Kaenon is based in Newport Beach, CA and has a ‘waterman’ DNA, where they strive for excellence in eyewear that meet the demands of the surfing, sailing, boating, paddle boarding, swimming, and fishing lifestyle. They make a family of stylish and functional frames, that can be fitted with excellent grey, copper or yellow polarized lenses. The lenses are a high end SR-91 composite material, which is their own high tech composite material–not glass, which means they are light weight and durable, yet they are quality, extremely high quality lenses, so they are awesome to look thru. They are light weight and sporty, and are a great compromise of function and fashion. They are fun to wear, especially on calm days, warming trend, somewhere between the North Shore and Indian Prairie! There is no reason to not experiment and try new things with your sunglasses and lenses and see what works and what fits you best and see if you don’t find something you like or something that works better. Kaenon’s are available in 3 vibrant and distinct color variations, that are polarized of course: Yellow, Copper, and Grey. I show you how I use the yellow (Y35) lens in the above video. I’m going to introduce you to my world viewed thru various Kaenon sunglasses with the various lenses in separate projects, starting with the yellow lens. The Y35 Kaenon Hard Kores are my choice for fishing in the black water of Okeechobee.
To understand why the Yellow lens helps ‘add light’ and brighten up the dark water of Florida, and brighten up cloudy and grey days for sight fishing, you have to understand the basics of ‘light transmission control’. The simple is, Yellow lens technology allows more light thru the lens. It blocks less sunlight, so you are gaining light vs. grey or copper lens (with the exception of the C50 which has my curiousity!). Go ahead and get yourself some yellow lenses and try them out. I bet you don’t take them off all day (in Florida anyway).
The Y35 Lens is amazing what it does to brighten up and ‘electrify’ an otherwise grey and gloomy day. When you mix in the black tannin water of Florida, the Y35 has a whole new meaning. These things pierce thru that clear black water we all strain our eyes to just see a little further, a little deeper, and detect a fish or a bed that much further away. Here are the advantages to a Yellow lens:
Added light: Great for seeing in black water, grey days, and cloudy conditions, especially when you are sight fishing. Yellow lenses allow more light thru, and are a tool of serious sight fishermen. Serious anglers have multiple sunglasses and lenses to approach certain situations, and these yellow lenses from Kaenon will be something you will appreciate and use regularly in your fishing.
Added contrast and detail: You can detect beds further away (light spot in dark water) or dark fish tail against light spot better. Or when it comes to detail, you can make out the shape and/or color of a fish better (vs. confusing it with grass or moss). Think about competition skeet and trap shooting. Those guys where yellow lenses, and I’m guessing it’s just for many of the same reasons. I find even on the bright bluebird days of Okeechobee, yellow lenses work just fine middle of the day, not just the low light and grey days. With the dark water of places like Okeechobee, the yellow lenses of my Y35 Kaenon Hardcores just work all day long, rain or shine, to give me added edge to see better.
Electrify your eyes: I find the Kaenon Y35 lens a lot like being in a room with a black light. Your eyes take a minute to adjust, but once you get the feel for them, the darks and lights really stand out and contrast each other. It’s like playing with the color levels of a digital photo editing tool. Adding light or otherwise taking away/filtering out darkness, can make a photo come out great, whereas natively, it might have been really too dark to make out whatever you took the picture of. Editing software makes it possible to make digital photos come out best. Use this same mentality to choose colors of lenses to match the water and lighting of your fishing spot. Yellow lenses electrify your vision and add contrast and detail you wouldn’t otherwise get. Again, think sight fishing where you are looking for the black tails on the fish, lateral lines, the white belly of a fish nosing down on your bait, looking for light spots out at the edge of your horizontal range, where you can best anchor down/setup on the bed to assess if a fish is there, and all the things you strive for perfection when sight fishing. Yellow lenses are just an aid to help your vision to see more fish, beds and better see your bait and “the bed fishing theater” while sight fishing.
Seeing your bait: It is no accident the colors of 5″ Big Hammer swimbaits (bright white, chartreuse/yellows really stick out with Y35 lenses on) I tend to throw at big bed fish ala the 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fish Rig, tend to contrast nicely and be highly visible with the Y35 lenses.
Boat Driving: There are plenty of occassion to wear your Y35 Kaenon Hard Kores when operating your boat. Morning take-off, and just any grey/cloudy dark conditions are ideal for using the Y35 lenses to add some light and just give you better visibility driving in the exposed outdoors at 65-70 MPH.
Hipster Alert: You can wear your Y35 Kaenon’s out to nightclubs and trendy bars!!
Yellow? You hear me? Kaenon Hard Kores with the Y35 lens are a key tool to my bed fishing, especially in Florida. The fish, your bait, and the beds all tend to contrast in the dark water better with a yellow lens.
