TBC West Lake Ft Phantom - 06-19-11

This is a very deceiving picture!

Oh! It is a beautiful sunrise,
the temperature was nice,
and at this point the wind wasn't too bad.

And it was Father's day.
What a great way to spend it.

With my hubby,
fishing.

My dad first took me fishing,
years ago,
to a catfish farm.
What better place to start a child fishing!
A place where you're guaranteed to catch fish.
I loved it.
His pocketbook did not!
And then there was the crappie fishing!
He is the one that instilled the love of fishing in me!
Thank you Poppa!

But these pictures tell the true story of the day.

Look at those waves!
And that towel on his seat!
(and yes! Ft Phantom IS REALLY that color!)

So you think I just captured it just right?
Here's another shot,

OK. So that one doesn't look so bad either.

Let me show you a little film I took...

W - I - N - D - Y!!!

That is what today was. It was terrible!
It was one of those days when being air born on your trip across the
lake was the norm.
The days I hate.

We started out at some docks across from the spill way
with no success,
so it was time to move over to our favorite stick ups.
Thank goodness for our new trolling motor!
It had to work hard to keep us there.

Frank boated an under
(Ft Phantom has a 16" minimum on Large mouth)
and then broke off what we are pretty sure was a decent fish.

Then we moved back over to the docks.
He started catching lots of unders and
I actually boated one too,
but I soon succumbed to the heat and wind
and told Frank I was just going to be his netter the rest of the day.

He caught two nice keepers in this area and we stayed here the rest of the day.
He did break off again on a fish that he said he couldn't turn his head.
Fishing around the docks has it's drawbacks.
He was fishing under some stairs when he had the hit
and the fish swam under them and it cut his line.
So we went to weigh in with just two fish,
but that was better than some others!

Mattie May got to meet us at the ramp

so she helped Grumpy with weigh in!

Making sure they weigh them right!

We ended up with 5.54 and about 4Th place...

and that put us (unofficially) in fifth place for the year!
YAY US!!
Really yay Frank!
He does the majority of the work!

Our Championship tournament is
September 24 & 25
at
Lake Limestone

And our top six tournament will be
October 29Th
at

SAM RAYBURN!!!

We are very excited!
We haven't fished Big Sam in years
and are very ready to go back!

Until next time,
God Bless!

Final Tournamet for TBC West - It was Hot!!

Frank had been to Ivie the past two weekends with no luck. Some times pre-fishing gets you discouraged instead of helping you out. So Saturday, I actually went with him. I didn't do much fishing. I hate pre-fishing the day before a tournament. I love to fish tournaments, I love to pre-fish at least two days before, and I love to just go fish for the sake of fishing, but please don't make me pre-fish the day before a tournament. So when I wasn't sleeping, I was taking pictures. It was a good thing I did, because I sure didn't take any today! It was just to hot and we were fishing hard.

We hit the lake a little later than what we intended, but we sure did enjoy our breakfast at Concho Park Marina and the visitation with our friends. We did make it out early enough for sunrise, so of course I had to take a few pictures of that. I tried to get Frank in some to change them up a bit.

If I had a dollar for every sunrise picture I have, I could probably fund our fishing habits! You just never know what your going to get when you aim the camera into the sun and can't see what you are actually looking at.

These next two pictures are reversed and I am just too tired to fix them!

We don't fish up in the creeks much. Why? I don't know. We used to fish creeks all the time. So we headed up into Elm Creek just to see what was going on. I can't remember if he was throwing a Texas or Carolina rig, but I do know he was throwing a brush hog, watermelon with the tail dipped in chartreuse. He pulled out this nice little guy probably between one and two.

He threw a buzz bait most of the morning, actually more like most of the day which is odd for this time of the year! He caught this nice little keeper about 9:30 yesterday morning. He had a few more blow ups on it, so we marked this spot and headed on out into the main lake.

We marked a few new humps we hadn't seen before and headed up into the creek. This young lady couldn't decided weather to run off or come on down and check us out. She posed long enough for me to get a couple of pictures, then she was off. We see deer around the park all the time, but not very often when we are out on the lake. Isn't she an odd orange color? All the deer are this color right now. Usually they are more brown before the turn sort of grey during the winter. They sure do show up in the brush!

After loading up and getting our showers, we headed over to Elm Creek for registration. On our way over Frank said he saw a plane on the lake. And sure enough he did. We tried to get to a good place to take pictures before they took off, but didn't make it. We could tell it was a Coast Guard plane, but couldn't figure out what they were doing. Some of our friends were still on the lake when they landed and they went over and talked to them. They are based out of San Francisco and just came over to check out the lake. Pretty neat if you ask me. It's not every day you get to see a CG plane land on a lake in west Texas!

