Cletus T.
Senior Member
Well folks….Good Friday turned out to be a Great Friday because number one, I had off from work and number two I went fishing. I guess you could go ahead and say number three also which of course is we caught a boo-koo of bass. I went fishing with my dear friend Mr. Wojo Jenkins (who is about as solid as they come) on his home lake. This lake is a private 50 acre lake / pond that he lives on. There are boat docks and it’s a great place to build that confidence because there are so many hungry bass out there, but you see there in lies the problem. You will either catch a 7-pounder or you will catch a rinky-dink. There is very few fish in between that size. There have been some giants caught out of there including a 13-pounder and two years ago on Good Friday, Mr. Wojo Jenkins busted a bass that was just a few ounces shy of 9 pounds and then 5 casts later I caught one weighing 7 and a half pounds right out of the same spot. (Big fish like to hang out together). Wojo has taken it upon himself to get this fishery right and he is doing one jam up job too. We were logging in long hours there during 2007 and 2008 and he even hired Greg Grimes to do an analysis of his lake so he could get a better grip on the situation. We got a little off track in 2009 because was building his new house so we didn’t fish it as much but for a while there we were doing some serious pond management and taking out the little bass. Wojo would take these fish out and move them to another pond out there or he would give them to somebody who wanted them to eat. This man has built fish attractors and sunk them out there because there is very little cover out there but he has placed these fish holding structures in very select places and the fish are relating to them very well. I tell you all this to lay the groundwork for what we are doing out there which is “Getting it Right”. We are harvesting the little bass so the bigger bass can grow and also so you can catch them because they are out there but they can’t get to your jig in time because the second it hits the water there is a wolf pack of 10-12 inch bass smacking your bait. We got back on the pond management train yesterday and I mean in a big way. So sit back and hitch a ride on the Pond Management Train…….Choooooo……Chooooooo!!!!
We meet at the boat ramp a little before 7 a.m. and I have Wojo a black coffee and a BEC (Bacon Egg & Cheese) that I place in his hand. I have already eaten my SEC (Sausage Egg & Cheese) and I was ready to get down to business. We scooted straight across the lake and I got busy with a crankbait. It wasn’t but a few casts into it when a little ole 10-incher smacked my lure. This was the first pond management bass of the day but he would soon have a lot of friends in that livewell with him. Wojo was throwing a bluegill pattern “Rat-Trap” and just burning that bad boy and he was ripping the lipps straight off the tiny dancers. It wasn’t long before we had 10 fish in the box. The moon was still bright in the sky and I have some quality videoing of this and I also have some footage of a beautiful red-tail hawk pouncing on some breakfast down in the grass. It was awesome. We couldn’t ever tell exactly what it was he was dinning on but it looked like he was getting his protein. We fish the Rat-Traps and crankbaits for most the morning getting a really good reaction bite. The sun started to climb the ladder and get high in the sky and we started getting downright dirty with them with some soft plastics and I was throwing my little baby doll green pumpkin jig. I got so much confidence in this bait its silly. As Wojo put it, “Every bass in America will eat that jig” Wojo is whacking them with a green pumpkin lizard and he is mixing in a Senko every now and then too. He was like a Jedi-Master on the front of the boat at times.
We visited the one spot where there have been a lot of big girls caught out of and we just felt like a repeat of what we caught on that Good Friday two years ago might be in order. There is a brush pile that sits in about 5-6 feet of water right on the edge of some deeper water and it’s just a great place that holds big fish year after year and really all through the year too. There have been big girls caught out of here in the winter as well as the spring and one time back a few summers ago I hooked into one that still haunts me. She broke my line as well as my heart but not before I got a real good look at her. Her eyeballs were the size of a drink coaster and she gave me the evil eye right before she snapped my line. Ask Wojo about it…..he was there. So was Hunter Jack……he still talks about that faithful day. We fished it and caught a few small ones off of it but no big girls wanted to come out and play tag with us.
We move on around the lake and pick up more and more rinky-dinks and we just load the box with bass. We have a measuring stick laid out on the floor of the boat and if the bass is less than 14 inches then it’s out of there. Every now and then Caesar a.k.a. Wojo will give the thumps up to a little runt that gives a great effort or it just has some characteristics that we like…….like big dark eyeballs or a fat gut on it even though the rest of its body is thin…..its belly sags……we like that in those tiny dancers and some of those get dropped back in the box. We don’t ever lay into a big girl and we did see a few nice ones cruising and even a few close to a bed where their male counter part was guarding home base. Wojo made the quote of the day after catching a very feisty 16-inch fish. As he was trying to unbutton the hook from the top lip of this particular bass it was really fired up and its gills were flared out and it was munching down on Wojo’s hand he made this comment and it fired me up……. “Gahhhhh….they are just such a predator” and they are folks. Largemouth Bass are predators…….don’t let them fool you. We have the Led Zeppelin playing once again in the boat and Wojo firmly believes that largemouth bass love Led Zeppelin and I would have to say that I agree with him.