I definitely recommend getting yourself into a yellow lens for fishing the dark water of Florida and just to have as a tool in grey/cloudy conditions and perhaps for driving your boat. I wear the Kaenon Hard Kore frame, because I find it incredibly light weight, sporty, and comfortable. I can wear them all day and don’t feel the fatigue of the nose or ear pieces on my head. You have a few frames to choose from from Kaenon that offer the Y35 lens. Here are the others frames that have the Y35 lens: The Arlo, The Kanvas, and The Rhino.
FishStrong published a review of the Kaenon Kores with the C12 (Copper) lens. Yellow lenses are a specialty thing, and definitely a tool to have, especially if you like “lookin’ at ’em” . But copper lenses, as Hale White from FishStrong explains, are the most universally useful. Take a look at FishStrong’s write up HERE. You can expect us to be back with our own take on the copper and grey lenses, and expect more collaboration with us and FishStrong too.
Sight fishing is like anything else, you need a system. Yellow lenses are part of my system and I encourage you to give it a try in the black water especially.
The Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig is part of a system. It's a system that involves using finesse baits and bigbaits to aggravate a fish into biting. The swimbait is fished as an 'intruder' and provides a power fishing approach to big fish, the female kind usually, but also good for the better than dink males you might need in a tournament situation.
We shared this rig in Southern Trout Eaters. We have been getting asked a lot of questions about it, and Spring has sprung, so here goes. Think of the 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig as a workhorse bed fishing bait, geared for ‘bigger’ fish. The one rod you have rigged up in case you come up on or purposely hunt big fish on beds. We’ve had a few years to validate this rig, in the mountains, and in the grass of Okeechobee and Seminole. I credit my friend and trophy bass hunter from the Bay Area, Rob Belloni, for sharing the fundamental of his Big Hammer Texas Rig with me. I’ve sorta dumbed it down since I’m usually not hunting double digit fish with it, most of my world, 4-9 pounders are king, with chances at double digits for sure though. I’ve made my own adjustments and have made it a staple in my sight fishing system. Rob has fooled giants, I have now fooled quite a few 4-9 pounders with it in multiple Southern States. This is a great trophy and tournament style of sight fishing, and it points out the need for a knock out punch in your bed fishing arsenal.
The 5" Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig. 5" Big Hammer, rigged flat side up. Just bury your hook point enough to keep the bait weedless and free from snagging the fish, but able to sting one that just barely grabs it. Peg your weight, pitch and hop this thing around larger bed fish and see what happens.
The 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig:
Bait:5″ Big Hammer Swimbait (colors: Pearl, Invader, Glowbug, Silver Phantom, Chartreuse, Fire tiger)
This 7'10" Powell Flipping Rod is a favorite all purpose 'heavy pitching' rod, for baits >1 ounce but not more than 1.5 or so. ie the Medlock Jig, 5" Big Hammer Rig, pitching 3/4 -1 ounce creature baits in grass, and light punching. The rod has guts. I think of it as a heavy pitching stick. I have whipped some nice fish with this rod. The short handle makes it handle and fish nicely, but long enough for leverage.
When you look at the trends in where bed/sight fishing is going, you will notice certain swimbaits and softbaits have flat sides or can be rigged flat side up are doing the most damage out there. More cutting edge, more geared towards targeting bigger fish or a better mouse trap for fooling weary pressured fish. The Dean Rojas Warmouth, and the Jackall Clone Gill 2.5 and the Mission Fish are all part of the big picture of modern sight fishing. All have wild variations and secret rigging and tricks I’m sure. I know the Hammer and Mission Fish best, both part of my toolkit. Believe me when I tell you I use a drop shot a lot when sight fishing. You need a big knock out punch and you need finesse, so I use the Mission Fish and Hammer as my big knockout punches, and drop shot/wacky and light texas rigs like the Warmouth and Clone Gill as my finesse approach. I thought it important to note flat side up or just flat sided bed fishing baits, have something about their swagger. Flat sides, square/boot/slight swallow tails, realism, perch/bluegill profiles, buoyancy, weedlessness, unique vortex, and big fish attraction. The Lateral Perch from PowerTackle is a derivative here, and likely a bed fishing bait for someone out there, but too has the this flat side up profile and swim, and is worth noting. I cannot speak to how well the Lateral Perch catches fish, but all of the other named baits I’m 100% certain catch fish on beds really well, and have too much in common not to connect the dots. They all fish differently, but in the grand scheme of sight fishing, you better have tools that can be drop shotted, pitched, weightless/wackied, hopped, swam, and texas rigged if you want to be competitive. Don’t just limit yourself to white tubes, craws and creature baits. Be thinking perch/bluegill too.
