Innholdsfortegnelse for November - December 2016 i Bassmaster

With the popularity of wacky rigging, and the increasing popularity of Neko rigging, the use of an O-ring on soft plastics has spiked. However, there are few efforts more frustrating than trying to slide a small O-ring over a floppy plastic bait. Although they make O-ring tools, Bassmaster Opens angler Jason Dudek makes his own with items lying around the house. Here’s how he does it. 1 Using a pair of pliers, remove the tip section of a Sharpie, including the ink cartridge. 2 Next, drill a hole in the butt end, using a 3/16-inch bit. Try to center the hole as best you can. 3 Into the hole you just drilled, screw a No. 12 by 2-inch stainless steel pan-head screw (the stainless will not rust). 4 Over the…

Drew Benton Hometown: Panama City, Fla. Birthday: May 10, 1988 What’s it like being from the city where everybody else goes on vacation and spring break? As far as the spring break part of it goes, I try to stay away from the beach. I rarely go to the beach much anyway unless it’s for something the family’s doing. I love saltwater fishing — flats, offshore, all of it. So it’s nice to go back home to that when you’ve been on the road. However, I’m a hunter, and it’s not as great for hunting, so I get to vacation somewhere else. Tell us about your college baseball days. I played catcher and outfield for Gulf Coast (State College). Fishing actually took the place of baseball for me when I…

Up The prospects for bass fishing on California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta after a petition to target bass for eradication was withdrawn before its scheduled review by the California Fish and Game Commission. A group of petitioners, largely made up of farming and water district interests, had sought to change size and bag limits for Delta bass. The petition was opposed by a coalition that included the American Sport-fishing Association, B.A.S.S. and the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, among others. Up Bass boat sales. According to industry data, sales of bass boats grew by a whopping 29.9 percent in the 12-month period ending in January 2016. The growth was fueled by increased sales of both lower-price-point, entry-level boats as well as high-end boats in the $50,000-$100,000 range. Rick Pierce, president of Bass Cat…

6 Daylight Saving Time ends. So fall back and don’t be late for takeoff. 8 Election Day. What a long, strange trip it’s been. 11 Veterans Day. A salute to those who have served. 17 World Philosophy Day. “I fish, therefore I am.” 24 Thanksgiving. Count your blessings December 21 National Flashlight Day. The flashlight was invented in 1898 by Joshua Lionel Cowen, who also invented the Lionel train. 21 Winter Solstice. It’s officially winter; who has the hand warmers? 24-Jan. 1 Hanukkah. Do they make a fishing-themed menorah? 25 Christmas. Dear Santa, just leave the new boat out front.…

A new poster featuring North American freshwater fish makes an interesting holiday gift, but bass enthusiasts should be aware that depictions of their favorite species might leave something to be desired. The 39-inch x 27-inch poster includes more than 900 species of freshwater fish in the U.S. and Canada, and to some extent, it shows the various species to scale based on average sizes. But when it comes to the Micropterus genus, dedicated bass anglers likely will notice problems with fish nomenclature and depictions. While it’s clear all the poster’s fish illustrations are designed to be more interpretative than realistic, some of the color schemes and patterns used in the bass group seem a bit arbitrary. There’s also the matter of scale, with the smallmouth, for example, depicted much smaller…

Pedal to the metal I saw a guy with a gas pedal bolted to the floor under the console of his bass boat. Is he just one of those “go-fast” guys, or is there a sensible reason for throttling by foot instead of the standard hand throttle? Hank Cottingham, Memphis, Tenn. A very good reason. It’s safer. Imagine running down the lake and the lake surface is churned wildly by boat traffic. Someone on a Jet Ski unexpectedly cuts in front of you. What do you do? With a foot throttle, you instantly let off the gas and both hands stay on the wheel for maximum maneuverability. “It’s a safety feature because you can react quicker,” says Jimmy Mason of T-H Marine, manufacturer of the Hot Foot. “Plus, in rough…

“Someone will catch a 10-pounder,” Keith Combs predicted, “and it won’t win big bass.” ON FEBRUARY 5, Houston will host an event some have come to know as “The Bassmaster Classic of Football.” Officially, it is Super Bowl LI. I was fortunate to attend a Super Bowl game in the not too distant past, and I can assure you, it’s a pretty big deal for football fans. But so is another championship to be played out in Houston next spring: the 2017 GEICO Bassmaster Classic presented by GoPro, which many refer to as the “Super Bowl of Bass Fishing.” Only a city as vibrant and large (it’s the fourth most populous city in in the United States) as Houston can handle two such spectacular events in a six-week period. Of…

