Thursday, July 26, 2012

Arkansas River BFL

Friday morning I had some work to do before I left for the tournament at Muskogee, OK on the Arkansas River.  I quickly packed everything and headed to work.  The boys started getting all crazy when I told them they weren't going with me.  They hate when I pack my poles and not theirs. 

After working for about an hour I took off on my 4 1/2 hour drive to Muskogee.  About an hour down the road I realized I had forgotten my tackle out of the boat.  I had grabbed my tournament bag but had forgotten that on Memorial weekend I had been Walleye and Crappie fishing and had switched my boxes out.  All of my terminal tackle and crankbaits were in the boat.

If I turned around I would be pushing it to get to Muskogee.  Especially since I didn't know where the pairing meeting was to be held and it did not pull up on mapquest or my GPS.  I needed time to drive around if need be.

I passed through Broken Arrow on the way and stopped at the Bass Pro to stock up on some necessity's as well as a quite a few other things.  Forgetting my stuff was a $70.00 mistake.  Not really.  I picked up a lot of cool things that should help out in the future and I restocked all of my hooks, jig heads, and bullet weights as well as added some new goodness to my arsenol.

When I got to Muskogee I checked into Days Inn.  It was nice for the price of the room.  They told me how to get to the marina and where Walmart was located.

I drew a great boater and an early position, which was good.  It was going to be hot the next day, 106 degrees, and I wanted to get them early.

The next morning I missed my turn to the marina and showed up a little bit late to meet my partner.  We still had time to help out another boater get their boat in the water. 

We took off at 6:00 AM and made a huge run down the river.  A couple hours later we were fishing.  My boater quickly pulled in 2 keepers, then a third. 

I was getting bit, but it was light and when I set the hook my bait was wadded up on the hook but no fish.  My boater finally told me I was setting the hook too late.  I needed to set the hook as soon as I felt the fish. 

We fished in about 1/2  a foot of water most of the day.  This, again, as in every tournament this year was new to me.  I caught one fish that touched 14 inches when I measured it but when my boater measured it was about an 1/8th of an inch short.  I hated to throw it back but 1/8 of an inch will cost you dearly.

My boater rounded out his limit but had his big one die due to how he had hooked it under the tongue.  Before we left my boater said lets go hit some rocks.  I was excited, this was my chance.  I love deeper water.  I started out with my regular rock bait.  My boater said that he has luck there with crankbaits.  I switched to a crankbait and right away got hit by a 15 1/2 incher. 

That would be it for the day.  We had a long run back and the wind had picked up.  It was a rough ride back.  We couldn't slow down as we had to get back in time to lock through.  We were in the air more than on the water for quite a while.  It was a little fun but my back paid the price.

I caught a couple of rock bass in the river on the way back to the ramp but no bass.

My bass weighed in at just under 2 pounds and was good for 45th place out of 90.  It moved me up in points from 34th to 23rd for the year with the Grand Lake tournament remaining.  The cutoff for Regionals is 40th place.  If I catch 1 keeper at Grand Lake I should make it to the regionals.  I would like to better than that though.  This will be my 1st tournament with some previous experience on the body of water we are fishing. 

After the tournament I drove to Oklahoma City to visit Mizike.  We went out to the casino for a couple hours that evening for something to do.  I ended up leaving with an extra 250.00 thanks to my favorite slot machine.

The next day we ate at Toby Keith's restaraunt.  The chicken fried steak was huge.  It was the size of 2 or 3 regular chicken fried steaks.  I at the whole thing and all of my sides.  Dang you, Man vs. Food.  I was miserable.  We checked out the museum of osteology after that.  Then I headed home. 

It was a great weekend.  I learned some new fishing techniques, and had a load of fun.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

We Killed the Rabbit


 Holy smokes it's 2 months later into the summer and I am just getting around to posting again.  Quite a bit has happened since the last post. 

We are expecting another little fisherperson.  Look out crappies!  We are thinking that it will be sometime around February.  Christina has been pretty sick with this one.  She is sick all day and evening.  Hopefully that lets up soon, she is so miserable.

I had never heard the saying, "She killed the rabbit", before this pregnancy.  Maybe it's because we lived in a different society with our last two pregnancy's.  Wildlife is a lot more thought of here.  Apparently, before pregnancy tests, they would use a female rabbit and inject a woman's urine into it.  If the woman was pregnant there would be a distinct change to the ovaries of the rabbit.  Some believed that the rabbit's died from this change, but in reality the rabbits would be killed when they would disect it to look at the ovaries.  In fact any woman that thought she might be pregnant then "Killed the Rabbit".

I also got the boat registered.  It only took 1 year to get everything legalized.  If I move states again, I will sell my boat no matter how much I love it.  It's not worth not being able to fish during the prime fishing season.  Now it's miserably hot and the fish are harder to catch.

I did go back to Glen Elder the week after my last post.  I took the boys back and we had fun in the wind.  Apparently it blew for 11 days straight above 40 mph.  You would think that would be some kind of record.  Around there I am sure it is not even close. 

We caught a few more fish, but still it was slow.  I haven't whacked em at all this year. 

This last weekend we took a trip with Mizike and his family down to Broken Bow, Oklahoma.  That area is so green and the water is crystal clear.  It feels like you should be catching trout, not bass.

We didn't fish much but did get a few hours in.  I had 1 bass take my worm and swim with it.  When I set the hook there was nothing.  I could see him swimming with my lure in his mouth at 7 foot deep.  He was a monster of a fish around 5 pounds.  That was my only decent fish except for a little smallmouth that took my worm next to a stump.  As soon as he hit he headed straight for the surface.  I tried pulling sideways to keep him from coming out of the water but there was no deterring him.  He lept several feet into the air and right at the peak of his jump my lure comes gliding out of his mouth.  It was a spectacular jump.  I have never seen a fish get that high out of the water.

Next weekend is the FLW BFL tournament out of Muskogee, OK on the Arkansas River.  It will be a blast to fish even in this heat.  Rivers are generally tougher fishing than lakes but in a tournament you can get away from the crowds.  I like tougher tournaments.  I tend to do better in them.  After fishing Broken Bow, I am looking forward to some stained water.

With some luck, I may have a chance for a check in this tournament.