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Stay or Go, part IITo Stay or Go, that is the question.
(This is part two of a series of articles on this subject)
Tournament fishing is an ever changing puzzle of what to do and when to do it. Decision making is the difference between winning or getting a check and not even being close. As I continue to fish, learn and write about this subject hopefully some of you can learn from my mistakes. In the first part of this series, I wrote about making the decision to stay on a group of fish. Well I have a painfully fresh example of when to ?go? to share.
While practicing for a tournament on Lake Norman last week I discovered a pattern that was consistently producing 13 to 15lbs per day. Given the time of year and the full moon quickly approaching I figured the fish would be moving into the cuts/spawning areas. They were, nearly every cut I went into, mid-way in or further back I got bit. The better fish were coming in the shallowest water.
I was skipping a jig into the darkest area under the dock; if my jig made it to the bottom I would hop it out slowly and go onto the next angle. I had fish take the jig before it ever reached the bottom and others grab it as I was hopping it on the bottom. The deeper the cut the more bites I got, but the better quality fish were coming from ?the dirt?.
It had been relatively warm most of the week and Friday night a front blew in and it was thirty degrees at blast off. I thought that this might change/affect the shallow pattern a bit but didn?t expect it to shut it down completely.
I spent the first third of my tournament day fishing the pattern and got nothing to show for it. I fished several of the better areas where I had gotten multiple bites. I slowed down and fished more persistently and still nothing. So I had to ?go.?
I changed areas and patterns, fishing deeper brush piles close to or on the main channel. This produced 7 bites in about a two hour period. It was around 1:00pm when I decided to go back to my pattern. I was fishing this tournament for a check, not points and felt I would need the big bites to have a chance at the check I wanted.
Off to the races I went, running and gunning as many of the areas as I could, hoping that the afternoon sun would draw ?the bigs? back under the shallow docks. All the while I was working my way away from the deeper brush. After an hour plus of ?the Lake Norman shuffle? without a bite I realized I had made a mistake leaving the deep brush. There wasn?t enough time to run back to it so I stuck to my guns and hoped for one BIG bite. It didn?t come.
Looking back I see where I made a couple of bad decisions. First, I should have known to abandon the shallows after that front came in. It was too early in the year and the fish hadn?t committed to the skinny water yet. At this point they are very likely to pull out when a front comes through. Secondly, after I went to the deeper, heavy cover I got several bites and shouldn?t have left it. Last but not least, knowing that the weights are usually tight on Norman, rather than bearing down and trying to get ?a? check I grasped for ?the? check. Hind sight is 20/20 and all these signs told me to ?go? away from the pattern I found in practice, I just didn?t see them.
2006-04-09 22:59:01
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