Can you imagine a derby where almost every angler weighed in a 33-pound limit? That is the stuff history books are made of. EVER HEARD OF the “dog years” formula? You know, the one where you multiply your dog’s age by seven to give you an idea of how old your pet would be if it were human. The idea is to give you perspective, I think. So, when your 12-year-old English bulldog is hobbling around with a bum hip and is blind in one eye, you don’t treat it like a teenager who should be full of vim and vigor, but rather, coddle the pet like it has achieved 84 years of life. Well, while I was covering the recent Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year Championship at Mille…

The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission and Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission are partners in the Restoring Prairies and Glades for Fish and Anglers program, which removes invasive trees from 14 natural areas and places them in nearby reservoirs as fish habitat. A proposal by James City County to build a desalinization plant near the Chickahominy River’s confluence with the James is not sitting well with many who fear adverse consequences for the fishery and the ecosystem. A drought affecting much of the West has diminished Lake Mead to its lowest level in history, 37 percent capacity. The Arkansas Game and Fish (AGF) used a pontoon boat and crane to enhance fish habitat in the Salt River chain of reservoirs.…

Bill Evans and his wife, Vickie, moved from Ohio to Washington state four years ago to be closer to their grandchildren. But Evans also has found some excellent bass fishing in the Evergreen State. Evans, a longtime bass tournament angler who has qualified for the Bass Fishing League All-American, caught a 12.53-pound largemouth in August to break the state’s 39-year-old record for the species. Evans was fishing Lake Bosworth in Snohomish County on Aug. 9 when he skipped a wacky rigged green pumpkin Strike King Shim-E-Stick under a dock. According to an account of the catch on Strike King’s Facebook page, Evans wrestled the fish from under the dock and into deeper water. He was using a spinning rod with 8-pound-test line, and the fish made three big runs, pulling…

R.D. Hull, inventor of the Zebco spincast reel, didn’t just revolutionize fishing reel design in the mid-20th century. He also turned his idea for the Zebco reel into the house of his dreams. And for a cool $6 million, Hull’s dream home can be yours. Hull, the Texas watchmaker who was inspired to invent the Zebco reel by watching a butcher unravel string from a spool, commissioned architect Cecil Stanfield to create a house in the image of a fishing reel in the late 1960s. The house was built in Catossa, Okla., just outside Tulsa, in 1970 and recently was listed for sale through Chinowth and Cohen Realtors. The centerpiece of the 12,620-square-foot house is an indoor swimming pool, which sits beneath a 25-foot Lexan overhead dome. The five-bedroom, seven-bathroom…

LET ME MAKE one thing clear: Russ Lane is not a wimp. The 6-foot, 3-inch veteran Bassmaster Elite Series angler was a standout athlete at Huntingdon College in his home state of Alabama and pitched for the Richmond Roosters minor league baseball team before becoming a professional angler. Today, when not on the road competing in B.A.S.S. tournaments, he stays in shape through low-impact cardiovascular workouts and rigorous weight training. Put simply, he’s one big, tough dude. But on one frigid January morning back in 2007, Lane was shivering like a frightened bunny rabbit. In the wake of a monster cold front, the air temperature was only 10 degrees when Lane arrived at the remote reservoir for his “Day on the Lake” outing for Bassmaster. The pro looked as puffed…

IT SEEMS THAT 2016 was the year for killing dry spells on the Bassmaster Elite Series. Bass fishing legend Rick Clunn won his first-ever Elite title, his first trophy since topping an Open field in 2002. Takahiro Omori, Randall Tharp and Ott DeFoe also earned their first blue trophies this year, although each had wins in Bassmaster Opens event in years past. Britt Myers scored his very first B.A.S.S. victory after a decade of trying. And Kevin VanDam proved he was not done winning Elite Series events by dominating two this year, after a five-year hiatus from any first-place finishes (the most surprising dry spell of all). Following are the details of how each of these anglers topped the most talented field of fishermen the world has ever seen. MARCH…

Lake Okeechobee, Florida — In December in south Florida, bass are starting to go on beds. This is when Brandon Coulter “puts on the Costas” and goes sight fishing in 2- to 4-foot-deep spawning areas. When he spies a big hole in the vegetation, he casts to it with a lipless crankbait or a swimbait. Lake St. Clair, New York — Before ice starts forming here, look for smallmouth far back from the rivers, typically on flats in 6 to 8 feet of water. The bass will hold where there’s some type of hard bottom or where the weedlines have died back and clumped up. Coulter works these flats with swimbaits and shallow-diving crankbaits. Lake Guntersville, Alabama — Coulter says the bass bite in this Tennessee River reservoir…