After a wonderful dinner and some strange happenings at Big O's in Valera, we headed back to Concho and of course had a bit more fellowship with our friends before we hit the sack. Had to get up at five this morning! Two days in a row just kill me!

Most of the morning on Sunday, we threw our buzz baits into stick ups. Not these kinds of stick ups, that would be to easy.

These kinds of stick ups! What you can't see is the grass just below the surface of the water. Chunk, wind, pick off the grass! That gets old after awhile! I think you can see Frank's buzz bait in this picture. This was right at sunrise. Remember, I didn't take many pictures today.

I bet Frank threw that buzz bait until 11:30. I changed over to a spinner bait after a bit. It's easier to get the grass off one of those. And it's what I caught my one little keeper on. Frank caught four of his on the buzz bait I think. I kind of forgot some stuff today - I am sure it is the heat wiping out my brain cells!

We stayed here most of the morning then headed over to the dam to fish some of the new humps we had found with no luck. Then headed into Elm Creek. And after that we headed closer to weigh in where we finished out the day. We were going to keep fishing until about 3:10 because we were so close to weigh in, but after a check on the fish and finding we had some stressing out, we decided to call it a day. We finished the day with five fishing weighing in at 12.16. Points but no money! The story of our lives.

This was the last monthly tournament for the West Region before the Championship (being held at Amistad) and Pam said we may have made it into the top six. After checking out last months standings and estimating the points today, it will be a push. It would be nice but I am not getting my hopes up. We have one more tournament for the Panhandle region. It's in two weeks at Lake Stamford. Maybe we can catch enough there to end in the top six. I'll let you know!

Have a great week!

Praying for Rain or a Cool Front

We have our last tournament for the West region before we fish the classic! We will be fishing O.H. Ivie. This is the last Sunday of July. July means it is hot! Frank has done some pre-fishing the past two weekends with no luck. So maybe we will get a little cool front to lower the temperature so we won't be completely miserable. Rain would be even more welcome!

If anybody has any clue as to what they are biting on or where they are hiding, give us a call! We can use all the help we can get!!

Busbee Math - Am I a Victim?

Welcome to Miller Creek!

We left the house at 3:45 this morning to eighty degrees. I love to see the high at 80 degrees, but eighty degrees at four in the morning is already hot. There were times today the air felt heavy, like I was standing in an oven. The sky told of what the rest of the day would be like, clear with little to no wind. That wind thing is so unusual. We almost always have a 10 MPH breeze, but today it was still, a lot. We did have some wind, and when we did it was actually welcomed, but it seemed during the hotter parts of the day it was still. God sent us several clouds to cover the sun for a bit, which gave us a little relief, but for the most part it was sunny and HOT!

We don't fish this lake very often. It has been over a year since we last fished here. There were some great things to see and some not so great. The area around the lake is mostly farm land so we had company from several cows today. I'm not sure which is funnier, Frank "mooing" at the cows to see their reaction or the cows reaction to Frank "mooing" at them. Both are pretty funny.

There were flowers blooming all around the lake. These pretty purple flowers -

Aren't they pretty? I don't remember seeing these before and I don't know what they are. I found it very odd that they were blooming in July. Wild flowers around here usually bloom in the spring, not the dead, dry heat of summer. There were also a lot of dragon flies. Three different kinds, the normal blue ones we always have, a large one that had a type of tiger stripe to it, and a very small bright orange one. I could have taken time to take pictures, but between texting my friends and taking pictures, Frank gets a little miffed at me!

If you read here, you will see one of the reasons I don't like this lake. SNAKES. I am not a fan. And Miller Creek didn't disappoint today. We say lots. None of the ugly black snakes that we saw last time but snakes none the less and they were there. Ewwww!

To tell the truth, as hot as it was, when we started cutting across the water at around six this morning, I got a little chill. But once the boat stopped that went away fast. We started the morning with some top water action, if you want to call it that. I was the only one to catch a fish, if you call it a fish. Frank couldn't believe what I had done. I actually caught a minnow! Yep, a minnow, foul hooked on my Pop'R! I had to take a picture because I didn't think anyone would believe me and because, well, that's what I do!
So there is the proof! If you or anyone you know has ever caught a smaller fish, I would love to see a picture!

And Frank gets the award for the largest fish of the day. He was throwing a crank bait into a ball of minnows, and when it hit, it hit hard. It felt like he almost fell out of the boat. His rod was bent over like I have never seen it before. I dropped my rig and grabbed the net. Boy were we disappointed when the fish surfaced...

