Gone! Another year wiser, and feeling better than ever.
Okay, it’s time for that year end summary. 2014 I didn’t fish a whole lot. Not gonna lie. Another ‘transition’ year for me, settling back into Southern California life. I’ve learned many new things in 2014, and few of them relate at all to fishing. The one biggest lesson in fishing from 2014 I will carry forward is the lethal nature of glide baits. The Slide Swimmer 250 namely blew my mind. I saw my buddy Cameron Smith call fish out from deep tule clumps with the Slide Swimmer. He was literally flipping and pitching it into little whole and stalling/twitching it out on braid and did some amazing things to pull fish out. I spent a few weeks on the White River in Arkansas. Let me tell you, the Slide Swimmer 250 did more damage in one day than I did in 6 months living in Arkansas! There is a sweet spot for a bait that can be swam, stalled, and power fished in heavy current situations.
My dad was with me when I hooked a GIANT brown trout on the Slide Swimmer 250 and followed up with one more in the boat, and one more pulled off. Crazy good day of bigbait/big fish hunting on the White River. Blazing July heat, but it burns so good with that 50 degree river water. Promar Nets become livewells in small river boats.
My PB brown trout. Stoked to say the least.
Otay Session with my boy Cameron Smith. Slide Swimmer 250, 80# braid and the LDC 8 XH rod.The Hobie Alter Memorial Service. Fare you well Hobie. We love you in these parts.
There is this event called Stagecoach that happens out in the desert. I don’t plan on missing Stagecoach going forward. I felt really cool and awesome. There is a serious shortage of men at this event, and many cowgirls, which was a good problem to have.Spent a day with Kevin Mattson. The Bass King. Kevin is fricking awesome and really had a fun day shooting film and just fishing.
Got Hard Drives? Yes, I’m working on DVD #2. Video editing is really hard and time consuming. 2015, I hope to release #2Xmas 2014. Good to be home. Surround yourself with family and good friends.
I don’t dream of weighing in 30 pound sacks on Okeechobee anymore. I enjoy fishing from shore, wading, and small boats. The bang bang of bass fishing can be exhausting, but you have to chase your dreams. So go for it.
Wading, on a Tuesday afternoon. Braid, Okuma Komodo 364 and a top hook Huddleston 68 with the barb pinched down. Shallow water trophy hunting, White River, Arkansas.
I’m realizing where I’ve made miscalculations and misjudgements in my fishing at times. I’m a huge fan of big fat round reels. I am born and raised on Don Iovino “doodling” where short Phenix Rods, w Excalibur Handles and round Abu-Garcia reels where how you caught fish in Southern California. Now, at a macro level, understand that Iovino was both right and wrong. At that same time, a guy like Dean Rojas was smashing fish with reaction baits, challenging the finesse only / shaking 4″ worms on 8 pound line in >20 feet of water to get a bit. My point being, I’ve made mistakes in REEL SELECTION at times. Low profile reels tend to be way more easy to fish. They weigh ounces less than the big gold Shimano Calcutta TE or D Series. Low profile reels have way better gears than they used to, they have quicker gear ratios and line pickup speeds, and can handle all your bigbaits. I like the slowness of the round TE 400 for specialized Huddleston fishing. I can’t see myself not having a few 400 TEs in the boat with me, but the 300 Series of low profile swimbait reels continues to grow on me. Anywho, besides ergonomic and aesthetic advantages, they tend to have faster gear ratios. I suppose I need to say, the Shimano Curado 300 is and will remain a sick ass low profile swimbait reel that can handle bigbaits and big fish. However, Shimano is no longer in the position they enjoyed historically. Insert Okuma.
Okuma provides a great value product. They have made outstanding rods in the bigbait fishing department for years. The Guide Select Series has been what I and many other recommend to beginning swimbait fisherman. I know Mark Rogers and Mike Bennett a little bit, and know these guys charge hard and do a lot of hardcore charging. They keep hardcore swimbait fishing happy and treat them with respect and aloha. Check out what Oliver Ngy (Big Bass Dreams) and Kevin Mattson (Bass King) fish with. Okuma wisely has decided to engage subject matter experts and figure out ways to partner and team up with them. The result is what can be seen and felt in the Okuma Komodo 364. Let’s be honest., the Okuma reels couldn’t compete in the quality department years ago, but now they can. They’ve proven it now for the last few years, and the work of buys in both salt and freshwater are all the validation you should need.
Slinging a Huddie 68 at a 45 degree upriver angle. Fishing it back down and across. Sometimes stalling to a 45 degree downriver or more angle retrieve back.