Kevin Dame Florida 10-2 Lake Kissimmee, Florida ◆ 1/2-ounce Z-Man ChatterBait Elite ◆ Water clarity: stained ◆ Depth: 3 feet ◆ Weather: overcast, windy Jason Chase New York 6-13 Lake Erie, New York 3/8-ounce jig (green pumpkin) David Collyer Zimbabwe 10-6 Lake Mutirikwi, Zimbabwe Custom spinnerbait (green) Bill White Alabama 10-2 Private lake, Alabama Zoom Baby Brush Hog (watermelon red) Mark Copley Tennessee 6-8 Lower Niagra River, New York Strike King Coffee Tube (chaos) Greg Cope Tennessee 10-8 Lake Chickamauga, Tennessee Strike King 5.5-inch swimbait (shadalicious) Kris Cartrite Texas 10-0 Lake Alan Henry, Texas 3-inch Madman Craw (white) Scott Schooler Oklahoma 10-9 Farm pond, Oklahoma 1/2-ounce Booyah Blade spinnerbait, Double Willow Blade (black and red) To request an application, write to editorial@bassmaster.com or B.A.S.S., The Lunker Club, 3500…

“I’ve waited 12 to 15 seconds between pauses before and caught ’em. It’s painful but effective.”—Elite Series pro Randall Tharp TWO-BAIT BLUFF What’s the best tactic for fishing bluffs in cold water? @Mason_bass_fishing, Instagram Elite Series pro Russ Lane I mainly use two baits. First is a small crankbait. I parallel the bluff walls with a Spro Fat Papa 55 in crawfish color, cast right up against the wall and run it no farther than 5 or 6 feet out. Crawfish are the main forage for bass hanging out on this structure, and this crank can catch ’em quickly. If the fish aren’t right against the face of the bluff, I’ll throw a Buckeye Lures Football jig/Big Bite Baits YoDaddy craw trailer combo perpendicular to the structure. The bass are…

The Bassmaster Elite Series has joined forces with the popular Toyota Texas Bass Classic to introduce the Toyota Bassmaster Texas Fest, which will be held May 17-21 on Sam Rayburn Reservoir as part of the 2017 Elite Series season. The Toyota Bassmaster Texas Fest will combine features of Bassmaster’s popular BASSfest and the 10-year-old Toyota Texas Bass Classic, B.A.S.S. CEO Bruce Akin said. “Texas Fest will host a special Fan Appreciation Day offering anglers and their families opportunities to meet, greet and learn from the world’s best professional anglers,” Akin said. The event will continue to benefit the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD), which has been instrumental in introducing fishing conservation guidelines that have influenced tournaments across the U.S. The Toyota Bassmaster Texas Fest will emphasize best practices in…

Cast a lure in just about any direction from here and it’ll land in some of the Sunshine State’s best bass waters, including nearby Rodman Reservoir and Lake George. Silver Springs. Tourists have been flocking to these artesian springs for glass-bottom boat rides since the 1870s. What’s in a Name? The city takes its name from the Timucua village of Ocale, a name believed to mean “big hammock” in the Timucua language. BY THE NUMBERS 75 Average high temperature for November and December 269 Number of bass between 8 and 9.9 pounds submitted from Rodman Reservoir for Florida’s TrophyCatch Tracker…

THE STORY HAS been told so many times it certainly isn’t new, but yet, it deserves to be told once again. It’s Sunday, March 6, 2016, and with cloud cover and a strong south wind in the forecast, Edwin Evers gambles and makes a long run up Grand Lake’s Elk River, where he catches 29 pounds, 3 ounces to win the 2016 GEICO Bassmaster Classic presented by GoPro. That final-round catch is the heaviest ever recorded on the event’s final day, and his three-day total of 60-7 is the fourth heaviest in Classic history. Looking at the Talala, Okla., pro’s history — 16 years of competition, 11 wins, more than 60 Top 10s — Evers’ long run up the Elk River wasn’t exactly a gamble, but rather, simply part of…

There is a benefit to leading the points race throughout the year on the Elite Series … and it goes straight into the checking account. Toyota awarded $1,000 to the Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year (AOY) points leader at the end of each tournament, including BASSfest. So even if a fisherman didn’t end up with the title, being No. 1 during the year, even if for just one week, paid off. The winners were: Bassmaster Elite at St. Johns River — Rick Clunn Bassmaster Elite at Winyah Bay — Brent Chapman Bassmaster Elite at Bull Shoals/Norfork — Randall Tharp Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Elite at Wheeler Lake — Greg Hackney A.R.E. Truck Caps Bassmaster Elite at Toledo Bend — Greg Hackney GEICO Bassmaster BASSfest presented by Choctaw Casino…