Once in a while my instincts kick in and tell me to do one thing or another, sometimes I listen, other times I ignore that little voice in the back of my head, only to later wonder about how things would have gone had I listened.
Well, just last week while filming a show with a friend, I told him that I thought we could catch some fish on spinnerbaits or crankbaits around brushpiles. At the time we were fishing out deep, had caught a couple and were reluctant to leave. Finally after beating around for more than an hour without another bite we moved back to a little place and threw a crankbait around some. Even though I caught a couple of fish on the deeper diving crankbait, I still felt like better things awaited us shallower and on the end of a spinnerbait.
I finally made it to some scattered brush around the outside of a dock in the back of the creek. On my second cast slow rolling a 5/8oz double willow leaf spinnerbait, a 4 1//2lber jumped on. After that fish I managed to catch one more pretty quick and we were out of time for the day. I had a feeling that the spinnerbait bite was working everywhere but didn’t have time to prove it.
The next day I got invited to go out with another friend. We put the boat in the water and headed towards a river channel drop, when I thought of a brushpile that was near by. This brush wasn’t in the back of a creek, but I thought the fish could be there. I threw my spinnerbait past the brush, let it sink to the bottom and began to wind the bait in. I could feel the blades of my spinnerbait thumping along as the tension on my line increased and I knew my bait was getting close to the brushpile. The spinnerbait popped over the limb and there he was, the 2lb bass smashed my spinnerbait after it released from the limb. First cast, first brushpile!
I turned to my friend and told him that we might be on to something. On the way to the closest brushpile I could remember, I explained how I had the idea the day before and managed to catch a couple on it. Even though the previous day’s fish had been in the back of creek, the water color on the main lake was dirty enough that I felt good about slow rolling a spinnerbait. We fished a couple more areas without a bite and I was beginning to question the pattern. I knew I really just needed to keep running that pattern. The next brushpile we fished my friend caught 2, both in that 2 to 2 1/2lb range. We fished a few lay downs to try and rule out the idea that the fish were relating to just any kind wood in the water. They weren’t! So back to the brushpiles. We had one get away on the next brushpile and I felt pretty good about the pattern.
We were running out of time, having only a couple of hours to fish this day. We ran to another area where there was a lot brush scattered around a boat house. On my second or third cast I caught a 4+lber. We took a few pictures showing of that fat, healthy fish and then turned her loose. My friend and I definitely had a fun couple of hours of fishing.
The point of this article is to share my experience and try to remind myself and others that sometimes that little voice in the back of your head is right. The really interesting thing is that the more you listen to that voice, the more you’ll find that it’s right. In a nutshell, follow you’re instincts. They’re probably right.
There is no substitute for time on the water!
Rusty White of Rock Hill is a professional fisherman and full-time guide on the Catawba chain of lakes, offering full- and half-day services. For more information, visit fishingwithRusty.com.
