A Couple of Buck Stories

First off, I know these two deer are nothing spectacular, but this one to the left was my first buck with a bow! My father-in-law constantly
talked about how fun and addictive bow hunting was, and it made pretty good sense why! So, I took his word for it and bought a used Matthews Switchback last year. This was the best investment I have ever made. I hunted hard day in and day out trying to get a buck on the ground, and finally it happened in the third week of October! Me and a buddy went up to Atkins to some private property that I thankfully have permission to hunt. I went into an area that I had never hunted before with a bow and just went up a tree! This particular place was an oak flat just south of a thicket. There was a NW wind which was perfect! I sat there until about 6 when I heard what all hunters want to hear, something crunching the leaves coming from up from the thicket to the oak flat. This 7 point looked like he was on a mission, perhaps cruising looking for some does. The 4-blade muzzy went right through the boiler room and he went maybe 30 yards. Boy was I excited!

These set of horns are from this year! Once again, nothing out of the ordinary, but still a decent 8 point. I was hunting up in Atkins on the same property. I found a fence row coming up from a thicket that had a couple giant white oaks that were loaded. I knew deer would be using it, but the first time I hunted it I climbed a tree a little far out from the area just so I could get an idea of where the deer were coming from and how they were using the area. I saw numbers of deer with one being a shooter buck but it got dark on me before I could get a shot! I went back to the same area the next weekend and moved in closer. I had a cowhorn spike working the area for an hour or so, and never seen any of the same deer I had seen the time before. A few minutes before dark this 8 point came up from the thicket along the fence row to have a little supper. Boy did I surprise him!

I caught this limit of bass early this spring on a chartreuse spinnerbait with double Colorado blades, one gold and the other chartreuse. Believe it or not, it only took me about 45 minutes total to catch the ten fish, and that includes culling a few small fish out. I tried to get Ashley to come with me that morning because I knew what was going to happen, but she decided to sleep in. I caught a limit in the afternoon on the day before that so that's how I knew it was going to be good the next morning, and the low pressure front that was hanging around for a couple days only helped. There was rain and storms all over the state, which during any time, helps tremendously. Needless to say, that afternoon after I caught these ten fish me and a buddy (Dustin Tippin) went back and caught two limits, and were culling the smaller fish out for the last hour we were there. I caught these fish where there was running water in the bottoms, the rest you will have to find out on your own!!

8-22-09
Although today wasn't the best day to be fishing, since it's the second day after a major front. It was just too nice outside to sit around the house. Me and Ashley went down in the bottoms and went to one particular
spot
that I knew might hold some fish, only because there was running water. I managed to catch a few bass on a crank bait. It definitely was very slow but I knew that would be the case, but still managed a mess of bass.

My Biggest Bass - 8lbs.

I caught this particular fish when I was 17 at Holla Bend Refuge. It was in the spring during the spawn, which helped this fish weigh what it did. To make a long story short, we were just hitting the banks with spinner baits like most people do this time of year. I caught the fish and we weighed it at a local grocery store, and I decided to put it on the wall. I'm sure this story is nothing out of the ordinary, but since that day I have been fishing just trying to catch big bass. I met my soon to be wife when I was 22, and quickly realized I was going to have one of, if not, the best local avid fisherman/bow hunter as a father-in-law.

9-27-09
Last Sunday morning Me and Ashley decided to go and try to catch a few fall crappie! We ended up fishing for about 3 hours and ended up with 18 total. We fished vertical in different types of structure anywhere from 4-8 ft. The morning started off slow and the fish were in deeper water. By noon after the sun was shining we were catching numbers of fish in 4-6 ft of water.

9-9-09
Well I decided to go back for some more crappie yesterday afternoon, hoping it would be similar to the day before when me and Ashley caught 18. The barometer pressure was lower and there was a south wind, which usually means good things are going to happen! That definitely was not the case for that evening. I fished multiple spots I usually catch fish and caught 1 crappie. That was the only bite I had got, so I knew something was wrong. I was fishing the same jig as the day before, chartreuse, hot orange, black. As the evening progressed, and it begin to get closer to dark, I pulled up to the same tree top I had fished before and never got a bite. I changed colors to a chartreuse/pink/chartreuse (brightest jig in my box), and ten minutes later, I had ten slabs in my ice chest! The lack of daylight ended this trip with only 10 fish, but they were all good ones!