The Okuma 7'6" MH Rod getting it done too. You need some 7'6" and shorter than 8' rods for fishing baits like the Mission Fish. This is an even beefier style of pitching stick vs. the Powell, but it takes the conversation to more like 2-6 ounce baits no problem. I liked using it for the 5" Big Hammer rig too. Lots of power and fished very nicely. The rod still has good feel even though my rig was under weighted for the rod, and it just worked for me.
The 5″ Big Hammer Sight Fishing Rig is an excellent sight fishing system. You can see your bait very well in the black Florida water, and it shows up well fishing a bed fish in >8 feet of water in clear water. The rig has ample weight involved, which means you can ‘rapid fire’ and harass a fish with the bait, pushing the fish around, and firing them up into biting. The bait hops really well, and has the square tailed flap on the way back down to the bottom. It’s more of a hop hop and slight drag and shake style of bait. The fish love to ‘catch’ the bait coming back down to the bottom, with a well placed and timed hop. The 5″ Big Hammer gets bigger bed fish to bite and has an excellent hook-up and land ratio. There is very little risk of foul hooking or snagging a fish, with the Texas rigged nature of the bait, which also opens up the ability to bounce the rig off of the side, head and tail of the fish, making them eat it. You can expect to see a sight fishing production from us in the near future, highlighting this rig. We gave a sneak peak of the bait underwater in our Lake Seminole FLW Evestart Preview video, in case you missed it.
First off, huge congrats to Brandon McMillan. That guy can fish and has the mental game to be a superstar. Extremely impressed with Brandon’s fishing and ability to put it all together in win. My 2012 Lake Seminole FLW Everstart was pretty decent, but nothing fantastic. I basically weighed in 12 pounds per day, had decent limits and finished 26th place. We had strong wind and clouds during the tournament days, which had me off my game. I had hoped to get 13-15 pound limits by finesse fishing, and then hunting a big fish with a bigbait or sight fishing. The wind just made me have to work twice as hard to get a fraction of the bites. No excuses, my gameplan just wasn’t very well suited for the weather. It took me way too long to catch a decent limit and I didn’t have the time to hunt the big ones as planned. I kept at it, figuring I might be able to pull off 15 pounds or so both days with one bite. I broke off a fish on a wacky rig on Day 1 in the wind, and that hurt. You have understand in super shallow stump fields, when the wind is blowing, you get pinned up against stumps, high centered and it’s pretty much complete chaos at times. I hooked a nice fish and the fish ran me around on spinning gear, and just basically whipped me where I got stuck on some stumps in the wind with the boat, and broke off where in any calmer conditions I could have avoided the catastrophe. No big deal, but every pound counts and would have improved my overall standings significantly.
Wacky Rigged Trick worms are pretty darn finesse. Trick worms fall and stall much more than even a senko. Add a #1 Owner Mosquito hook and loosen up your drag and get to work. Braid mainline with floro leader recommended.
So, if you want to catch fish on Lake Seminole right now, here are some insights. The fish are on beds, up shallow, and can be found along the shallow sand bars, points, humps and hard bottom places in Spring Creek big time. You are either catching fish on beds, getting ready to bed, or just coming off the bed/guarding fry. The water in Spring Creek is getting back to its normal clear self and things are getting right in Spring Creek again. We had weeks of muddy water caused by some heavy rains that sorta screwed up the creek for a while. There is also a shad spawn happening early in the morning. So, first thing in the morning, guys had areas with hyacynth edges and/or rock where they were able to power fish their way to good 17+ pound limits in the first hour. I missed this bite pretty much completely, but beware shad spawn fish are winning fish, as per Mr. McMillan, Shaye Baker, etc. Find shad spawn and throw spinnerbaits, topwaters, and swim jigs.
Lake Seminole Conditions as of 3/25/2012
Lake Level: -.05 feet
Water Temp: 72 in the am, 78 in the afternoon
Grass: Mediocre grass at best, hasn’t grown up much in most places.
Wacky Rigging is a perfect blend of Rate of Stall and Rate of Fall. So much so, that when done properly, you can literally ‘float’ your bait in place, suspending it in the water column exactly where you want it. Cast your bait a little bit past your targets. Your targets should be any light spots (beds) you see from a distance, stumps, trees, grass line, isolated patched of lily pads, or just randomly on good high percentage flats. Dead stick the bait to the bottom on the initial fall. Just let it fall to the bottom, pick it up and shake it a couple times. Then let it settle to the bottom. I only fished the wacky rig 5-10 feet in most cases back toward the boat, and then would reel in and make another cast. The wacky rig is death on Seminole and the fish there really react well to a slow fall and slow stall.
