I met up with Lzyfish at Clear Lake Wednesday afternoon and got camp set up. Thursday morning I slept in and drank coffee before getting on the water. The weather had turned to wind and rain so any bed fishing that was happening the week before was over for the time being.
I fished the keys and flipped a couple of nice fish from the trees, senko'd up a couple and got one around 5 on a drop shot. Friday pre-fishing was a little better for bites. I stuck a nice one on a jig and had a few bites on a brush hog that I shook off for the most part. I looked all over for bed fish but they were not around yet.

Day 1
I headed to the canal leading in to the south end of the keys and flipped a 4+ fish right away then headed into the docks and started fishing. I worked all the way to the back and back out again for only 2 more bites for another 4+ and a 3+. At about noon I decided to go out and brave the wind and white caps to see if I could get some fish off the rock piles and was rewarded with 2 more fish to fill my limit.
The sucky thing is that when I caught my last fish with a couple hours still to go I had 1 fish belly up in the live well and another on the way. My pump was running but quite pumping water sometime earlier so I wasn't re-circulating and the fish were on their last leg. I took the dead one out of the live well and hung it in the water on the side of my boat by the culling buoy, so not to contaminate the rest of the fish in there. I then started to scoop water into the well with a water bottle I cut the top off of. Every ten minutes or so I stopped fishing and put 20 scoops of water in the well with a little fish dope. A while later I noticed the DOA hanging on the side of the boat was moving a little. I thought hey maybe I can save it. I put it on a longer rope I carry and it started to swim, just a little at first then it came back to life. The one that was doing poorly earlier had also perked up and I ended the day with 18.40 pounds for the five bites I had all day with no DOA's.

Day 2
I headed right back into the same area I had fished day 1 but only hit the key locations. The fish were just moving up and on the first day I got all my bites on the first or second tree after turning into the side canals off the main canal. Sunday I was able to get 2 more 4+ fish pretty quick from these same spots then made the move to the rock piles about 8:30am. Fish #3 was a 2.5er I flipped in the main canal on the way out to the lake.
The rock piles didn't produce so I tried to decide if I should head back into the keys or search the shallows for bed fish, that were not there on Friday or Saturday.
I opted to go looking for beds. Best decision I made all day!
I was cruising around tossing an A rig when I snagged on something in the middle off nowhere. It turned out to be a sunken boat in 5 feet of water, with a bed right next to it with 2 fish on it. I caught one right away and had another solid 3+ fish in the boat. As I was putting the fish in the live well I drifted over another pair of big fish doing the dance. The female looked to be 9 or 10 and was locked on. I went to work and proceeded to hook and lose this fish 2 times in the next 20 minutes, then she spooked and was gone. I said some bad words and regrouped, then caught the male and weighed him in. He was just shy of 5 pounds and the big girl he was with was about twice his size. In the end I caught 5 bed fish all males and culled up twice. Day 2 I had 18.88 at the scales and ended the weekend with 37.28 pounds for third place.

I want to thank Rob and Taylor for running a very smooth show. And thanks to everyone else who came out and fished the open this year. I had a great time and hope to see everyone there next year.

And I would also personally like to thank all the sponsors who came through big time with goodies for the raffle. It was awesome!

Coyote Bait and Tackle
Walton's Pond
Bass Tackle Depot
Chubby Chaser Baits
Dichoso Baits
Catchem Caro Baits
Little Creeper
Tackle It
Limit Out Bait and Tackle
Rodstrainer
Miller Punchin weights
And whoever else I'm forgetting

EDIT:
Flippin The Bird is who I'm forgetting, so a big thanks to them also!


MT

Great report and good job. I hope more reports are posted for those who werent there