Just got the full report from Waveland and the news was good. All the 'schooling' paid off today when KVJ and partner went out and slammed the door on a 33 boat USA Bassin' field out at Waveland, taking the win by nearly 2 pounds. "The Apprentice" and his partner Mark slid under the radar screen and went unnoticed until it was time to hit the scales. Their sack of nearly 16 pounds also had the 2nd biggest bass of the tourney, which Mark caught. The best part was that they had almost all their weight by 10:30 and only had to burn 2 holes to get it. After that they went shallow and played around and were able to check out a bunch of shallow stuff, as well as do some graphing. That resulted in a couple new spots for the arsenal, including a hole which produced their largest bass later that day.
Water temps have dropped by about 5 degrees from last weekend, but color was still pretty good. Some bass are starting to chase shad schools which will be a sign of things to come. All the storms and rain, along with the coolor water temps have changed the graph picture some as fish start to show up a few feet deeper than they were a week and a half ago. Also starting to get a good enough mix of weeds and algae in the shallows to start bringing on a frog bite.
nice win,i was looking at the numbers and seen one 5lb fish and all the rest was 2 and three pounders and no four pounders at the scale, all these numbers look like last years numbers,do you think the bass are growing as fast as they should be,i would think you should be seeing a few more 5lb and maybe 6lb showing up at the scale,i fished sunday about 4 hours, nice day to be out
Posted by: jin spears | June 08, 2009 at 07:28 PM
I think the bass are doing exceptionally well considering the fish kill at the lake about 3 years ago. A quick check of the numbers will verify this. In 2007, average winning weight was 8.90 pounds and average big basss was 3.17. There were NO 10 pound sacks brought to the scale that year.
In 2008, average winning weight jumped to 15.41 and average big bass was 3.90 pounds.
Three tourneys into 2009, and average winning weight is 15.82 with an average big bass of 4.79 pounds.
If things continue as I expect them too, barring any further fish kills, this year will finish much like it has started, and next year will be better still with an average big bass of better than 5 pounds. This past weekend was just a tough tourney with the lake being "off".
Posted by: Big Indiana Bass | June 08, 2009 at 09:53 PM
maybe i am thinking about glen flint a couple years ago to much,it would take 23lb to win a 4 hour tuesday night tournament (yes i won three in a row) then in about a two year span it went to the dead sea,also waveland was killed this spring on the crappie, boat after boat taking 50 fish for two guy's day after day then i seen guy's taking 5 inch crappie,i think they should have put a 10 inch size on the fish and a limit of ten,i know you do a lot home work on this lake but you can tell what the pressure is doing all ready,my point is we do not need another glen flint,ban the tournaments put limits on the crappie and lets see if we can have another turtle creek,it was the best lake the state ever had and waveland the chance to be like it
Posted by: jin spears | June 09, 2009 at 03:23 PM
You're dead on about Glenn Flint, and I still haven't figured out exactly why that lake went dead so fast, literally in one season. As to Waveland, while it certainly could become another Turtle Creek if managed as such, I don't believe you'll see that happen any time soon. As you mention, some of the damage has already been done, and the IDNR really don't have too much planned in the way of regulating a lake to make it a fantastic fishery at the expense of being able to legally harvest fish. They are trying it on a couple isolated bodies of water (Sugar Cr. for smallies, and a couple northern lakes for bass), but I haven't heard of any other plans beyond what has already been tried. My advice is to enjoy Waveland while you can, because it's just a matter of time (probably several years) before it peaks and heads downhill.
Posted by: Big Indiana Bass | June 09, 2009 at 03:54 PM
i agree with you,the lake is run by the waveland town board is what i was told,you are right about just enjoy it
Posted by: jin spears | June 09, 2009 at 07:56 PM