Halloween bassin'

[bluebasser86]

My buddy Jon and I got out on Halloween to chase some fish around, turned out the weather was feeling like playing mostly tricks and not giving out many treats as we fought rain in the 40 degree temps along with 20mph winds. We were on a lake known mainly for smallmouth and having reports of good fishing we started on a likely spot. I'm pretty sure I missed the first 6-8 bites I got while Jon was catching them pretty well on a spinnerbait and tube.

I finally got my act together and started catching them on a spinnerbait, tube, and shakyhead.

Right before we left I got our biggest smallmouth of the day on a spinnerbait that went 19" and 3.28lbs.


We left a little early to try a little pond that was on our way home, wow where we not disappointed. We'd had over 2" of rain fall the day before and the little pond was swollen and muddy, didn't look good when we pulled up but hey we're here let's give it a try. For the first 15 minutes the pond seemed devoid of life, shallow, and muddy. I was running a homemade black and blue chatterbait along a metal overflow grate when it got slammed by a super fat 3 pounder that pulled like it was 6, the next 3 casts resulted in the same thing! When the little flurry stopped I pitched a black and blue Strike King flipping tube at the grate and got thumped. This one was even fatter and pulled way harder than largemouth are supposed to! No skinny fall fish here!

Jon was on the other side of the pond fishing an inflow area and catching them pretty good from what I could tell. I continued covering water quickly with the chatterbait and tube, catching several more fish. I pitched into a corner area with small chunk rock with the tube when I felt a very sharp tap. My line took off so fast I was positive it was a catfish from the start. The fish didn't move towards me at all on the hookset, instead it steadily pulled drag off my pitching rod, heading towards a brushpile, but I got it turned and moving back towards me. Doing just like catfish do it stayed down, pulled hard, and ripped some more drag before I got it close and saw a big bucketmouth and greenish sides! I didn't have my scale on me, it was in the boat along with my camera so I had to take a picture with my junky cell phone camera and guess the weight. She was extremely fat like the rest of them, I'm guessing somewhere in the 5.5-6 pound range.

Needless to say we'll be back

[joedog]

Clayton, Jon great share and as usual...NICE BASS!

Ya I saw this on another forum I visited probably right after the post.
I thought, "Blue you holding out on me?"

Came to this site, again probably right behind you, to PM you and give you a hard time.
Sure enough you beat me here and I almost posted but was too busy laughing.

Now in most your cold weather posts you have on the fingerless gloves or mits on.
Have you guys ever tried neoprene gloves.
Diver friend turned me onto them a long time ago.

Used them since my crappie days BUT I'm not sure I'm even convinced yet today that finger optional gloves/mits aren't better.
I just really like the feel of the line in my hand.
And baitcasting isn't all that bad but spinning gear can be a challenge.
And due to sluggish fish, finnesse is really what cold weather fish respond to around hear.

Thoughts wanted.

[bluebasser86]

I pretty much always fish the White River fingerless fleece fishing gloves from BPS. They're about $5 for a pair so I usually have a couple pairs on me when it's cold out. Of course I could only find one pair in my truck Thursday and it rained pretty hard in the morning so they were completely soaked after about 30 minutes of fishing but they still kept my hands pretty warm. If it's really cold I'll go with the gloves that Jon was wearing because they have the mitten top that can be folded over, mainly wear those when I'm driving the boat in cold weather though, not so much when I'm fishing.
Part of the reason I opt for the fleece gloves over neoprene is that they're a lot easier to fish with for me. Fishing line sticks to neoprene pretty badly during a cast so it makes slowing my spool or line down pretty tough. I've fished days that never made it over 20 degrees out with those gloves without losing any fingers to frostbite yet

[Jrob78]

Looks like an awesome day of fishing. Funny how catching fish can make the nasty weather more tolerable.

[keithdog]

Those bass look like they are getting plenty to eat for sure. Talk about chunky! Good thing you stopped to try out the pond. Sounds like a nice spot to run to from time to time.