Lessons Gleaned (Part 4)

Achieving consistent productivity starts with choosing the right locations to fish. Fishing in places holding plenty of the right fish hedges the bet favorably. Despite these truths, fishing in places loaded with quality fish can't completely eliminate the importance of other aspects of angling efforts, namely strategy, lure choice and presentation style. Versatile anglers do the right things more often than those stubbornly committed to a limited number of things.

I and most of my partners prefer wading over fishing out of the boat, especially when we're targeting trophy trout. For me, this preference has a recognizable genesis. I caught my first trout measuring at least twenty-seven inches while wading in the back corner of a shallow cove in West Galveston Bay and caught many other big trout while wading before I ever caught one while casting from the deck of a boat in water too deep for wading. Sometimes, though, fishing from the boat in deep water makes far more sense than wading, even for anglers targeting monster specks.

I learned this lesson the hard way, while competing against other top trout anglers in the state as the 20th century ended and the new millennium began. Competition reveals one's strengths and weaknesses better than fishing alone because it forces a comparison of one's results with those of others. My poor performance in several events held early in my career forced me to acknowledge how my devotion to wading could doom me to failure in specific kinds of conditions.

Perhaps the most important factor which tips the scales in favor of fishing out of the boat is the temperature of the water. Extreme values, either cold or hot, can send most of the fish away from shorelines and shallow structural elements, out of the reach of wading anglers. I remember several winter and summer events which proved this point to me in poignant ways. In one tournament, held in Galveston in late-winter under bright blue skies with cool north winds blowing in the wake of a strong front, I and my partners struggled to find some kind of pattern which would allow us to catch our fish by wading.

Extremely low tides and dirty water made this nearly impossible. We found a skunk on day one, fishing in West Bay, then succeeded in locating a sweet looking ripple created by water gushing out of a drain in East Bay on day two. I did manage to catch one solid trout by casting a Super Spook upcurrent at the mouth of the drain and working it toward where I stood. But when organizers of the event wrote the names of the leaders on the boards that Sunday afternoon, my catch left me invisible.

On Saturday, we noticed what I'd describe as an armada of boats drifting in the middle of West Bay, most of them in the area approximately south of Green's Cut. The next day, we saw another big group of boats working deeper parts of East Bay, mostly east of Hannah's Reef. Though I don't remember specifically, we likely mentioned this to each other as we raced around closer to the shorelines, looking for some spot where we thought we might wade and catch the right fish. With little confidence in our ability to catch big trout off the deck of the boat, and perhaps more importantly, no desire to fish out of the boat, we chose to wade when doing so made little or no sense.

In situations where results matter, stubbornly committing to flawed strategies renders one's skills obsolete. In those days, I had already developed a sharp acumen related to catching fish on floating plugs. I rightly believed I could make trout blow up when many others couldn't. But my confidence in topwaters and the related preference for wading, which makes presenting them much easier, doomed me to failure in events in which most of the fish had retreated to water too deep for wading.

This same thing occurred at least two other times in events held during the peak of summer heat waves. In one memorable tournament, held in the Sabine National Wildlife Refuge, on Sabine Lake and Lake Calcasieu, the guys who did best reported catching most or all their big trout on topwaters while fishing areas too deep for waders to access. I spent all my time trying to scratch out a few bites, wading in places where I did normally catch quality trout in cooler weather and coming up empty.

These and other events emphasized the potential pitfalls associated with becoming too tied to the strategy of wading. I generally stand by my preference for getting into the water with the fish to try and catch them, especially when the goal is to catch one giant fish. Because wading facilitates stealth and allows for methodically, repeatedly and precisely probing tiny sweet spots with confidence, the tactic often works best for anglers who don't care how many bites they get, because they've put a priority on catching the biggest trout they can.