You need a few 300 Series, low profile reels in your swimbait game. Skipping 6″ Weedless Huddlestons under docks was a favorite past time of mine for years. Low profile reels and dock skipping make a lot of sense. A new trend in my Triple Trout fishing is fishing the 7-8″ Triple Trout on the Curado 300. The quicker gear ratio (vs the Calcutta 300 or 400) made fishing the Triple Trout way easier. So, I find the mid range hardbaits to be an outstanding application of the 300 Series of reels. What Kevin Mattson and Oliver Ngy have really opened my eyes to is the application of the 300 series, with the Komodo 364 to the megabaits, the bigger bigbaits like the Slide Swimmer 250. The Slide Swimmer 250 and the magnum glide baits like the Roman Mades, Gan Craft and big Rago Glideaor, need to be a staple in your swimbait fishing, as are the Huddleston Deluxe, Triple Trout, MS Slammer and the rat baits of your choice.
The base of the Bull Shoals Dam, and the genesis of the White River trout fishery. Big browns live here. Don’t fish here. You might get your arm broke.
Here’s the deal, you can spend $250 on a Curado 300 and be happy. Shimano is not a company that can be engaged if you are interested in fishing for a living and want to partner with them in any shape or form. Just leave it at that. Fish their stuff, and be stoked, it’s awesome. Or you could spend $ 220, buy an Okuma Komodo 364, and align yourself with a company and group of guys the welcomes and engages the swimbait fishing community and subject matter experts. When there are alternatives out there, like Okuma and Abu Garcia that are making great value products that are high quality, capitalism and free markets take their course. I would definitely recommend the Okuma Komodo 364 now after fishing it hard. I haven’t caught the uber giants with it yet, but I did fish the gamut of my favorite mid size and magnum sized baits, and have wipped some nice fish. I keep a pulse on what reels guys are really catching their fish with, and the Komodo 364 across both salt and freshwater continues to impress and amaze. Check out Okuma’s facebook page to get a pulse on their community and O’hana HERE.
Blazing July Heat, 50 degree White River, and the Slide Swimmer 250. The Okuma Komodo 364 has the guts to lob megabaits. And the gearing and quality to do it 50B times in your lifetime. Low profile, quicker, and easier on your wrists. Talk about putting English into a Slide Swimmer and cutting current. Notice the fish’s mouth got a little tore up, but Karma came around quick, notice my thumb bleeding on my right hand. She gouged me good as I tried to pick her up at one point.
The Promar Net is my livewell and definitely served it’s purpose in spades this day.
2nd Slide Swimmer fish. Notice how gold and orange this fish is vs. the above fish. This one was way smaller, like a 23″ fish. The above fish was >30″ and my biggest brown ever. I love the GoPro. Shots like this are random and just fun.
For what it’s worth, I highly recommend you invest in a Komodo 364, a spool of 65 or 80# braid, and pair it with the swimbait rod of your choice and application. Braid and the low profile bigbait reel with the faster gear ratio have changed my fishing. It works and is my system for many baits now with the exception of slow rolling Huddlestons , fishing for the ‘one’ in some super clear / super pressured situation. I use florocarbon leaders where applicable. Braid gives you WAY MORE control and play with your hardbaits. You can make turns and stalls and cut water WAY BETTER than with mono or floro. There is only usually a foot or two of line actually in the water ahead of the bait, because you tend to ‘high stick’ your rod tip on your retrieve with braid. You don’t have the line sag and drag challenges you do with mono or floro.
It’s getting really hot, really muggy, and the grass is getting way thick. I always look for the cleanest/blackest water I can find with the most beautiful hydrilla, and usually the fish are there. I found a few instances where I could fish the XL Nezumaa around isolated clumps of reeds and buggy whips. The bottom is just carpeted with wonderful hydrilla, that really good green hard and crisp hydrilla, and the water is by far the deepest and clearest water I’m fishing the XL Nezumaa along walls of reeds too, and just trying to get a big bite where I can. As the heat sets in, I highly suggest rats and big wakebaits, like MS Slammers or 3:16 Hardbaits. Big topwater baits basically, the can catch a big one at high noon, blaring heat in the right conditions. And rat baits are super fun to fish-my favorite. Just super fun fishing and helps endure brutal conditions and heat.