The light texas rig was a better bait for casting and dragging around in the wind. It was just easier to fish in the wind and many guys who did well were finesse fishing. Seminole is not like Okeechobee. You have to approach the bedding fish with much more care and they don’t kill anything you throw over a bed. You have to slow down, finesse and work them into biting more than on the Big O. You could just drag the bait, or do a slight pull and swim. If you came thru the sparse grass, you could rip it or give it some swim, but when on barren bottom, the drag retrieve seemed to be the better deal. Fishing for the same fish as the wacky deal, just less finesse than wacky, but much better for fishing in any kind of wind.
The Carolina Rig is a good bait on Seminole for a few reasons. It can be fished nicely in the wind first and foremost. The fish on and around beds seem to eat Carolina rigs, don’t ask my why, but they do. Just ask Lloyd Picket Jr about that. He catches solid sacks of bedding fish, by blind casting Carolina rigs in the Spring time, I’ve seen it a couple times. Anywho, the Carolina rig also helps you probe the deeper and transitions sides of the sandbars, points and humps. So you can probe the deeper 6+ foot range of the sandbars. Sometimes the fish move out or are sitting deeper due to whatever reasons, and a Carolina rig is a great compromise of finesse and power because it can be fished down to 15+ feet and across a 2 foot deep hump in the same cast. Many good bags were caught on the C-Rig, lizards and creature baits on stump flats, sandbars, and humps in and around the Spring Creek and Fish Pond Drain area.
The bigbait bite on Seminole was nothing spectacular, but there. You have to fish around the bedding fish, or around the standing timber, grass or docks directly adjacent to the spawning areas. That was the key, but Seminole just wasn’t a great time for moving baits. Finesse baits dominated, but I got the occassional bigbait bite.
Tournament time again. I’m unusually optimistic about stringing together a good tournament. I have been catching fish, not in great numbers or size, but I think the fishing is generally pretty tough out there. Guys who I know can catch them are struggling, which I’m not suprised. This leg of the journey has been tough. Yes, there is a shad spawn, and yes the bass are bedding, but Seminole is a different animal than most lakes. This year, the grass on Seminole has not grown up and it’s relatively barren compared to the other times I’ve fished here. What that means is you cannot go pound the grass and milk fish out of it. Grass lakes without grass can be confusing. Keeping it consistent and being able to have solid sacks of fish for 3 days is the goal.
My gameplan: Fishing Small, getting a good solid limit, and then breaking out and fishing Big. I have various areas where I can fan cast finesse style baits and get it done. I have areas that are in danger of being ruined by muddy water coming down Spring Creek, however, I think I can adjust and fish the moment and conditions. We have relatively strong winds and thunderstormy type day forecasted for tomorrow. That means the bed fishing will be tough for the most part. Not game over, but the bed fishing on Seminole that I’ve experienced is pretty fickle. The fish are really smart, trolling motor aware, and require extreme stealth and skills to get to bite (the big fish anyway). Ideally, I get a good limit with enough time to go have some free time to go hunt some big ones. I am hunting them with Triple Trouts, 3:16 Sunfish/Bluegills and the 5″ Big Hammer sight fish rig (bed fish). The big swimmer bite has been tough, but it’s out there. I need a good 2-3 hours of chunking and winding to get a bite, and that assumes muddy water and muck haven’t messed with my water. Muddy water and muck (ie, floating grass niblets the ducks pull up, or snot grass pieces, or just wind blown garbage are the doom of the swimbait at times).
I’m fishing for a Top 10 and God willing, am able to pull off a Top 5 or better. I think I can be consistent. Worst case, I get 10-12 pounds per day, but best case, I think I can get 15+ a day, and sustain it for 3 days in a row. I think 28- 30 pounds, two day total, will make the Top 10 cut or slightly less. Guys are going to have some big sacks, but I don’t believe they can do it 3 days in a row, let alone 2 days in a row. We shall see. I feel good about catching some fish and competing.
"Simplification is the Ultimate Sophistication" (Da Vinci) After reading the Steve Jobs Biography, I realized something basic about simplification in bigbait fishing. Softbaits get the most bites (and tend to catch the biggest fish, ala 8" Huddleston). So when in Rome, throw a softbait! Okeechobee validated what I already knew: The Vortex Tails catch the biggest fish, and the Boot Tails (3:16 Rising Son Jr) get the most bites. Making the 3:16 Rising Son Jr. the better tournament swimbait, among other reasons. Now, when I did get a bite on the 8" Huddleston, it was a magnum, they were just hard to come by.
You can expect full details, video/film and more photos to back this subject up, however, those things will take me much more time. Fishing bigbaits in shallow grass is like everything else an ongoing discussion. I’ve just arrived at Lake Seminole, and the shallow grass and bigbait assault continues. I’m a bit in a holding pattern on some video production stuff, trying to find my path on some directions and paths to take with various projects and pursuits that will remain private for now.
