Happy Fathers Day!!

To all of those Dads out there reading this site. Have a great Day.

Next week we will be practicing for the Detroit River open. I will post some reports as soon as I get back.

Muskegon Recap

First of all, let me apologize to everyone folowing this site for my lack of posts lately!!! Things have been quite busy between fishing, work, and dreaded honey do's.

Our tour of Michigan didn't quite go as well as planned. The first stop in Saginaw bay went okay, but we uncovered a trolling motor problem that ended up hurting us for the whole weekend. We ended up weighing 19lbs of smallies, good enough for another top 10. Primarily all of our fish were caught on rattle traps in about a foot and a half of water. Saturday night we began our pre fishing for our muskegon tournament and were able to find quite a few smallies on beds on a lake way north of muskegon. Things were looking good until we looked at the forecast for Monday and it called for 15 - 20 mph winds out of the southwest. By Sunday afternoon we were becoming quite pessimistic on being able to run to our spot from Muskegon up lake Michigan. We decided at the last minute to try to go find something on Muskegon lake in case our plan to run back fires due to the weather. While pre fishing that evening we met quite a pleasant family with a 10 year old boy who might be the next Kevin VanDam. I plan on writing another post about him real soon. Kelly, Ken, or David Micheal, if you are reading this please send me DM's pix. I promised him I would put them on the site!!!

Monday morning I awoke at around 3am to rolling thunder and howling winds. Not a pleasant sound when planning a 80 mile run up the big lake in a bass boat. Nick and I decided after blast off to go to the pier heads anyway just to see what the lake looked like and eliminate the thought of making the run. While in the channel, 4 other boats turned around, one of them being some well known lake erie anglers. Nick stated, "if they aren't running, we aren't running." Which I thought was a pretty good idea considering as the salmon boats were heading out, they would dissapear in the troughs of the waves.

Throughout the afternoon, we fought a broken trolling motor and a lack of knowledge about Muskegon lake. It was a pretty dissapointing day to say the least. We left the lake early after only catching 5 really small male largies.

The moral of the story.... Never put all of your eggs in one basket! Especially for a tournament the you have been looking forward to for the whole year.

Random Info...

Congrats to Nick for finishing 8th in the BFL on Patoka Reservoir in Southern Indiana. Whats awesome about his finish is that he did it without a motor. The day before while practicing he blew his lower unit but stayed to fish anyways.

This weekend him and I will be touring the state fishing two tournaments on opening weekend. First we will be on Saginaw bay on Saturday fishing the Fishers of Men season opener, and then we will be heading over to Muskegon to defend our titles at the BBT Memorial 100 on Monday. Stay tuned to see how we did.

Pre Fishing Shortcuts -Nick Neves Legend Pro

Over the years I have been on various waters that adjoin state land, or have empty lake lots, and or public marina's. I learned years ago while pre fishing an event in Southern Indiana that I could actual pre fish from the shore and cover water much faster. There are multiple advantages to this technique. The first is huge. With todays prices of fuel, instead of driving around a whole lake and iddling endless channels, park the boat and trailer and walk marina's, walk the woods around the lake and observe. This is a real benefit when the fish are spawning. Most beds are shorline and marina spawn oriented and what better a way to see them than above looking straight down. There is less glare, no engine or trolling motor noise and zero mud kicked up in shallow area. Prior to GPS I would also utilize blaze orange tape and mark a twig directly above a hard to re locate bed. While I will not advocate littering, the bio degradable orange survey tape used by hunters marking trails and surveyors work great and will break down.

I will give 2 words of warning involving this method however, first make sure the marina doesn't have signs posted "no fishing" a small bribe may be all it takes, and lastly with the woods in spring and tall grasses CHECK FOR TICKS !! I had the sickening find of two ticks on my body after walking the banks of Barkley Lake in Kentucky, the fish were worth it as Matt Morgan will attest and we covered alot of water via foot, but I still itch writing this tip as I think of my afternoon find.

Give it a shot and good luck on the lake.

Special thanks to my sponsors ; Legend Bass Boats, Mercury Motors, Poor Boys Baits, Mizmo, GAMMA, Snack Daddy Lures, American Eagle Rods and Remax Mid-Michigan

Nick Neves

Las Vegas...

I will be gone to Vegas from now until next Monday. Good fishing to all!!! To the left is a picture of one of many fish that Nick and my Dad caught today on Lake St. Clair. If I were you, I would get there as fast as you can. Reports of 80-100 fish are common and many fish over 5lbs. Remember, Please release them immedietley so we can do this for many years to come.

Bed Fishing

Now that we are in the heat of the spawn here in Mid-Michigan. What is your favorite bed fishing technique? I have tried some really off the wall stuff but my two favorite lures to use when the bass are on their beds are a poorboys craw on a small ballhead jig or a 4 inch senko on a weightless hook. I first throw the craw to see how aggresive the fish is. If it doesn't bite right away, I reel in and throw the senko. The senko really works well once the fish is aggrivated b/c it just kind of sits in that strike zone for an extended ammount of time. I don't throw the senko first b/c it is harder to make a precise cast with that then it is with the little craw. Once the fish realizes that there is something in it's territory then it is easier to pick off with the weightless senko.

I'ts also very important to try and cast from the side of the bed as opposed to directly in front of it. Fish with escape routes to deep water feel less pressured then those in which are trapped with nowhere to go.

My most off the wall presentation for bed fishing is a suspending jerkbait. It's a sure fire bait when bed fishing, especially if you put a split shot up about 3 inches off the line tie. I resembles a minnow trying to look for eggs. The downside of using this rig is that you can only really use it on beds in open water because of the two sets of trebles on the bait.

Posting Comments...

Guys and Gals, I opened up the comments for everyone to post not thinking that someone was going to be childish enough to post as someone else. From now on, all of the comments will be previewed by me before they are published. Mark, Sorry for the smar@$$ post by me in regards to the comment that I thought was yours.