9-7-09
Well, Ashley and I spent the day doing yard at my grandma's house. I believe we finished around 4 or so, and headed to our house. For some reason, we got a wild hair and jumped in the truck around 5:40 and went to catch some evening crappie. We only got to fish for about an hour and fifteen minutes before daylight ended, but it was well worth our time. Chartreuse/hot orange/black and chartreuse/pink/black were only two jigs we used the entire time, and we kept 18 crappie total. We only fished 4 different tree tops, and there was not a small one in the bunch, which is a little unusual. I didn't weight any of the fish, but I KNOW there were at least 5 that would of been 2lbs or bigger. All in all, a great time and well worth the trip!!

55 crappie

Jigs we used for today

8-29-09
Yesterday morning me and Ashley caught 31 crappie, which we have already posted below. Well, we went back that evening and managed to keep 25 more. Nothing out of the ordinary on that trip, but we went back this morning for round 3. We got there around 7 a.m. and pulled the boat out around 1 p.m. The morning started off pretty slow, with us only catching a few fish out our main tree tops. We spent a lot of time running around in the boat trying to find other places that might hold fish, and managed to catch a few more here in there, but still pretty slow. Around 11 a.m. it was almost like you flicked a switch, to ON, because we started catching multiples out of the same tops we fished before that only produced one or two fish, and some of which produced none. We checked the pressure early this morning when we were on the water, and realized it had jumped up to 30, which the day before it had been much lower. Also, there was a pretty steady east, northeast wind. By the time we had left, the pressure had fallen to 29.95 and wind had switched to the Northwest. And as all fishermen know the old saying, "winds in the west, fish bite the best, winds in the east, fish bite the least". That's definitely true for the most part in my opinion. Anyways, when we got home, we ended up with 30 more slabs, and Ashley caught her biggest crappie yet, 2.1 lbs. Although she didn't want her pic taken with it, I surely didn't mind getting mine taken with it, so here are few pics from today.

31 CRAPPIE

8-28-09
Today was an overall great day for crappie fishing. A low pressure front moved in last night and proved to help tremendously in how the crappie were biting. Me and Ashley caught 31 slabs this morning in about 3 hours! All of the fish were caught in structure in 5-8 ft of water on jigs made from my friend Skip at thumpitjigs.com. Anyways, we fished vertical all day in moderate to heavy structure which seemed to work very well.

Here are the jigs we used today :

Summer Crappie Fishing

The majority of fisherman know it's a whole new ball game after the spawn when it comes to catching numbers of fish. This requires a lot of work. I read all the time about people who spider rigging and troll, but to me that's really not as fun as fishing vertical in treetops and structure. Crappie are a very dedicated schooling fish, which means they like to stay in packs in much deeper water during the summer months, and that's where spider rigging and trolling comes in handy. After the spawn, obviously fish move to much deeper water during the warmer months of the year. Most people think just because they catch crappie closer to the banks during the spring, that they can do so during the summer, WRONG! I have figured out that to catch crappie consistently during the summer time, you have to put in some time of your own making a place for these fish to be. Tree tops, man-made structure, anything you know that will hold fish. Sink these structures in the deeper waters such a creek channels, drop offs from one debt to another, areas with little current, or any other favorable area you know of that crappie love during the summer. Hopefully this information is helpful to you in the future!

Spring Crappie and Bass

One of my favorite times of the year! Everyone knows that you can catch crappie close to the bank when they spawn, but the question is, what is the exact time to start catching them in the shallows. Well, in the last two years I have learned so much about this topic from my soon to be father-in-law. When the water temperature heats up to 55 degrees, the crappie start moving in from the deep water to the shallows to find a place to spawn. First off, the big black males fan out a bed for their big fat honeys. They are the funnest to catch in my opinion, as any crappie fisherman knows, they are the meanest. The sows sit and wait in deeper water for the males to finish making the bed, and then they move in to lay the eggs. This is the time of year when at any time it's possible to catch a 3+ pound crappie. Once the eggs are laid, the male moves back in to protect the eggs. At any point during this time, if you drop a jig anywhere near these beds or eggs, it will get destroyed quickly. It's not that the males or females are hungry, it's that they don't want anything near their eggs that they think is harmful. Also, keep in mind the best time to fish this time of year is in the evening, as the sun heats up the water temp throughout the day to the right temp. Anywhere from 55-65 degrees, (ideally 62-65 degrees) you can catch big crappie on the spawn. Every body of water is different on the temperature, as obviously the smaller bodies of water heat up faster then bigger bodies of water. This concept is the same for bass, although they like the water temp to be a little warmer (63-68 degrees).