11 teams fished, 5 teams weighed in and 2 places were paid.
11 brave teams showed up in the rain to fish Travis on Tuesday night. With ongoing rain bands hitting Mansfield Dam at takeoff, and more scheduled to approach around 9pm, the weather was considerably cooler than it had been. It was also cloudier, which many teams reported shifted their patterns for the worse.
Not impacted by the weather, the team of Chris Baker and Russell Truitt pulled out a limit going 9.40 pounds and won $200. They found a population of fish and the pattern to win it at the end of last week’s tournament.
“Russell and I had a great time tonight. We stayed on the lower end, but we found those fish the week before at 9:25 and were not able to get to weigh-in on time! This week the fish were still there and we were able to put three keepers in the boat in the first 15 minutes. It slowed down after that, but we stayed in the general area checking our sweet spot from time to time,” said Chris.
Chris expanded on their pattern for us.
“The only fish we caught off of a dock or cable was the bigger fish…our fourth keeper. The rest of our fish came off the bottom on a Texas rig in 18 foot of water on rocks. The last fish literally came on the last cast at 9:18. I was putting away baits for the run back and I felt a bump, man were we pumped! We only caught three other small fish and had a handful of bites.”
Congratulations Chris and Russell for a great bag of fish on a tough night!
Our second place team with four fish at 8.20 pounds was TTZ team member Brian Booker and partner Grant Schnabel. They continued their reign as first loser, and fittingly Brian told us how they did it.
“Well, it was a weird night with the weather. Our cable fish were not there to put it mildly. Not sure if that has dried up or if it was the cloud cover, but that cloud cover has not slowed the bite in the past.”
Then, in a stunning development, for the first time in a month the trolls left the bridge.
“So we decided to head to a marina ledge nearby, and they were there for sure. We only fished it for about an hour and were able to put three more good keepers in the boat. Grant had a really good fish we think break him off. The fish knocked a foot of slack in the line when he brought his bait over the ledge! When he set the hook, the fish pulled drag for a second or two then his line broke.”
Grant told us how deep the fish were.
“The ledge comes into a point, but the sweet spot is in about thirty foot of water. When you felt the rock lip, you would stop your bait and feel the fish tick almost every time. Those ledges are starting to get right!”
Confirming the ledge bite theory, Kelley Mauldin and Mike Reynolds also had four fish weighing 6.58 pounds. They took home the tackle pack provided by Yamamoto/Kinami baits. Staying near the top for a while now, Kelley shared more with us.
“We are still fishing ledges in twenty to twenty-five foot. The better baits for us are Brush Hogs and Senkos. We’re catching a lot of fish, and there seem to be more fish moving out to us all the time. They are getting in that summer pattern as they should.”
Starting to hear a theme here? If you are doing the math at home, you have learned that the bass are starting to get into predictable areas. One other thing you’ll notice from the pictures is these bass are feeding up. They are full of shad and still coughing it up on the deck after being brought in. That is important, because the post spawn curse may be a thing of the past, and the big head disease may have gone with it. Big heads now will probably have big bodies to match, and that eight pounder is closer all the time. The pot is right too, as next week it starts at $825! We’ll see you Tuesday.