Okeechobee, outside grass line. 2012 is the first year I've been to Okeechobee in the winter where the fish were holding on the outside grass lines. The inside grass lines were choked out from the low water overgrowth, and the water clarity was good in the mainlake, which I've never seen either. The fish were more in their summer pattern that I've ever experienced, which made them a bit more accessible with baits with hanging or partially hanging trebles, especially those that weight > 2 ounces!
Preparations:
My mental preparations began for Okeechobee this past summer, when sitting and talking with Mickey Ellis for 3:16 Lure Company. I was reminded of some simple lessons and things I used to know. Line thru swimbaits, in particular, can be fished in shallow grass really well because they tend to swim high in the water column, and I knew that coupled with braided line, I could keep those baits even higher in the water column, literally on or just below the surface. Braided line adds weedlessness, trust me on this, its a combination of buoyancy and ability to snatch your bait clean.
The other preparations I had for Okeechobee came from reading the Steve Jobs Biography this fall. Laugh if you will. You ready? “Simplification is the ultimate sophistication” was the quote. Leonardo Da Vinci is the source of the quote, but Steve made me aware of it (along with a few other tidbits of Da Vinci wisdom). Let me attempt to walk you thru this. When you simplify your bigbait approach on a foreign lake or foreign conditions, you need to start with SOFTBAITS. When I assessed what baits I’ve caught the vast majority of fish on, it was clear to me that softbaits are what get bit more often, under most conditions. Of course I had my Triple Trouts and 22nd Century Bluegill on, but unless they are killing your softbaits in shallow grass, they probably aren’t going to kill your faster swimming and moving hardbaits in shallow grass, either. Forget the trout eaters here, we are talking shallow grass fishing, in less than peak heat season. With all the challenges of getting on a bigbait bite on tournament day, the one thing you can do, when conditions present themselves is keep is soft, stupid.
K.I.S.S: Keep it Soft, Stupid! You know I love certain hardbaits, but rarely do you go out and just pounce on hardbait fish on lakes without a lot of history of swimbait action, especially those without trout. Also, when you have a tournament minded approach, boot tails get bit quite a bit more than the the 8" Huddleston Vortex tail at times. It's a tradeoff. The 8" Hudd catches magnums, the boot tails catch 3-7 pounders and those are the fish I'm hunting on tournament day, not lake or world records. Add to that, Rate of Stall, a subject we have only just begun to propose, boot tails have more drag, and the 3:16 softbaits tend to have excellent Rate of Stall due to buoyancy and lift.
I had a phone conversation with Steve Pagliughi (“Urban”, is his online handle) in November. Steve is a Huddleston guy and a 3:16 guy. Steve and I have never met, never fished together, and just had a conversation about bigbaits and fishing. Steve implored me to take a look at the 3:16 Rising Son Jr. He told me the bait just flat out gets bit. Excellent, that is what I needed to hear, along with his other tidbits of insights about Huddlestons, grass, and line thru swimbait approaches. I don’t pretend to be a ‘know it all’ and find myself laughing at people and fisherman who take that approach. The most talented professionals I’ve ever been around have some common traits, and at the top of the list is humility. Being human and consciously recognizing your human flaws means you are aware that you cannot know everything. You cannot be master of all. You have to leave yourself open to continually learn, make adjustments and keep an open mind and mix the new things you learn into the pool of wisdom and experiences you have, and adopt/apply new things accordingly. California, the Bay Area in particular, excels in an open minded approach to everything. People seek out diversity and different because they know it ultimately enriches them. When you take the approach that you ‘know it all’ or otherwise close your mind to things because they are ‘different’ or don’t come from the same mold you came from or come from outside your world, you stop LISTENING. Folks may hear all and think they know all or are aware of all, but unless you really listen and process the information and take the time to do so, you aren’t really knowing everything. You are just hearing it, and it goes into the bucket of clutter along with everything else we are exposed to in today’s connected world. You don’t know everything, and even if you did, you cannot apply it in real time or in appropriate time. I really appreciated my conversation with Steve because it was so on time, and so honest and something I really enjoy, learning something new, especially in the world of bigbaits. Just hearing Steve’s confidence and experience with the Rising Son Jr. and some of his Huddleston applications got my head right well in advance of leaving for Okeechobee.
The Rising Son Jr.