But some situations, usually those generated by weather either cold enough to turn wading people into popsicles or so hot the deck of the boat burns the bottoms off boots, catching fish while wading can become nearly impossible. If the only way to catch a fish is by fishing out of the boat, the only way to catch a big fish is by fishing out of the boat. Playing the percentages correctly always means deploying the basic strategy best suited to produce the desired outcome. The same truth applies to the lure-choice part of the puzzle.

Only by relying on sound operating principles related to lure-choice can one achieve consistent results. Becoming too committed to one type of lure and trying to force-feed the fish reduces productivity. This truth rings especially loudly if the preferred type of lure floats on the water's surface. Though trout and other fish can and will strike topwaters aggressively at times, they will ignore them entirely in other situations.

I now use a set of tested principles when choosing which lures to deploy, many of which I began to learn while competing against others in Troutmaster tournaments decades ago. Two of these basic lessons stand out among all the others when it comes to how I select the right lure for the moment. After several events in which I struggled while others brought bulging sacks to the scales, I realized my commitment to throwing topwaters sometimes sabotaged my chances for success.

In most of those events, I heard others describe how easily they'd caught their fish on soft plastics, while I worked ridiculously hard for a scant few blowups. I now realize I'd have likely done much better in specific events, if I'd been more committed to one plan I now think of as a basic and simple strategy. When water temperatures rise above 80° or so, I start most mornings off throwing a topwater, expecting a relatively easy bite, but when the blowups become harder to urge, and after I've tried adjusting my presentation style somewhat, I tie on a soft plastic on a light jighead to try and keep the bites coming.

Thinking about exactly what I did in the August event in which I led on day one after catching the big trout on Sand Point in West Matagorda Bay, only to find the water wrecked by fresh new winds the next morning leads me to conclude my stubborn insistence on using topwaters cost me money. I honestly don't remember trying a soft plastic at all after I realized I'd likely smell a skunk if I stayed at the little reef and moved around into the protected, clear waters of Keller Bay. I do know I caught the one trout I weighed on a Super Spook.

If I found myself in the same situation today, I'd abandon the idea of trying to catch a fish on top, especially a full-sized plug. I'd tie on a worm and keep it on, unless I suddenly found the catching easy on it, got my three fish, and could see lots of mullet and other bait fish jumping out of the water. This basic plan of attack has worked for me on many occasions in the years since I stopped fishing against others in tournaments and began measuring my catch mostly against those fishing with and beside me on charters. When a fast morning topwater bite wanes, the best way to keep catching often involves switching down to a soft plastic.

In other situations, namely when water temperatures dip down below 60° and stay there for a while, starting the day off throwing soft plastics makes much more sense than anything else. In cold water, I generally start a day throwing soft plastics on light jigheads and working them low and slow, switching up to other lures if and when the bites come frequently enough to convince me the fish are aggressively feeding. I began developing this basic strategy after I felt the sting of bad results in winter tournaments all those years ago, when I spent far too much time throwing other lures, because I lacked confidence in my ability to catch fish on soft plastics.

I did develop supreme confidence in my ability to catch fish on slow-sinking twitchbaits back in those days, especially in water of moderate temperatures. I learned to love how well Paul Brown's Fat Boys urge strikes from big trout in shallow water when worked rhythmically, with deft touch. In my best tournament year, 2001, I caught 15 trout weighing at least 4 pounds during the hours of the events I fished; 10 of them bit a Fat Boy. This fact would mean little if I threw a Fat Boy 67% of the time, or more, but I threw it less than half the time.

I did well in several events because I rightly figured out how to catch some relatively big trout on these lures when others couldn't or didn't. In order to catch fish on Fat Boys, one must master a presentation style suitable to them. I did, and in the years since, I've caught more big trout, including plenty which stretched the tape to more than 30 inches, on these supremely effective shad-imitators.

By becoming more versatile in my choice of strategies and lure choices, I improved the consistency of my performances, over time. The most complete anglers display high acumen with multiple types of lures; they also learn to work each type of lure in multiple presentation styles. In the last part of this series on how competing in tournaments accelerated my learning curve, I'll dive into the important role presentation style can play in the quest to catch the right fish.