A drum! Needless to say, we were a bit (a lot) disappointed. But he did take the opportunity to play a joke on some friends that were fishing across the lake. They were far enough away that he knew they couldn't see what species of fish it was, but close enough he knew they could hear him. He did a little Mike Icconelli on the front of the boat, a little yelling and dancing, then tossed that big thing right out of the boat! It didn't take them long to make their way over just to check out what was really going on. All in fun, guys, all in fun!!!

We had three fish (2 decent, 1 dink) in the live well when all of this was going on. We had been alternating with Texas rigged worms and lizards, with top water, spinner baits and crank baits. We each had a nice fish on a 6" black lizard with a chartouse (sp) tail. Yeah, the dink was mine, but I didn't feel so bad because I did have that other one in there and we figured it weighed about 2.5.

The day only drug on after that. Hot, no wind, hot, no fish, and did I mention IT WAS HOT! We could handle the hot a lot better if we had been catching fish, but when your not, the day just drags on.

Because of the heat, weigh in was moved up to 2:30, which is not good for us. We tend to start really catching fish around two. Today, I just couldn't make it. About 1:30 the heat really got to me and I started having that sinking, sick feeling of heat exhaustion, so I told Frank I was done. He wanted to take me to the truck but I wanted him to just keep fishing. And true to form, Frank got into some schooling fish and filled up our live well. Seven fish in seven cast. It was great until I couldn't keep up with him in culling. At one point I had to yell at him not to cast again because I had too many fish in the boat and needed help. We culled my little dink and a couple others and ended up with a nice 17.22 bag.

He is really happy in this picture, but the sweat had started running into his eyes!

We ended up in second place which isn't bad. In fact it is great! Tommy and Pam Busbee (our tournament directors) edged us out by less than half a pound (I think, check here to get the exact amount). We have been fishing with the Busbees for a long long time. We have sometimes questioned their mathematical skills and have even come up with the term "Busbee Math" when things might not seem on the up and up. And today was one of those questionable days. They assured us that they had witnesses to the weight of the their fish, but I sure would have liked to have seen the numbers on the scales myself!

Now don't go gettin' all high an' mighty on me! Tommy and Pam know what I say is all in good fun! If I didn't trust them, do you think I would still be fishing with them?

At last count, Frank and I were tied for 7th in the west region and were in 5th place in the panhandle region. We have one tournament left in each region before the Championship so all the points we get sure do help us out! July 26 we will fish O.H.Ivie for our final tournament in west and August 9 we will be fishing Stamford for the panhandle. Wish us luck! We sure would like to be in the top six for both regions!

Twin Buttes Tournament

It was a very hot weekend! Weatherbug kept telling me on Sunday that it was ninety eight degrees, but when I got in the pickup, the thermometer was reading 105. I tend to believe my vehicle!

Registration was at Field and Stream (thank you Cliff) and then most of us headed over to Logan's Roadhouse for a bite to eat and a few had a drink or two (the margaritas are great!). I think a fun time was had by all!

The tournament started at 5:45 AM which meant we had to get up at 4:00 AM! Yuk!!! But we did and we even had time to stop at Whataburger for some breakfast. The weather was nice, a bit cloudy and around seventy five degrees and not much wind. Around sunrise, we had a little rain which was nice, but I think it just rained on me and Frank. There were some people fishing about 100 yards from us and the water around them was as smooth as glass. I felt like the "Born Loser" with a little rain cloud just above my head! While we were enjoying the rain, we also noticed a promise from God, a rainbow, in the western sky. It was not very bright but there none the less. I think the worst part of the day, even worse than the heat, was being attacked by gnats and flying ants. Frank didn't believe me when I told him some of those pesky things were ants until they started biting him. I think he wanted to jump in the lake to get them off of him. Those little critters hurt!!! You should see the welts they left on him. As the day wore on and the heat continued to rise we felt as if we should have stayed home. We lost two fish a piece on buzz baits with trailer hooks and thought the day was going to be just like his pre-fishing day - no fish! The mood in the boat was not a very pleasant one, but that too changed. Most of the morning looked like this - just blue skies and the sun shinning bright! It was hot by 10 AM! We both prayed for a little relief; rain, wind, whatever He could do for us to make it through that heat. And He did - He sent some of the most beautiful clouds I have ever seen. It was still hot, but every once in a while there was a break with a cloud over the sun. It was indeed a blessing.

