Lake Toho BFL 3-28-12 thru 3-31-12

I fished the Gator Division BFL this past weekend up on Lake Toho – ended up pretty shabby in 59^th even though I took 3 days off to pre-fish (3-31-12 BFL Lake Toho Results).  Here’s how things layed out in my eyes.

Shad Spawn

The first 2 days I was able to track down a shad spawn bite that lasted 15-30 minutes after sunrise.  With water temps in the morning ranging from 74-78 degrees, the shad spawn was happening pretty solid.  I found 2 areas that both had the same overall features: a scattered hydrilla edge run up against a Kissimmee grass line adjacent to a hard bottom area (sand/shell).  One area had so much bait that it was tough getting the fish to single out my bait over the real-deal – in that case a Pop-R was key (old school).  The rest of the fish all fell victim to a 1/2oz D&M Custom Baits Spinnerbait in a white/translucent pattern as well as white/chartreuse.  The wind and air temps increased each day and the shad spawn basically disappeared by the day of the tournament – I think due to water temps starting out at 78-79 degrees and winds kicking at 15mph right off the bat in the morning. 

Flipping the Blown in Stuff

I found a couple areas to flip as well.  Nothing too consistent but all the areas boiled down to harder cover (Kissimme grass, Gator grass, bulrushes) with various grasses blown into them (hydrilla, chopped Kissimmee grass, anything floating on top).  Once again, I caught a few fish here and there on this pattern up until the day of the tournament including a 4lbs and a couple 3lbs.  Depending on the thickness of cover I flipped everything from a 3/4oz to a 1 1/2oz paired with beaver baits and smaller craw baits.  I did flip quite a bit of open emergent grass – bulrush clumps and Kissimmee grass – without much luck.

The Irony

I tried to cover a lot of bases during the practice time I had and ended up catching a few cranking scattered hydrilla flats off of Kissimmee grass lines – nothing memorable and no size comparison to the above patterns.  The day of the tournament a front started coming through kicking the wind up more than the past 3 days and my trolling motor took a dump around 11am.  I had already missed a 4-5lbs and lost another of the same size shaking a 1oz Punch Craw in a bulrush head.  To escape the wind a bit we drifted the flats around the powerlines without success and finally about 1ish pushed up to the scattered hydrilla line out from one of my shad spawn areas. 

My coangler started catching fish on a trap and I missed a few on a swimming worm.  Switched to a 1/2oz Red Eye and started burning and ripping and turned a limit around in ~1hr making 3 drift passes on a 200yd stretch.  Key was a section of green good condition hydrilla.

1/2oz. Red Eye Shad from Monster Fishing Tackle

Got a little lucky in end.  A storm blew up ~3pm and we pushed behind an island to use the last bit of time we had in the day and I ended up ripping up a 3lbs on a trap off an isolated hydrilla patch off some old dock pilings.  Ended up with a whopping 10.01lbs but I was awfully close to zeroing for a majority of the day.  For as much as I was aware of the shad population in Toho and its reputation as a trap lake, I really didn’t explore that avenue enough during practice.  Seemingly it’s just another case of looking at what’s right in front of your eyes instead of over thinking things.  It’s too bad too, because I think I could have found a few areas to toss the Alabama Rig I’ve been wanting to bust out in some offshore circumstances = guess she’ll have to wait.