Clear Fork Tournament

This Sunday we fished a Twin Rivers Bassmasters club tournament at Clear Lake. It was a pleasant change from most of the lakes that we fish as the lake had a lot of vegetation.

The weights were down this weekend for a couple of reasons. The water clarity is not as well as it was a couple weeks ago. Also, there were 2 club tournaments going out on the same day. The Columbus Bassmasters were out there as well.

This was the first time I had fished the lake, but have heard good things about it. I didn't prefish it as it is over an hour and a half from the house.

At the start of the day I did not know where to fish. I was going to fish along the South bank near the boat ramp or around the islands. We drew 2nd to last boat out and the other club had taken off by the time we got started so the South bank and islands were covered with boats.

We went North and found a nice spot that dropped to 9 foot close to shore. It had grass and lily pads. Everything looked good. I made a mistake and went to shore. I am out of practice fishing vegetation. The fish even showed themselves a lot out deep. There were quite a few closer to shore as well but the larger fish were deeper.

We worked topwater for a while with no success and I changed to rubber. About an hour after I started working the shoreline I decided to head out in the middle of a cove to try for the suspended bass that kept working the surface. Dave pulled a 2 1/2 pounder out pretty quickly. As soon as he did the fish quit working the surface and we didn't get another bite there.

We moved to the South shore and I picked up a 1 3/4 pounder pretty quick followed by a 12 1/2 incher. I had caught a few more shorts in the process. As soon as I caught the 12 1/2 incher the bite died considerably.

The rest of the day I pulled out an occasional short fish. Finally around 1:00 I landed another 12 1/2 incher. That would be the last keeper for us.

At the weigh in we heard that most of the boats had their limits by 9:00 and barely caught fish the rest of the day as well. If I was to go back again next week I am sure I could get a quick limit and have a shot.

My 3 fish weighed 3.53 pounds. I finished near the bottom. First place had over 7 pounds and second and third had over 6 pounds.

I will prefish Griggs for our upcoming club tournament. I have to have a few productive spots figured out or I risk not catching a fish. The fish here seem to only feed for a couple hours in the morning. After that it is nearly impossible to catch a keeper.