Lake Ida – League Tournament
June 19th, was the night of storm after storm. The tournament normally runs from 5:30pm to 9:00 pm. But what started off as a cloudy warm night turned butt-ugly around 7:00pm. The wind picked up and it started to rain and rain and rain. Then the lightening started and by 7:30pm both Roy and I decided it was a good time to put his boat on the trailer and wait this storm out on shore, three other teams felt the same way and after 2-hours of fishing Roy and I, along with the other 3-teams were done. But, some of the other teams stayed out until 9:00pm. Once the other teams got to the weigh-in safely, we weighed our bags.
In our two hours of fishing we caught 7-bass. From that 7-fish we were able to put together a 4-fish limit that weighed 9 plus pounds, good enough for first place and big bass of the night.
Our starting place was a deep cabbage weedline that breaks from 6-feet to 22-feet in about 3 boat lengths. In the first 30-minutes we put 3 measure fish in the well. Two came on a Texas rigged Ring Fry and one on a crank-bait. The wind picked up to the point that it was almost impossible to stay on this spot, so we moved to a dock complex and some pencil reeds. The pencil reeds produced two more fish on a Strike King 1/2 –ounce Bitsy Flip (blue/black) with a Rage Craw trailer (blue/black). One of those fish was a measure fish, which completed our 4-fish bag. Next we moved to the dock complex, which has produced big fish for me in the past. This complex was semi-protected from the wind, so we could pick it apart without battling the wind. Unfortunately this time the docks only produced 2-fish, one was a short fish, but the other was a 3-plus pound largemouth which culled-out a smaller fish. This fish turned out to be our biggest fish and the big bass for the night. Again the Bitsy Flip and Rage Craw did the trick.
It appears from the fishing I’ve done this past week that we are starting to see the green fish setup in their summer haunts as they move from post spawn to summer season. Yea, for deep weedlines! So other than the ugly weather and a short time on the water, it wasn’t too bad a night. The next Tuesday night league is on the Le Homme Dieu Chain.
This should be interesting and fun, as in the next 11-days I will be pre-fishing for and then fishing four tournaments. Tuesday night league tournament and Reel Team Bass tournament, both of which are on the Chain. Then the West Central Series and the MFBA (Mn. Federation of Bass Anglers), both of which are on Minnewaska. Not a bad problem to have.