Bored with what we were doing, Frank decided we should change tactics. We started throwing a Hag's Tornado blue fleck, Texas rigged - IT WORKED! About 11:00 we caught fish, both of us at the same time. By the end of the day we had four fish in the live well, three pretty nice and one little dink. We had to measure him again just before weigh in to make sure he still crossed that 14" line. We had a 9.00 bag and were just thrilled. We didn't win, but after Frank's discouraging pre-fish last week, we would have been happy just to have that little dink! (No pictures - we were trying to get them back in the water as quick as possible to reduce stress on them)

We did see another unusual site. We had seen dirt devils all around. Late in the afternoon, one decided to join us in the water. My picture is not very good but you can see how the water was lifting up inside the funnel. It was really pretty neat!

Tourny This Weekend - Twin Buttes

MAN - IT IS HOT OUTSIDE!!!

We will be fishing with TBC West this Sunday, June 28. Any suggestions? Frank did a little pre-fishing last Sunday with no luck. Everyone that was there last week at least did the same as Frank. This may be a tournament without any fish! They are smart to be hiding out in the water. It is much to hot out of it!

Hopefully, I will have something to report on Monday. But seriously, if you have any suggestions, let us know!

Fishing in July

Baby, IT'S HOT OUTSIDE!!!

This was the reading on our mirror Saturday afternoon on our way to Lake O.H. Ivie. That is crazy! Luckily we were in our nice air conditioned truck!
I thought I saw some goats sweating as we passed them on the road. No wonder!

Gas prices are about to cut into our fishing, as I am sure they are doing the same to you. Four dollars a gallon! We're going to have to start winning some tournaments to be able to pay for the gas. Do you remember when this price was the cost of a gallon of gas?
Now it will only buy you a soda to get you on your way down the road!
We got there in plenty of time to get registered, and have a hamburger at Concho Park Marina before Frank had to get some work done on the boat. Last week he had some problems with the tachometer, but one phone call to our friend Mike, and he knew what he needed to do get to it working. He couldn't do it at home because he needed the motor running. So I backed him down the ramp and he got it done.
We always feel like we are the only ones with boat trouble, but this picture shows, if your going to own a boat, your going to have trouble.
Because of the hot weather (remember photo #1) our tournament started at 5:00 AM! Crazy I know but much cooler. I took a short video so you can see and hear the sites and sounds of the lake at five in the morning.

OK, so maybe just the sounds of five in the morning. You see in that video exactly what we saw, darkness. It is that dark that early.

We only had one fish. Frank caught it and it weighed 1.54 (I think). We had one of the few one fish stringers, but we did not have the smallest weight. Check out Tommy and Pam Busbee, the founders and West directors of TBC...

Some stringer! The funny thing, its total weight was less than our one fish. So always look for that silver lining.

The weather was hot, but not much wind. That is very odd for a mid July day. It allowed us some time to play after the tournament. To really appreciate the video below, turn your A/C off for a couple of hours, then place an industrial fan where it will blow the hot air directly into your face.

Wasn't that a nice ride? Mattie May loves this video. She told her mommy "I ride de boat again, Mommie" and she pushes the play button for another ride. Why can't the wind be like this when we take her to the lake?

Lake Ivie is one of our favorite lakes, even though it was not very nice to us this weekend. It is outside of Ballinger, a great Texas small town. One of the sites to see in Ballinger is "The Cross". It is great to see at any time of the day and has a wonderful story behind it. If you are ever out this way, definitely stop and see it.
Our monthly tournaments for TBC are done for the the year. We now start planning for our championship that will be held on Lake Belton in September. Be sure to go to the TBC web site for more information on that.

HOT, HOT, HOT

I am back and alive. After a month of illness, throwing my back out the Monday before vacation then being on vacation, I am up, moving, and fishing. Well I am not back to 100% but I am getting there. Sunday was very hot and extremely windy. The wind did not help my back any but here are pics from our tournament on Father's day.

Does this picture look familiar?
SALT CEDARS! No we didn't fish OH Ivie again, this is Hubbard Lake. What we were really fishing was grass, lots of grass, all around these salt cedars. We threw spinner baits, rattle traps, frogs, and worms. But we just couldn't get any decent fish to take the bait. We had two fish that weighed just over three pounds, definitely nothing to brag about.

Because my back is still not back to normal, this is what I saw most of the day.

You don't recognized this? It is looking through the top of my hat that I kept over my face while I laid in the back of the boat with my feet up in my chair. It was the only way I could get any relief.

Without the hat, this is what we saw.
Isn't that a beautiful blue sky? That really is the sky, clear and sunny all day. There were no clouds at all. Oops,
there's one,

and a few more. These were late in the day and obviously gave no break from the sun and heat.

So not a great day on the lake, but, as usual, we had fun!