Page 55 - Lady Bass Digital Magazine May 2023 Revised

Are you a finesse angler? Are you a deep water angler or a shallow water
angler?
At one point, I considered myself a jig and crankbait angler! I did well
fishing crankbaits 10’ and shallower and flipping or skipping a jig into
cover or under docks. Later, I fell in love with skipping an almost
weightless wacky rig and working a hollow-body frog over hydrilla mats.
I had success during those time frames. I won the 2012 Lady Bass Classic
working a frog over and around hydrilla mats on Lake Guntersville. I won

the 2016 Lady Bass Classic fishing a 1.5 Lucky Craft Ghost Shad crankbait
and skipping a jig into cover on Old Hickory Lake near Nashville.

Since those times, I more and more frequently find myself with not being

able to focus...too many technique choices and I did’t even realize it un-
til recently at our opening event on Lake Palestine, Texas, when I looked
at the deck of my boat and saw a kitchen sink of rods and technique choic-
es. I was frustrated, but I could not put my finger on what the problem or
problems might be.

Then fishing a Federation event on
Sam Rayburn, I again struggled. I
knew that time of the year meant the
fish should be up shallow and in the
brush, but when my co-angler caught

two good fish in the 8’-10’ range, I
changed and began looking for fish in
deeper water or at least with deeper
water nearby. Before making that de-
cision, I had caught fish in the shal-
lower water, but they did not com-
pare in size to those caught by my
co-angler. So, based on that, I felt
like the fish were positioned deeper. I found myself all day long torn be-

tween targeting the bushes or fishing the grass with deeper water nearby. I
swapped between multiple techniques with little success. I was near fish.
There were boats around me catching fish within 50 yards of me. Some were
focusing on the bushes and others on the flats with scattered grass. I was
in limbo land.

It wasn’t until weigh-in that day, that anglers who came in with little if

Lady Bass Anglers Association 55