No we never busted that fat bellied pig of a bass but we know that they are in there and hopefully with the little bit of pond management that we did, it will make it easier for Mama-Sow to come out and dance with us. I knew the box was getting pretty ful because there were times that between Wojo casts and my casts that we caught bass on back to back to back casts. That’s 6 fish in the box in a matter of 5 minutes. We only fished till high noon (12 o’clock) since I needed to get back and Wojo was celebrating his 5-year anniversary with his lovely wife Laura who is doll baby and a wonderful lady who is full of life. I tell Wojo this all time and he would agree with it but he defiantly married up. He got the better end of that deal but they are a beautiful couple with two beautiful kids and we are blessed to have them in our lives. We loaded up and I hit the road but I told him ole Wojo to send me text on how many fish we took out because he takes them right up the street to another pond and dumps them in there because its kind of a kids pond and the bass are always hungry which those kids really like. I got a text from him right as I was pulling in the driveway. The text said this…… “We took 62 bass out today”. Man….I knew we had caught a bunch but I guess I was thinking more along the lines of 40 but I’ll take it and the J-Shore Hawg Pen (Name of Lake) will take it too! With the 10-12 fish that we did throw back you're talking about a 75-fish day!!! What a beautiful Spring day it was and my Good Friday turned into a Great Friday because I got a friend who will take me out on his shinny boat and let me fish his lake and even though the bid fish didn’t show up I still had an awesome time and made some lasting memories. Stay tuned for more reports from the J-Shore Hawg Pen because we are getting it right!!!
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We meet at the boat ramp a little before 7 a.m. and I have Wojo a black coffee and a BEC (Bacon Egg & Cheese) that I place in his hand. I have already eaten my SEC (Sausage Egg & Cheese) and I was ready to get down to business. We scooted straight across the lake and I got busy with a crankbait. It wasn’t but a few casts into it when a little ole 10-incher smacked my lure. This was the first pond management bass of the day but he would soon have a lot of friends in that livewell with him. Wojo was throwing a bluegill pattern “Rat-Trap” and just burning that bad boy and he was ripping the lipps straight off the tiny dancers. It wasn’t long before we had 10 fish in the box. The moon was still bright in the sky and I have some quality videoing of this and I also have some footage of a beautiful red-tail hawk pouncing on some breakfast down in the grass. It was awesome. We couldn’t ever tell exactly what it was he was dinning on but it looked like he was getting his protein. We fish the Rat-Traps and crankbaits for most the morning getting a really good reaction bite. The sun started to climb the ladder and get high in the sky and we started getting downright dirty with them with some soft plastics and I was throwing my little baby doll green pumpkin jig. I got so much confidence in this bait its silly. As Wojo put it, “Every bass in America will eat that jig” Wojo is whacking them with a green pumpkin lizard and he is mixing in a Senko every now and then too. He was like a Jedi-Master on the front of the boat at times.
We visited the one spot where there have been a lot of big girls caught out of and we just felt like a repeat of what we caught on that Good Friday two years ago might be in order. There is a brush pile that sits in about 5-6 feet of water right on the edge of some deeper water and it’s just a great place that holds big fish year after year and really all through the year too. There have been big girls caught out of here in the winter as well as the spring and one time back a few summers ago I hooked into one that still haunts me. She broke my line as well as my heart but not before I got a real good look at her. Her eyeballs were the size of a drink coaster and she gave me the evil eye right before she snapped my line. Ask Wojo about it…..he was there. So was Hunter Jack……he still talks about that faithful day. We fished it and caught a few small ones off of it but no big girls wanted to come out and play tag with us.
We move on around the lake and pick up more and more rinky-dinks and we just load the box with bass. We have a measuring stick laid out on the floor of the boat and if the bass is less than 14 inches then it’s out of there. Every now and then Caesar a.k.a. Wojo will give the thumps up to a little runt that gives a great effort or it just has some characteristics that we like…….like big dark eyeballs or a fat gut on it even though the rest of its body is thin…..its belly sags……we like that in those tiny dancers and some of those get dropped back in the box. We don’t ever lay into a big girl and we did see a few nice ones cruising and even a few close to a bed where their male counter part was guarding home base. Wojo made the quote of the day after catching a very feisty 16-inch fish. As he was trying to unbutton the hook from the top lip of this particular bass it was really fired up and its gills were flared out and it was munching down on Wojo’s hand he made this comment and it fired me up……. “Gahhhhh….they are just such a predator” and they are folks. Largemouth Bass are predators…….don’t let them fool you. We have the Led Zeppelin playing once again in the boat and Wojo firmly believes that largemouth bass love Led Zeppelin and I would have to say that I agree with him.
No we never busted that fat bellied pig of a bass but we know that they are in there and hopefully with the little bit of pond management that we did, it will make it easier for Mama-Sow to come out and dance with us. I knew the box was getting pretty ful because there were times that between Wojo casts and my casts that we caught bass on back to back to back casts. That’s 6 fish in the box in a matter of 5 minutes. We only fished till high noon (12 o’clock) since I needed to get back and Wojo was celebrating his 5-year anniversary with his lovely wife Laura who is doll baby and a wonderful lady who is full of life. I tell Wojo this all time and he would agree with it but he defiantly married up. He got the better end of that deal but they are a beautiful couple with two beautiful kids and we are blessed to have them in our lives. We loaded up and I hit the road but I told him ole Wojo to send me text on how many fish we took out because he takes them right up the street to another pond and dumps them in there because its kind of a kids pond and the bass are always hungry which those kids really like. I got a text from him right as I was pulling in the driveway. The text said this…… “We took 62 bass out today”. Man….I knew we had caught a bunch but I guess I was thinking more along the lines of 40 but I’ll take it and the J-Shore Hawg Pen (Name of Lake) will take it too! With the 10-12 fish that we did throw back you're talking about a 75-fish day!!! What a beautiful Spring day it was and my Good Friday turned into a Great Friday because I got a friend who will take me out on his shinny boat and let me fish his lake and even though the bid fish didn’t show up I still had an awesome time and made some lasting memories. Stay tuned for more reports from the J-Shore Hawg Pen because we are getting it right!!!
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