The ArmyBassAnglers East Division Team of Michael Garrett and Jason Blackmon kicked off the Skeeter Bass Champs season under other than ideal conditions on East Texas’ famous Sam Rayburn Reservoir. Morning temperatures at takeoff were around 24 degrees and the boat and tackle on the decks were quickly coated with a thin layer of ice. Combine a lake 8.28 feet below normal pool, freezing temperatures and fog, this day was going to be tough from the very get go.
“It was so cold the visor on my motorcycle helmet began to ice over from the moisture rising up from the lake” stated Blackmon. Garrett and Blackmon’s initial plan was to make a long run up to the Indian Creek area to fish rattletraps in the grass. The creek greeted the team with grass but was only in about 2-3 feet of water.
“The bass will bury up in this stuff during post frontal conditions, but we just weren’t able to get the fish to work with us” stated Garrett
. After thoroughly working the area with the rattletraps, the team made a move to fish some deeper drops. “We pulled up on the backside of a shallow island and found a drop from 4 feet down to 20 and Garrett immediately slammed the hook home on our first keeper.”
The team began to flip visible cover right on the edge of the drop. Five minutes after Garrett landed the first fish, he immediately slammed the hook home on another solid Sam Rayburn Bass.
After working the area over and graphing the drop, the team made a move to the Julie Creek area of the Lake. As the team idled up to the first point they spotted one of the “famous” Sam Rayburn brushpiles.
“We had our eye on this brushpile out in front of a point where we knew the creek channel swung in but there was a boat already camped out on it. The gentlemen in the boat asked us if we were fishing for money and we stated that we were. The gentlemen asked us if we wanted him to move so we could fish the brush, and I was kind of blown away by that. We immediately told him just because we were fishing in a very large tournament he had just as much right to the water as we did” stated Blackmon.
We began to speak with the man and his dad and took a few minutes to inform him of the mission of the ArmyBassAnglers of SUPPORT.DEFEND.FISH. The team would join the other boat around the brushpile and Garrett again would drive the hook home on another solid keeper.
“We thanked the gentlemen for allowing us to share the brush and in return provided them with several bags of Lake Fork Trophy Lures soft plastics as a token of our appreciation. The team would struggle the rest of the day to put a limit together.
“I’m glad Mike was here to at least give us some weight, but I just couldn’t get it going today in order to help him out. That’s fishing sometimes” Stated Blackmon.
As the team approached the scales and shared with the crowd the mission, the team would end up with 9 pounds and some change.
Mike and Jason would like to thank all the sponsors that make ArmyBassAnglers possible and you can follow all the action at ArmyBassAnglers.com or catch them on Big Bass Battle on Versus, World Fishing Network or the Texas Channel on Time Warner.
232 Team would compete with $60,320.00 paid out. Total number of fish brought to the scales was 601 with an avg weight of 2.99 lbs. 83 Team would bring in a limit with 79 teams blanking.