|
GREAT WEATHER, BUT TOUGH
FISHING!
By: Ron Wilson
April 11, 2006....
Wow the second Saturday in a row with great
weather! I checked the weather on
KCRA 3 Doppler radar and knew it was going to be a beautiful day.
Bass Pro Norval Pimentel of Modesto
and I fished the Nor-Cal Team tournament held at Lake Don Pedro.
Norval and I were the first boat out.
Just great, neither of us had done any pre-fishing and had no place to
go!
Blast off came and Norval headed to a
rock pile in first bay near the nudist camp where he caught a couple
small fish. I had fished the last Nor-Cal event with Mr.
Super Pork Robin
Lowe so I took Norval to the spot where we had caught two nice fish but
nobody was home.
Next stop was up in 3rd bay on an
island top. But we had no luck there either. I asked Norval about 6 Bit,
but he said it would probably be to muddy, We went in and sure
enough it was chocolate, what we didn’t know was that if you went back
further in the water cleared up.
Next stop was Poor Mans Gulch, the
water was clear in the back but no fish. Norval tossed a pig and jig on
the way out and dumped one at the boat before I got the net. He then
Carolina rigged a Brushhog and soon had a good fish on that came
unbuttoned when it started to jump.
I was really getting frustrated, here
it was noon and I had yet to even get a bite! I was tossing all the
baits that were supposed to be working, but the fish just didn’t want to
bite what I tossed at them.
Next spot was down toward the power
lines, but no luck. Then he took me to a rock wall. Finally I had my
first
bite, a fish in the 2 pound class. I started feeling better. Norval made
another pass and I picked up an 1001B 6 inch
Keeper worm and tossed it to the rocks and a 3 pounder ate it on the
fall.
All right, I was back in the game.
Two fish in a half hour. Norval missed a couple more and then we moved
to another island top but had no luck.
Time was starting to run out so we
headed to Willow Creek, but nobody wanted anything we had to offer. We
sure didn’t want to end up with just 4 fish so Norval headed back to a
rock pile by the old nudist camp area. I switched to a 1050 Keeper 6
inch worm and tossed it out on a dart head near a rock. The bait started
coming back toward the boat way to fast. I reeled down and set on a real
nice smalley. I got it close to the boat but it sure didn’t like Norval
with the net and when it made its dash toward the bottom, like they all
do, the hook pulled free. Here it was 3 o’clock and we had a 3:30 weigh
in and I had just dumped out 5th fish! Norval made a cast and one ate
his 1059 Keeper worm. Man we had our limit finally!
I can’t think of a harder day I've
had on the water. At the weigh in I soon realized that all we had to do
was fish like we knew what we were doing and we would have had enough
fish in the boat to win the event, oh well that's why they call it
fishing!
Norval's new
Stratos Bass
Boat is a winner! Don’t know why but it seemed more steady in the water
that his old boat. I guess Bill Donaleski at
Bobs Marine
dialed the boat in for him real well. The new foot rest for the
passenger on the dual console is a winner to. I know that at 75 miles an
hour that console sure is nice to have in front of you and with that
foot rest I can add tension to press my big butt into the comfortable
seats and ride with my hands wrapped around a big old sandwich or a
couple pieces of chicken as we moved from fishing spot to fishing spot.
Maybe that was my problem, we had lots of food. Four sandwiches and a
bucket of chicken. Come to think of it Norval had one of his hands
wrapped around a piece of chicken when he dumped one of our good fish!
Great boat, great company, great
weather and the only thing that could of made it better is if the fish
would of bit better. I like the catching part of fishing! |
