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I am often amused by the occasional angry phone call we get here in the office from readers who are irate about the information in some of our reports. They will accuse our sources of lying or at least stretching the truth because they just fished the same lake or river and didn't catch a single fish. Well, let me tell you through my own experience, there is nothing more frustrating than hearing about how fantastic the fishing is when you can't put a fish in the boat. I can also tell you that no matter how tough the fishing appears, more than likely, someone has put in their time, figured out a pattern and is probably enjoying a great day of fishing. For the tournament fisherman, this general rule of thumb is proved out every week on just about every body of water in the north state. A perfect example is the latest NewBass tournament held out of Ladd's Marina on the California Delta on September 9. I fished this tournament with fellow staffer Albert Berends and we experienced one of the slowest days of fishing during the past year. While the bite has been fairly tough most of the summer, we have always been able to put a limit of fish in the boat. However, Saturday's bite was almost non-existent and we only managed a paltry 3 keepers in 6 hours of fishing. We tried every trick under our sleeves that day and just couldn't get things going. We started out looking for a big fish bite on buzzbaits, Zara Spooks and Snag Proof frogs in Fourteen Mile Slough, but didn't get a single touch on any of those baits. After two hours, we decided to head out onto the San Joaquin River where limits of smaller fish in the 1 to 2-1/2 pound class have been fairly easy to come by for the past two months. Albert was throwing a chrome/blue Speed Trap and I was using a silver/black Rat-L-Trap. Three hours into our cranking efforts, all we had to show for our efforts were two tiny keepers that barely made the 13 inch mark and one decent fish just a hair over 3 pounds. |
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With barely an hour left, we decided to hang it out and target frog fish in one of our favorite dead end sloughs on the east delta. Conditions were ideal with warming temperatures, plenty of floating "cheese" for the fish to hide under and an incoming tide. Unfortunately, the fish had no idea they were supposed to be on a feeding frenzy and we never had a single blow up. Time to head back to weigh-ins. This was our first Delta tournament in over three years of fishing together that we couldn't put a limit in the boat. Pulling into the marina, we spoke to several other anglers who also had a tough go of it. Andy Newby and his partner only had four fish, three other teams we spoke to had one or two fish and Leroy Bertolero said he didn't catch a keeper the entire day. The final clue to what a tough day it was happened when we saw Steve Sapp put his boat on the trailer without even weighing in. Just when we were starting to feel a little better about things, (misery loves company) Albert asked Dee Thomas if he was able to catch a limit. "Heck son, the bite's wide open! We probably caught six limits of fish today," he said. "And we didn't even hit my big fish water." Dee and his partner weighed in a couple boats in front of Albert and I and everyone's jaws hit the floor when they weighed in a 27 plus pound limit. One other team brought in a big limit, around 25 pounds and I believe there was only a couple other limits weighed in by the 20 plus teams in the tournament. So what did Albert and I learn from this experience? We need to spend a whole lot more time on the water if we want to compete on the Delta. While we have lucked out several times in last couple years without pre-fishing, we know the guys like Dee who put in their time are going to be tough to beat. This also confirmed our belief that there is always a good bite going on somewhere in the Delta and you're dead in the water if you stick with something that isn't working. Had we been a little more open minded and versatile, things could have turned out much different. |
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