I do like fishing certain bigbaits on snaps. I really find the Owner Hyper Cross Locks fit this bait, and my application beautifully. I like to walk and stall my rats. I do like to slow reel and wake them too, but man, I just can’t help but make that bait look alive and struggling out there. I only have small pockets of fishable water, I don’t usually have long runs of clean swim lanes to bring a top water bait thru, a bait like the XL Nezumaa, I can throw it right on the ‘point’ of a good isolated clump of reeds and usually there will be a hole in the hydrilla around the reeds enough to fish it out a few feet or more. You just don’t get 15-30 feet of swim most times, you only get 2-6 feet at times to work with, so you need a stallable bait, and a topwater is the bait, the ultimate stall bait. So around grass, or isolated layown trees, or around shade pockets, you want a bait that hangs in the little ‘pool’ you have to work with, and where too, you can get maximum action out of your bait when you do decide to walk it and really jerk it. The XL Nezumaa is violent and raucous, and you get a lot of action and noise and the bait only moved 4-6″ toward you. And with the right wind or bow in your line, you can float a bait like the XL Nezumaa rat in place. I am fishing 80# straight braid on my XL Nezumaa and recommend a Low Down Custom Rods 8′ XH if you haven’t ever tried one of those rods for lobbing a BIG bait like the XL Nezumaa or Slide Swimmer 250.
I’m hanging tough in Florida. I thought I’d share some pictures over the last few months. I am working full time at full speed with my software gig. Business is good and I’m just going with it. Hope to get out fishing more, and continue the search:
Fishing for trophy brown trout on the White River in Cotter, Arkansas, is making me a better swimbait fisherman. There are new challenges of current, water fluctuation, baits, rigging, and access. This fish went 29.5 Inches and ate a 3 Dot Olive 10″ Triple Trout at the base of a shoal.
I haul a lot of water, with swimbaits, hunting trophy brown trout….but it’s all about learning. I’m still rigging my modified jon boat into a better river boat. I’m still learning the river, how to control the boat, and what angles the fish seem to prefer. The bait selection is easy: Huddleston and Triple Trout for the most part. Duh.
Above the Narrows, White River, Arkansas
The quiver of boats you need in the Ozarks. I love my Ranger Boat, but goddam I’m tired of burning fuel. Drift boats are awesome, and Honda 4 Strokes, are incredibly efficient.
River fishing, current, and the orientation of the fish makes casting angles and how you line and position yourself up so much different than I’d do in lakes, but it’s still very similar.
It’s safe to say Simms Fishing Products rock, and fit perfectly into the ‘cross over’ conversation. Love their products, their company and style.
Not lots of room to work with up on the deck, but shoot, room enough. Love how jon boats fish, and just love getting on the river and having access. Forgot to put the spare trailer tire in the truck, I don’t usually bring spare tires in the boat!
Fishing with 2 Fly Fisherman this day, out of a drift boat, you have to understand how different they fish. You have 3 people in a small boat. You have shuttles to run so you have a truck at the end of your drift, and maybe a trailer too. You need someone to row, and 2 guys to fish and you rotate. I can cast 4 X further than these guys, so I am rarely at a disadvantage, even from the back of the boat.
You don’t grip a brown trout by the jaw. Their mouth and teeth could probably eat a tin can. Trout fisherman are super careful about fish care and handling fish. These big White River brown trout are healthy and hearty, and this one was released unharmed.
The Trophy Brown Trout in the White River are eating the stocked rainbow trout. The browns are wild fish, and savvy fly fishermen are using streamers to get big browns. For a guy like me, swimbaits and bigbaits are a no brainer.
BigBaits, Simms Fishing Products, Drift Boats and a slowed down pace of fishing. This isn’t tournament fishing. This is trophy hunting, and brown trout are an excellent cross over opportunity. The White River in Arkansas is accessible to most of the MidWest and South very easily.
Trophy Brown Trout Fishing with Swimbaits on the White River, Arkansas
We first broke the ice on the swimbait bite on the White River in what was documented in our film Southern Trout Eaters. Now, two summers later, we are living on the White and spending a whole lot more time and energy to really dial in the fish. We have a long way to go. Fishing in current is a new challenge in itself. The above is a short clip of an approx. 26-27″ trophy brown trout caught near Cotter, Arkansas, on the 8″ Huddleston Deluxe Rainbow Trout swimbait, using our Southern Trout Eaters Huddleston Rig, with the added gill modification, ROF 12. We got some nice footage of the release and just wanted to share our ‘personal best’ with you. It isn’t often you wake up at 5am with swimbait fishing on your mind when the calendar tells you it’s July and the forecast is well into the 100+ degree mark. But that is what happens when you understand some of the nuances of Southern swimbait fishing. Trout Eaters are where you find them.
The Southern Trout Eaters rig works well with brown trout I’m finding. Like bass, big brown trout don’t always inhale the bait or eat it head first. Lots of swipes, kisses and short bites by those super smart brownies. ST-66 treble hooks are perfect for the rock hard bone razor teeth laden mouths of trophy brown trout.
Trophy Trout are not easy to catch or hold onto for a picture. Notice the size of the head and jaws vs. the rest of the body. A cool 104 degree July afternoon in Arkansas, contrasted by 58 degree water temps in the mighty White River.
