Bass Opener 2009

Bass opener was a great success this year. Perfect weather, great fishing conditions, and great company. I decided to spend this long-awaited event at my cabin in Aitkin County. Fishing alongside me this weekend was my Dad, his wife, and my wife Sarah. We brought the pup up and he had a blast spending the whole weekend running around in the Great Outdoors. Below I will summarize what the lures and presentations I used to have a successful MN Bass Opener.

Initially on the first day out, I started the day by fan-casting an area with sporadic emergent vegetation, reeds to be exact, using a white with grey speckled Strike King spinner bait. There was a slight breeze to distrupt the surface of the water, so I thought a spinnerbait would work well as the breeze would somewhat mask my lure. I ended up catching 3 bass, the largest being over 18 inches and I estimate it was around 3-3.5 lbs.

On the following day, the water was a bit calmer and I decided to use my polarized sunglasses to my advantage. I noticed that the water temperature was between 61.5-63 degrees. This is perfect spawning temperatures. I decided to search the shallows to see if the bass had begun to spawn and if I could see beds. The water was stained but really clear, so I could see almost everything in 5ft or less of water. Sure enough, I spotted a few big bass holding to beds, along with many crappies holding to their beds as well. So, I decided to switch from my spinner bait to a bait that would entice the bass to protect their beds, as they would not be moving far off of them to chase baitfish.

I decided to go with a black with red flake salamander lizard soft plastic lure. I Texas-rigged this on a Gamakatsu 4/0 EWG hook with a 1/4 oz bullet weight. I was using a 7 ft medium heavy rod with a Quantum Accurist baitcaster spooled with 17 lb flourocarbon line. Once I had this bait rigged up, it pretty much did the work for me. I would make a medium distance cast where I knew there were beds around. I would estimate that 80% or more of my strikes occurred as the lure was falling off of the inital cast. I would let the bass take it in their mouth for a second, then rear back and set the hook. I literally caught between 10-15 3-lb bass using this technique. I caught a few smaller males that were cruising around as well. My dad was pitching a jig for a bit with limited success, and once I got him switched over to the salamander, he was catching the big ones as well.

I read that bass absolutely hate lizards and salamanders because they are a naturally enemy of their hatch. This is why I decided to use them this day and give it a try. Now I have to restock my arsenal as the bass just demolished almost all of them. Overall, it was a great trip with lots of fish caught. All bass were quickly released and I watch many of them head right back to their spawning site.

I should have a video posted soon, but I want to edit out some of the down time when I didn't catch a fish. Actually, I didn't catch a fish at all on camera, but my dad caught a nice 3 lber on film. He said that he performs well under pressure...

Thanks for visiting!

PS- Sarah caught a beauty of a fish in between reading her books. She exclaimed "Put me on the blog!" So here it is..

Carl "Skip" Spande

Lakes Area Bassmasters, May 2nd, Long Lake, WI

Lakes Area Bassmasters kicked off the season on Wisconsin's fishing opener at Long Lake in Polk County, Wisconsin. All but 3 members were in attendance, so there were 8 anglers ready to start the season on a beautiful May 2nd morning. I was more than excited and ready to my hand at a brand new lake.

7 a.m. was our takeoff time and my dad and I were all set with our 16 rods between us in our SmokerCraft. We started the day on a steep bank shoreline. I was casting a Storm Wiggle Wort, hoping for a crankbait bite. On my 3rd cast I hooked into a nice northern pike. We landed him and after a little surgery, we set him free and I was on my way to retying my lure. About 15 minutes later, I caught my second pike. So far, I have about 10lbs caught in pike, with zero bass to show.

For those curious about the conditions, it was a high pressure day with high skies and there was about 20mph winds later in the day. The water temperature never rose above 52.5 degrees. Long Lake, despite its name, isn't large or that long at all. I believe it is in the mid-200 acres and crystal clear. I could easily see the sand bottom in over 12 feet of water. So to get to the point, this is less than optimal conditions.

To make a long story short, I zeroed for the day. Out of 8 anglers, only 3 guys brought fish to the weigh-in, and a limit was not caught. In total, only 6 fish were weighed, out of a possible 40 that could have been brought to the scales.

I would like to say "Congrats" to those that caught the fish under those tough conditions. It was a very frustrating day, but to be honest, there was nothing I would have rather been doing. I guarantee these posts will get better with some photos of nice fish caught. Stay faithful and Team BassAckwards will come through.

Thanks for visiting!

Carl