When you take a look at the Rising Son Jr. it looks like you’d expect a line thru swimbait with a boot tail. Here is what you may not immediately grasp. Notice, there is no ‘hardware’ in the line-thru. There is no metal involved. The bait is 100% soft plastic with the 3:16 Line Thru block glued under the chin/throat. This makes the bait extremely buoyant (it damn near floats). Buoyancy equates to ability to fish the bait over and thru super shallow grass, which is perfect for Okeechobee. Also, buoyancy equates to greater ability to stall (Rate of Stall) the bait and keeps the bait overhead longer. This is a key point to understand, especially at Okeechobee, where you’re targeting fish that are “about” their beds. Big females are rarely locked on the bed. When they are, you sight fish them. Most times, they are ‘about’ their beds, meaning, you want to swim your bait over the bed, putting your bait in their nursery, and keep it there, swimming along, for the longest amount of time possible. The idea being, they aren’t biting out of hunger, they are biting because Mother Nature and natural processes dictate that anything a bass can fit in its mouth will get eaten if it spends time where it shouldn’t during spawn time. Your bait is seen as a threat or an intruder or something that needs to be taught a lesson. Some baits move out of the nursery too quickly, and aren’t the best choice (ie, fast moving hard baits). Buy yourself some 3:16 Rising Son Jrs, and get to work. These things get bit, they catch big ones, and they catch the medium sized ones really well too. Stay tuned, more to come on this bait.
Trap Hook: One 1/0 Owner ST-36 harnessed to a #4 Owner ST-66 (when in doubt, fish the stock hook provided, it works great, I just like the insurance of a second stinger back further in the bait. Stay tuned, more to come on the trap hook setup).
The 3:16 Lure Company Rising Son Jr. Let me try and net out why this bait was so effective: Rate of Stall (buoyancy, drag, and swim), size and profile, ability to fish with braided line, trap hook setup (not shown above), and where and how the fish were positioned on the Big O, winter 2012. You get a feel for what I was fishing over, near topped out hydrilla, in this case a few hundred yards from where Randall Tharp would win the FLW Tour Event, punching the thicker hydrilla mats.Day 2, FLW Everstart Lake Okeechobee. Two of my four fish that weighed 18 pounds. I only had 6 fish for the entire tournament, and 5 of them came on the 3:16 Rising Son Jr. The other one came on the Huddie. All six fish I weighed at the Everstart came on the bigbaits. Finished 21st place, a major leap forward in my tournament fishing, committing to the bigbaits and getting it done. Day 1 was rough with only 2 fish for 6 pounds, but that played into the game. When you're down and need to make up a lot of ground, throw the bigbaits, if you dare.
The 3:16 Sunfish/Bluegill
So, you might be wondering, when did you throw the 3:16 Bluegill or Sunfish (same bait, two color options, both of them excellent) vs. when did you throw the Rising Son Jr? When I first arrived at Okeechobee around Christmas time, the water was approx 13.75. When I left Okeechobee in Mid February 2012, the water had dropped below 13.25. Half a foot on Okeechobee is significant. Falling water on Okeechobee is a chronic problem we face each winter. As the water falls, it creates less and less swim lanes to throw baits in. The grass starts topping out and you better be on your game to keep you bait up and out of the grass while fishing. The 3:16 Sunfish/Bluegill is not as buoyant as the Rising Son Jr. and it tends to fish a little deeper, so as the water level dropped, I had fewer and fewer places to fish this bait effectively. I found that Okeechobee bass really hated bluegill and sunfish baits swam over their beds/nursery areas too. Bluegill/Sunfish tend to be an enemy of bedding bass because they eat the bass eggs and/or the bass fry. Bass love to eat bluegill/sunfish, and it’s honestly something I’ve never committed that much time to. I get asked all the time, what bluegill bait do your recommend? Now I have an answer, because I committed a ton of time to learning the bait and getting familiar with it. I really hate recommending baits or tackle without having any experience. Expect more to come on this bait too. Need a bluegill bait? Fishing around bedding fish? Throw a 3:16 Bluegill or Sunfish and see what happens.
Hook: Owner ST-41 Treble Hook 1/0 (no trap, just single hook, no rings, just direct tied to hook)
Okeechobee Trout Eater. Of course there are no trout on Okeechobee. Golden shiner are the obvious choice, but I found other colors like the Hitch color to get bites too. Here is a nice one on the ROF 5. I fished both the ROF 5 and ROF 12 on Okeechobee the Winter of 2012 and had some fantastic bites. Try fishing an 8" Huddleston with 80 Pound Braid and a 400 TE from Shimano. You won't believe the torque and power you have with that reel and braid.
