Crappie masters national championship

[arkansasbowhunter]

Well the trip started out good for Greg and I as we left on Tuesday morning for lake washington and bait n things. We made the decision to split up and fish different lakes most of the time. We compared notes at night and made plans for the next day. The week s weather was great with cool temps at night and warm during the day. We caught fish almost everyday but also we struggled to find any good patterns.

We attended the seminar on Thursday night and had a good eat. there were not as many vendors as I expected to see though after talking with people who fished the Nationals in past.

We were excited to say the least and got to see a lot of the .com folks there. Friday came around and Greg and I fished very hard and lake hopped once to get on some fish. The boats were numerous and a challenge to fish around for sure pulling planer boards. I tried something new running two live wells to keep the fish alive and that soon was discovered to be a mistake when we tried to leave and my cranking battery was dead. We flagged a boat and they came to our rescue. Turned out they were fellow .com folks from another state and let me use his jumper cables to get started back. I now have a pair in my boat :-). We had 9 fish in our boat on Friday and felt good about our plan considering we lake hopped and really wasted 3 hours of fishing time doing that.

Friday night came and went along with my tackle bag full of all my plastic baits, some cranks, reels, and much more. I guess someone decided they needed it more than I did. I was just devastated and felt like I got punched in the stomach. Thank goodness arkie had sent Greg a care package and we left that stuff in the cabin. We had minimal stuff to fish with but made the best of the situation. We had several folks offer to let us use some of there stuff if we needed too.

Greg in the mean time was being bombarded from home with bad news that his toilet over flowed and ruined a lot of the house flooring. Too say the least I think we were both punched in the gut this weekend and didn't recover. The fishing on Saturday proved to be much tougher for us for sure. We fished around ark crappie and helped him because every time we passed by him he caught a fish lol. There was a big floatilla for sure both days lol.

We caught all of our fish planer boarding 1/8 oz jig head with arkie tube white/chart. We tried minners and just couldn't get bit. We found the fish wanted the baits fast for us. We saw a lot of folks just sitting still hovering with minners catching fish but overall I think the bite was slow and most had to grind on me to get there fish.

We saw all kinds of techniques from power trolling, planer boards, to long lining and spidering. Maybe some of the other teams will contribute to there techniques and what they did to catch there fish.

[arkansasbowhunter]

Enjoyed seeing an meeting all the .com family people. I know I won't remember everyone's name lol. Jerry James thanks for the Picts too.

[walker733]

Good to see you had a good time, even though the theft of all you stuff, right at a National Championship!

[arkcrappie]

JW, I appreciate all the help. The striped bass, gar and drum were fun to catch!

[Rees Guide]

The experience is worth it tho man, was good to see yall!!

[l_tedford]

Wish you guys could have had better luck. With the situations it would make it hard to focus on the task at hand.

[ski trip]

You are welcome, J.W. That's an awesome camera you have in that big honkin' iPhone!

[RCC]

Hate ya'll had some misfortune. Still a good job in spite of all the adversity.

[MEATGETTER]

I told u about that place! !! !!!

[NIMROD]

Sorry it did not go so well for you guys but it could have been worse . Glad so many of yall got to experince fishing a big tourament. JW a set of jumper cables should be a piece of standard eqipment in a boat . I even keep a set in my old tub. Good luck to all the fishermen in the next season.