swimbait | Wed Dec-17-08 10:01 PM |
Charter member
9890 posts
| |
|
#10816, "RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish"
In response to In response to 0
|
Aright, you got me to go through the old shoe boxes in the spare bedroom. I couldn't find the picture of my first swimbait fish and I'm not 100% sure that one exists. Need to check at my parents in my old "big fish" album. I did find a few polaroids from the same roll though. Which brings us back to January, 1998 at Santa Margarita lake. But before we go there...
I used to read Western Outdoor News religiously back in high school. Living in Santa Barbara I was fascinated reading about Alan Cole and others catching huge bass at Casitas on swimbaits. It made total sense to me that bass ate trout, but I was a trout/ocean fisherman at the time and had no clue at all about bass.
When Jamon and I used to fish for bass back then we only used two things. Either a 7" power worm texas rigged with no weight or a 2 and 3/4" floating Rapala in gold/black. The power worm we would deadstick on the bottom without moving it. Looking back it's amazing the bites we would get after letting that worm sit on the bottom for 3-5 minutes on a slack line. The Rapala we fished just like it said on the package. Cast out, wait for the ripples to die, then twitch it under - and repeat. We only used 6lb test with trout rods, and we caught a lot of bass. Sometimes I think I should try those techniques again.
Wound up making a few trips with Dave Jochman to Casitas in his 17' aluminum boat and somewhere in 1996 time frame I bought a 7" AC Plug. We'd tow up there in his Taurus station wagon and fish like hell for bass. Dave was from Illinois and I was just clueless. Neither of us had a good idea how to catch bass in 20 foot visibility water - which was how Casitas was fishing that year.
We went 4 or 5 times and caught one bass. A 3 pound bed fish I caught on a kalins grub. I didn't know what a bed fish was, I just knew that the stupid bass took a swipe at my lure and kept on hitting it when I cast back at it. We had almost drifted past when it finally hit. Boy I thought that bass was stupid. I don't think we ever had a follow on our AC Plugs but we sure tried.
1997 I was going to Cal Poly and decided to go to Santa Margarita lake. Didn't fish much my freshman year, don't know why. I have this recollection of catching a trout on powerbait the first day I went there, then catching a bass on a powerworm. The first reports I posted on calfishing.com were April 1999 so I don't have the report from that day. Someday I'll find my old archives of Jamon and Rob's fishing page on CD and see if I can resurrect them.
After a while I drug my Lews Float Tube up to Margarita and tried for bass. Started catching them on black/blue jigs with a single tail grub on 12lb test with a 7'10" walleye trolling rod. I remember buying that rod because I liked how the guides were small. Someone must have told me to use a long rod for flipping so I put two and two together - or so I thought. Flipping trash pockets was a good pattern back then though it was hard to pull them out of the junk.
January 1998 I got my head souped up to try my AC Plug some more (the green liar probably did it to me). I tied up my 7 inch bait on a 9'2" Sabre 190-9 glass rod with a Calcutta 400 (the no levelwind edition) with 25lb Triple Fish Camo. That 7" AC Plug felt like casting a 1/4oz speed trap on 15lb with that rod! I don't know how many trips it took (it took quite a few) but one day casting by the ramp I thought I hung a stick but it turned out to be a bass.
It's tough to lip bass with a 9' rod in a float tube but everything worked out. It was a nice fish, probably the biggest I had ever caught. I'd like to say it was a 5 pounder but didn't own a scale back then so that's between me and the Bass Gods now. I caught another one that day which I think is the fish in this photo. Just seeing the photo of those chrome hooks makes me cringe remembering all the strikes I missed with that lure (no, switching to the walleye rod didn't help my bite to land ratio - I tried).
http://www.calfishing.com/files/Images/daily_reports/1999_01_margarita.jpg
Here's a super sweet bonus photo of me fishing from shore in March that year. Hope it brings you a laugh like it does for me.
http://www.calfishing.com/files/Images/daily_reports/1999_03_margarita.jpg
|
|
|
| #1 - Your first swimbait fish
[View all] , Nico, Wed Dec-17-08 06:38 PM
| | RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
swimbait,
Dec 17th 2008 #1
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Matt Peters,
Dec 18th 2008, #2
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
socalfrogger,
Dec 18th 2008, #3
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Matt Peters,
Dec 18th 2008, #5
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
magmaster,
Dec 18th 2008, #6
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Sacto John,
Dec 18th 2008, #4
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
swimbait,
Dec 18th 2008, #7
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
PHISHnutS,
Dec 18th 2008, #8
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Carrot Top,
Dec 18th 2008, #10
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
dickthompson,
Dec 18th 2008, #9
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Slough Crew,
Dec 29th 2008, #11
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
swimbait,
Dec 29th 2008, #12
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Slough Crew,
Dec 31st 2008, #13
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
Gilbert,
Dec 31st 2008, #14
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
SWMB8R,
Jan 01st 2009, #15
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
bassindon69,
Jan 02nd 2009, #16
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
LimitedOut,
Jan 02nd 2009, #17
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
BassDaddy,
Jan 03rd 2009, #18
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
ll kaidoy ll,
Jan 05th 2009, #19
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
GGR,
Jan 12th 2009, #20
RE: #1 - Your first swimbait fish,
robert mendez,
Jan 13th 2009, #21
| |
|
|
© Copyright Robert Belloni 1997-2012. All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without express written consent.
|