The Record Newspapers - Hometown News For Orange County, Texas

If you are headed to the lake this weekend and you are looking for a hot tip, you would be hard pressed to do any better than talking with Tyler Shearin or Kameryn Henderson. The Orangefield duo just blew the rest of the field away in last week’s Texas Elite Student Anglers Tournament hosted on Rayburn. Shearin and Henderson’s 18.81 pound bag earned them a $400 check and their 6.83-pound bass took big bass honors as well. Two of the LCM teams managed top ten finishes as well. The fact that six of the fifteen teams failed to weigh a single bass made their winning total even more impressive! Over on Toledo Bend, Ryan Postwell celebrated his sixty-third birthday with a 10.60-ounce bass caught Monday evening. Postwell caught his first ever double digit bass dragging a brush hog on a Carolina rig in 17-feet of water. “My hands were so cold that I didn’t even feel her bite,” reported Postwell, “but I warmed up in a hurry when she jumped.” Neither he nor his partner had their cell phone with them, but they still released the big fish right away without a single picture. “My partner, Jason, has caught three double digit fish,” added the retired welder, “and I was thinking it may never happen for me. What a birthday present! The jigging spoon bite continues to improve, but it is producing far more yellow bass than largemouths right now. Part of the reason is due to location, but it is more a case of folks locating a good school of the smaller bass and looking no further.

Make no mistake about it…..catching a fish every time your spoon reaches the bottom, regardless of size, is addicting. More often than not, that pattern will yield a mixed bag that includes crappie and catfish and it is hard to drive off and leave action like that! This past week, the better largemouths caught on a spoon were taken jigging outside bends of the creek channels. It is not unusual for the largest tree on the outside bend to hold more than one good bass. At least for right now, the bass were holding about half way back in the coves. This program has worked well for years on Toledo Bend and it will only improve with colder weather. Darrell Sellers said that he found bass up to four pounds last Tuesday fishing a jig and craw worm on the outside bends of Clear Creek on the south end of the lake, but didn’t really catch them until he switched to the spoon. He said the fish were holding on the 18 to 20 foot banks of much deeper creeks. The most consistent crappie bite was much deeper this past week as well. Shiners and maribou jigs worked much better than plastic in 18 to 22 feet of water. The size was still very good, but numbers were down.There is no doubt that this won’t be Christmas as usual thanks to Covid-19, but it appears to me that Santa has changed his approach in hopes of making it happen. Judging by all of the cardboard boxes stacked at front doors and the Fed Ex trucks running non-stop, I think Santa has dressed all his elves in brown uniforms and sent them out to do the job early. Staying home for the holidays is the best gift you can give this year!