I’ve written and filmed plenty about the 6″ Weedless Trout, the Grass Minnow and Weedless Shad, its about time to shed some light on the 8″ Huddleston Deluxe Trout on Okeechobee. I wasn’t fishing the Rainbow Trout color, but I’m sure it would work. Of all the generally available colors of the 8″ Huddleston Deluxe, I’d pick the Golden Shiner or Hitch Color to start. Understand, you need to be prepared to fish both a ROF 5 and ROF 12, so have 2 rods ready. I fished the ROF 12 with just the single top jig hook, because with braided line, it fished extremely well in the grass and could be snatched clean. The ROF 5 was fished with the “Southern Trout Eaters” Huddleston Rig, and I loved that the ST-66 Owner Stinger Trebles matched and handled the braided line very well. I fished the 8″ Huddlestons on the outside grass edges, edges of lilly pads, edges of Kissimmee Grass, edges of reeds, and over top hydrilla. The bait fished pretty darn well. Depending on wind and depth and amount of water I had to work with, would depend which ROF of Huddleston I’d fish. When you lob cast a bait that weighs almost 5 ounces, its going to sink down at least 6″ or so when it hits the water at the end of your cast. So as the water was falling on Okeechobee, again, it became harder and harder to fish certain areas without constantly being mucked up in grass. Even with braid, 400 TE reels and a stout 8 footer, you cannot snatch clean from super thick hydrilla and pads from the outset of your cast. So, fishability at times was a challenge, but not impossible. It can be exhaustive fishing, like when you’re fishing a buzzbait and really working to keep the bait on the surface 100% of time, getting it running right just after it hits the water from the end of your cast. I didn’t catch lots of fish on the 8″ Huddleston, but the ones I caught were STUDS. The bites were awesome too. Just crushed the bait. Looking forward to getting back there and working on this bite more. Again, stay tuned, more to come on 8″ Hudds in the grass.
Okeechobee is such an awesome place, I miss it already. I just love the warm winter weather, the fishing, the tournaments, the Tiki Bar and the entire Roland & Mary Ann Martin Marina & Fishing Campus, and shallow grass. Okeechobee was the first place I fished after resigning from corporate life on Dec. 31 2008, and my first week on Okeechobee in early January 2009 almost killed me. I wrecked my boat once, got lost a couple times, got eaten by mosquitoes , and couldn’t buy a bite, but my how things have changed. I settled down and got right. Three seasons later, I’m finally putting together a bigbait bite, and gave ’em a run at the FLW Tour and Everstart with the bigbaits. Didn’t quite pull it off perfectly and have a lot of room for improvement, but I sure enjoyed progressing and taking bigbaits to the shallow grass of Florida.
2nd and O for 2012–Lake Okeechobee FLW Tour Open Preview
The House of the Rising Son: Okeechobee. Line thru, ball knobber boot tails, braided line and a trap hook rigging that brought me back to my days on San Vicente in the early 2000s. The 3:16 Rising Son, excellence is buoyancy and a thing I call, Rate of Stall---which are key to the grass fishing conversation--well, shallow grass anyway. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm still a Vortex head, and Florida has other Vortexes that do damage besides hurricanes and tropical storms!!!
Alright, tournament time again, FLW Tour Open, Lake Okeechobee. I haven’t said a whole lot since the Everstart. Trying to manage information…This FLW Tour Open is my one Tour Event for 2012, and I dang sure don’t need to be helping out the list of guys who already are household names I’m fishing against! So let me walk you thru my Everstart a little. Day 1, I planned on throwing the bigbaits all day. However, we had an unforecasted 15-20 MPH Wind from the NNE, that wrecked my major areas. The wind not only seriously mucked up the water color, it was causing my bait to run funky. Side wind and braided line swimbait fishing is no bueno. Your bait tends to drag with the big bow in your line and there was no getting away from it. I only had 2 fish for Day 1 and wanted to jump off the Kissimmee Bridge and just die. My friend Roger Ray showed up at the house out of nowhere that evening. He was down to fun fish, and it was a blessing to have a friend around and just snap me out of complete misery. My only comfort was reading how many other guys sucked on Day 1, phew. I mean, I drove straight home (was in first flight) fueled up the boat, and went to bed at 6:30. Just so disgusted and angry, didn’t even check the standings until later that night. Thanking Rodger once again for his use of time and timing. So Day 2, I started in an area I’d seen a couple big ones hanging around beds, but not locked on, and wouldn’t eat. Much better, calmer weather and conditions made things a little more normal and fishable to say the least. I stopped short, set up, and made long casts to where I’d seen her and got a big bite in the first 2 minutes of fishing. Solid 6+ pounder in the boat. Hooray. We moved a little further and fished on, and I made another long cast to another area a big one had been hanging around and BLOOSH, another solid 5+ pounder in the boat. Hell yeah. One hour in, I was back in the money and had plenty of time to fish. I kept chunking the bigbaits the rest of the day, got another one 4+ and one about 2.5 just committing to the bigbaits all day. Finished 21st place, and only weighed 6 fish for the entire tournament. 24 pounds in 6 fish. Was 6 pounds from the Top 10 cut. Kicking myself for being so one dimensional, because I could have easily made up 6 pounds in 4 fish if I knew what I know today.
