’s console before striking Dick. He was taken to a nearby hospital, treated for his injuries and released. Florida officials said it was the state’s first sturgeon incident of 2016. There were no sturgeon strikes reported in 2013 and 2014, but researchers attributed that to higher water levels on the river. They said recent drops in water levels likely are causing…

Bassmaster Classic Bracket Where: Niagara River, Buffalo, N.Y. When: July 19-22 Carhartt Bassmaster College Series National Championship presented by Bass Pro Shops Where: Green River Lake, Campbellsville, Ky. When: July 28-30 Carhartt College Series Classic Bracket presented by Bass Pro Shops Where: Kentucky Lake, Paris, Tenn. When: Aug. 4-6 Bassmaster Elite Series presented by Econo Lodge Where: Potomac River, Charles County, Md. When: Aug. 11-14 Bass Pro Shops Northern Open No. 2 Where: James River, Richmond, Va. When: Aug. 18-20…

National Top 10 Lakes 1. Santee Cooper Lakes, Marion and Moultrie, South Carolina 2. Rodman Reservoir, Florida 3. Chickamauga Lake, Tennessee [36,240 acres] Bass Pro Shops held the Battle of Chickamauga Classic this past March, which put the best high school teams in the region against each other. Grundy County won the one-day event with 29.57 pounds. Did we mention these were high school students? A 9.03 took big-fish honors. The Chattanooga Bass Association had three tournaments through May, and it took no less than 26 pounds to win. The organization’s March derby had two fish weighed in over 10 pounds. Giants live here. 4. Kentucky/Barkley lakes, Tennessee/Kentucky [160,309 and 58,000, acres respectively] Edwin Evers nearly cracked the 100-pound mark here at the 2015 BASSfest event. His 97-4 winning weight…

I ONCE HAD an opportunity to fish with veteran Bassmaster Elite Series pro Gary Klein on a small Alabama lake managed for trophy largemouth bass. The Texan caught bass on a variety of lures, but couldn’t tempt any of the giants that reside there. “Maybe the big girls want a big meal,” Klein said. He dug out a 1-ounce, 6-inch-long Cotton Cordell Pencil Popper, a topwater plug widely used by freshwater and saltwater striped bass anglers. Klein figured the big bait would call up one of the lake’s oversize largemouth. It didn’t, but I was surprised that Klein even carried a pencil popper in his boat for black bass. “I’ve been fishing a pencil popper for many, many years,” Klein said. “When the time is right, it’s going to catch…

“Embrace the water-ski crowd; they are likely improving your fishing!”Elite Series pro Russ Lane FROM TOP TO BOTTOM What’s your favorite follow-up bait when a bass misses your topwater lure? Any tips on getting that fish to bite again? @a_mattlane_u, Instagram Elite Series pro Justin Lucas I use a PowerBait Jerk Shad rigged weightless with a 5/0 hook. This soft jerkbait perfectly mimics a dying bait-fish slowly falling to the bottom, which is what you want with a follow-up lure. The key to getting a return strike hinges on three things: accuracy, distance and quickness of the follow-up cast. Since you likely will not use your follow-up bait often, rigging it on a baitcaster is a huge mistake. That rod will be baking in the sun, so your first cast…

Tragedies in kayak fishing occur far too often because of inattentive people driving bigger boats. An easy way to heighten your visibility is with D.O.T. C2 reflective tape, the stuff truckers use that the U.S. Department of Transportation approves. The tiniest bit of light makes this stuff flare. It costs about a dollar a foot, but 10 feet is sufficient. Lined measurements on the back make cutting easy. 1 Decide where to place pieces of tape on deck so some pieces will reflect no matter where the light comes from. For my 14-foot Hobie, I cut 10 feet into 28 pieces ranging from 2 inches square to a foot long. 2 Most went along the top of the hull. 3 Some strips judiciously placed on the hull at and below…

A RECENT REPORT from the National Marine Manufacturers Association shows outboard boat retail sales were on the upswing in 2015, with bass boats and other fishing boats accounting for large portions of market share. Here’s a look at some of the report’s key figures. 14.4% Increase in outboard boat retail sales from 2014 to 2015 17.9% Rise in fiberglass outboard boat sales from 2014 to 2015 $38,385 Average price of an outboard boat package with engine and trailer in 2015 $3.8 billion Retail outboard boat sales in 2015…

This city plays host to the Bass Pro Shops Northern Open No. 2 on the James River Aug. 18-20. Downtown Fishing. An extensive park system allows easy access to good smallmouth bass fishing in the heart of downtown Richmond. Don’t forget the 11- to 14-inch protected slot limit. Fish House. If you’re looking for fish on a menu, don’t pass on a visit to Croaker’s Spot, a Richmond soul food and seafood icon. History 101. You can’t help but get caught up in the area’s rich Civil War history; it’s literally all around you.…

A Connecticut angler used an Arbogast Magnum Jitterbug to catch Rhode Island’s new record largemouth bass. Brandon Migliore caught the 11.2-pound fish on Johnson’s Pond on April 30. The fish was taken at night while Migliore was fishing with his longtime fishing buddy Matthew Sheldon, who had just landed an 8-plus-pound bass during the same trip. Migliore fished the Jitterbug on a 16-year-old St. Croix Premier spinning rod and 30-pound braid. The fish topped the previous record of 10.6 pounds set in 1991.…

National Top 10 Lakes 1. Toledo Bend, Texas/Louisiana 2. Mille Lacs Lake, Minnesota 3. Falcon Lake, Texas 4. Sam Rayburn Reservoir, Texas [114,000 acres] If Rayburn and Toledo Bend were sisters (almost Siamese twins, based on their proximity), The Bend would be Jessica Alba and Rayburn would be Jennifer Aniston. Although Alba is certainly hotter than any other female walking, Aniston is pretty stunning, as well. When you separate the two, Rayburn becomes even more appealing. A February FLW event here required a 20-pound-per-day average to win. A 27-pound, 10-ounce limit was weighed, as well as another handful in the 24-pound range. The productivity of this lake is a result of focused stocking efforts, according to Dave Terre of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. “The TPWD routinely stocks Florida…

National Top 10 Lakes 1. Clear Lake, California 2. Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, California 3. Lake Berryessa, California 4. Lake Havasu, Arizona/California [19,300 acres] Year-round sun and crystal-clear waters make this dessert oasis a popular tourist destination. Ideal growing conditions, steady water levels and lots of big bass are why anglers come to this Colorado River impoundment. Almost 18 pounds per day, anchored by a 5 1/2-pound or bigger fish, were needed to finish in the money at a National Bass West 2-day Open held in March. 5. Dworshak Reservoir, Idaho [17,090 acres] One local guide calls this “the least used body of water in the state.” That’s surprising considering the last two record small-mouth came from here. Martin Koenig, Sportfishing Program Coordinator for Idaho Fish and Game, says Dworshak is…