Lake Hartwell provided a new stop for the FLW Tour field that had previously fished Lake Murray.
When the schedule was first announced, Hartwell was identified as a blueback herring lake, like Murray, and there was the expectation that running and gunning would be a big part of any winning pattern.
Turned out camping and slow fishing claimed the trophy. But the runner-up was running and gunning and there was plenty of variation among the top finishers.
What follows is a look at how Brent Ehrler, Ramie Colson, Jr., Stacey King and Bryan Thrift caught their fish.
2nd: Brent Ehrler
> 5, 15-13
> 5, 15-15
> 5, 13-07
> 5, 15-08
> Total = 20, 60-11
Brent Ehrler, who around this time last year was ranked No. 1 in the world, fished his trademark run-and-gun style at Hartwell. He had some water he knew, but touched it only occasionally. Instead, the key to his pattern was to run new water every day – stuff he'd never seen or touched.
He sight-fished two big fish on day 1, and his biggest on day 2. Other than those three, he caught the rest casting.
"I was pretty much blind-casting for staging fish," Ehrler said. "They were coming up and getting ready to spawn, or were post-spawn, and the key was I changed every day. It always seemed like what I did the day before wouldn't work anymore.
"So one of my keys was to cover new water. I literally fished new water every single day that I hadn't seen yet. It was one of those things where you pull in an area and start blind-casting. The fish were so spread out you had to do that. It's not like one area was loaded. I just kept moving."
The other key was specifics: He ran shallow pockets with shallow docks. He'd run as many pockets as he could and would pick up a fish about every third or fourth stop.
"One of the things that helped was when it was sunny, it positioned the fish better on the docks. Also, if the dock was in 20 feet, that was too deep. It had to be in 10 feet or less. I caught some of my better fish closer to 5 feet, but I'd want the boat in 10 or 12 feet."
He added that they weren't main-lake pockets – they were in creeks. He called them "side pockets" – in reference to thinking of a creek as a pool table. They weren't at either end of the creek – they were more toward the middle.
One interesting pattern-within-a-pattern was trolling-motor fish. He said he caught probably 15 fish the final day that were attracted to the splashing noise of his trolling motor. He'd watch them come up off bottom toward the working motor until they came so close they disappeared off the graph. He'd drop a shakey-head down and they'd bite it almost every time. The only explanation he could offer was the fish perhaps thought the splashing was a school of blueback herring.
He threw several different baits – again, he changed every day. His productive baits included:
> A Gary Yamamoto Swimming Senko (natural shad) rigged on an 1/8-ounce Picasso Shakedown shakey-head
> A Lucky Craft Slender Pointer 112 jerkbait in wakasagi (better on windier days)
> Gary Yamamoto 5" Kut Tail worm, again on the Picasso shakedown
> Gary Yamamoto Senko, rigged wacky on a 1/0 Owner Weedless Wacky hook (better in calm and sunny conditions)
Both the Kut-Tail and regular Senko were green-pumpkin/purple/green-flake (color 301).
He removed the screw-keeper from the Shakedown and placed shrink tube on the shank to create a plastic-keeper barb.
He caught the bulk of his fish on the Kut Tail.
Ramie Colson, Jr. (pictured) shared the winning backwater with Jason Christie.
3rd: Ramie Colson, Jr.
> Day 1: 5, 13-02
> Day 2: 5, 17-06
> Day 3: 5, 14-08
> Day 4: 5, 14-04
> Total = 20, 59-04
Ramie Colson, Jr. fished the very same backwater as winner Christie, although Christie fished one side and Colson the other. Both threw a spinnerbait, but Colson mixed in a trick worm.
Important is that Colson corroborated Christie's testimony that "sprouts" were a key component in the pattern.
"I still don't know what it was on those flats, but it reminded me of some stuff I've seen in Florida," Colson noted. "It was like lily stalks down there, and there was little clumps. The fish I think were rubbing on the roots. The water was muddy and dirty and I'd just throw at each clump and pretend there was a bedding bass there. It was slow fishing.
"Later in the day I'd pick up the spinnerbait and throw it to get my bigger fish as the day went on."
> Trick worm gear: G. Loomis NRX 822 "Mag Medium" rod, Shimano Stradic CI4 spinning reel, 10-pound Berkley FireLine (smoke color, tied direct), No. 1 Gamakatsu Wide Gap Finesse hook, half a nail weight, Zoom Trick Worm (green-pumpkin magic).
> Spinnerbait gear: 6'9" heavy-action G. Loomis 812 Spinnerbait rod, Shimano Core 450MG casting reel, 17-pound Berkley Trilene Maxx monofilament (to help lift bait off bottom), 5/16-ounce War Eagle spinnerbait (chartreuse/white, silver Colorado in front, gold turtle in rear), Zoom Fat Albert grub.
Stacey King found his dirty-water pattern early in practice, which allowed him to develop it fully prior to competition.
4th: Stacey King
> Day 1: 5, 13-13
> Day 2: 5, 18-10
> Day 3: 5, 13-02
> Day 4: 5, 12-01
> Total = 20, 57-10
Stacey King fished deep, clear water several weeks prior when he finished 2nd at the Walmart Open at Beaver Lake. He went the opposite way at Hartwell and fished shallow, dirty water in the Tugaloo River.
"My primary pattern was flipping a Texas-rigged 6" black Zoom lizard and a green-pumpkin/candy Chompers Salty Sucker," King said of Hartwell. "The Chompers has garlic in it, which I like during the spawn. But I did catch three of my better fish (the final day) on a homemade ChatterBait.
"I was fishing the very backs of pockets," he added. "They were spawning pockets and were extremely shallow. The best areas were truly nothing banks with very little cover – just gravel and clay, a hard-bottom spawning thing."
> Texas-rig gear: 7' heavy-action Bass Pro Shops CarbonLite pitching stick, Bass Pro Shops Johnny Morris Signature Series casting reel, 17-pound Bass Pro Shops XPS fluorocarbon, 3/0 Gamakatsu round-bend hook, 3/16-ounce Bass Pro Shops tungsten weight, 6" Zoom lizard (black) and Chompers Salty Sucker (green-pumpkin/candy).
> Chatter gear: Same rod and reel, 20-pound XPS fluorocarbon, homemade ChatterBait (white), Lake Fork Magic Shad trailer.
Bryan Thrift fished a single rock underneath a bridge.
5th: Bryan Thrift
> Day 1: 5, 12-14
> Day 2: 5, 19-10
> Day 3: 5, 12-14
> Day 4: 5, 10-07
> Total = 20, 55-13
Bryan Thrift's pattern was unique among the Top 5 in that he caught nearly every one of his weigh-fish off a single rock under a bridge.
"It was way back in a creek and there was a lot of bait there," Thrift noted. "I was cranking and the rock was 3 to 4 feet deep, but there was 15 to 20 feet of water around it. I was banging the rock every cast with a shallow-running crank."
For the first 2 days be cranked a Damiki DC100 square-bill, but lost all those baits and had to switch to a different square-bill.
> Cranking gear: 7' medium-heavy Damiki Dark Angel rod, Abu Garcia Revo Winch casting reel, 12-pound Berkley Trilene 100% fluorocarbon, Damiki DC 100 (real shad) and unnamed square-bill (chartreuse-shad).
Much of the tackle referenced above is available at the BassFan Store. To browse the selection, click here.