There is a huge difference between the Gambler BB Cricket and the Beaver. The BB Cricket is probably 30% smaller which means it punches that much better, and the Beaver already rocks the house in the flipping and punching department. It's similar to the difference between the 6" and 8" Huddleston baits, big difference, but in small baits, the difference isn't so noticeable, unless you really stop and look and fish. The BB Cricket can be fished where few baits will punch thru, just due to simple design and super small profile.
So, to the Tour Event. I have to credit my good friend and fellow angler, Casey Martin for helping me out a ton during off limits. We did a bunch of fun fishing and filming on some other lakes around, and Casey showed me the finer things to grass flipping and punching. I needed to see how the latest and greatest stuff was being done. Casey whacked ’em pretty good and showed me the advanced things about picking casts, where to hit, and how to choose and rig baits and the adjustments he made during a day. Casey can compete with anyone out there. Don’t let the fact he is fishing the Tour (and won 2 Tour Events and the AOY in 2011 as a Co-Angler) as a CoAngler fool you. He fishes the Everstarts as a Pro, and is solid as a rock.
Thanking Casey for helping me with my grass flipping and punching. Casey has been living with Derek Remitz and Craig Dowling most of the last few years on Lake Guntersville, and has honed his grass fishing on the mighty G'Ville. I found myself for the first time in a long time, having to adjust the basic mechanics of what I was doing. Casey is so efficient when he flips, he mathematically beats most guys. More pitches, more clean punches, less time changing over hands (he uses a left handed reel) and keeps the rod in his right hand 100% of the time, and has mad skills in picking out the right stuff to hit. In exchange, I've been lecturing Casey on perfect proportions, Vitruvian Man, and fractal geometry. Poor Casey!!!
The things Casey helped tune me into, combined with some old skills I used to use on Lake Havasu back in the day before it was a smallmouth fishery have come back to me. I’m fishing a healthy combination of flipping and pitching and punching and swimbait fishing tomorrow. We have bad wind and weather, however, I’ve found an area I believe, if I can get to it (meaning if the wind isn’t so bad we cannot run to it) I can get in, and be safe from the wind. So, one major swimbait area, and a lot of places I’m flipping and pitching and punching. I’ve gotten into a pattern to narrow down the endless amounts of grass and overwhelming nature of Okeechobee, with regards to flipping and pitching, and can sorta bounce around and just fish the moment with that deal and feel good about catching some fish, and some of them can be good ones. I needed a good way to fill up a limit because the Everstart showed me that even on a good day, I won’t get 5 in the boat, and I cannot afford to make any mistakes like that at the Tour Level. These boys are incredible anglers and have whipped me badly before, and I cannot beat myself by being one dimensioned out there, especially since we have 15-20 MPH NNE (just like on Day 1 of the Everstart where I struggled with the bigbaits so badly) forecast for tomorrow. I need 5 and tomorrow is my long day, so I gotta use that time wisely.
The mighty Medlock Jig, double weed guard, 1 ounce and a the biggest baddest hook you ever seen on a jig. Brandon won the Okeechobee Everstarts the last 2 years in a row on this jig. I think it's safe to assume they are eating it.
I am boat 147 tomorrow. Due in at 5 pm! Long day, but the weather is going to be brutal windy and rough, but heck, I feel a whole lot better about catching a limit and maybe getting 1-2 big bites, no matter what happens with the weather or wind tomorrow. Please know I am so overwhelmed and behind on so many things that I’m paralyzed at times. I spend my daylight hours fishing, and evening hours getting the footage off the cameras and haven’t even hardly gotten to the editing. The editing is the major heavy lifting, and I’ll be honest, I just haven’t had the focused time to spend on it all, yet. I spent the majority of off limits fishing, filming, working on the boat, doing normal stuff, and some days just resting. I have been filming A LOT since I’ve been down here. I’m not 100% sure what I’m going to be doing with the all footage. Thinking of working on another DVD project, thinking of just some mid-length YouTube series, and definitely have commitments to various business partners I’m obliged to fulfill, so therein lies my challenge. So, when I don’t know what to do, the best decision is no decision, meaning, hang loose and the right paths will eventually reveal themselves. Time’s a Revelator. So bare with me, have a lot to share and show, bigbait fishing and grass flipping and punching stuff. First things last, I’ve got to focus, keep it simple, make good decisions, and make the most of this event.
Okeechobee will not be won on the Alabama Rig, not even the Trip Jig, the modified castable rig, with 2 blades, a skirt, and 3 wires. I enjoyed 'field testing' multi-rigs for grass applications, and my work is not yet done, but it wouldn't be right to not mention that the Alabama Rig WILL NOT WIN on Okeechobee. More to come on the Trip Jig and various weedless setups I've been using (vs. exposed jig head and Hammers). Underwater photography and video is so filthy awful sickening.
