For the second year in a row, the FLW Tour visited Beaver Lake for its Walmart Open during a period of high water. This time around, Beaver was about 8 feet above full pool. And due to a cold spring, the fish weren't quite as far into the post-spawn as in years past.
That meant there were still plenty
of spawning fish up shallow. It also meant the shad spawn had yet to develop fully.
Ray Scheide won the event by flipping heavy cover. The fish changed location each day and he changed with them. He moved from ultra-shallow cover to deeper trees the final day.
Here's how the rest of the Top 5 finishers caught their fish.
2nd: Mark Rose
> Day 1: 5, 13-00
> Day 2: 5, 9-11 (10, 22-11)
> Day 3: 5, 11-00
> Day 4: 5, 8-13 (10, 19-13)
Mark Rose, who led day 1, worked two patterns. He started each morning on a shad-spawn bite. When that ended, he went flipping.
He worked the same shad-spawn spot he did last year, which he said was the same morning spot Mark Pack fished last year (when pack won) and this year. Rose described it as a "hard-bottom, pea-gravel spot on a point. Those shad would get up there to spawn at night. Last year I'd catch a limit and leave and I barely missed the cut. This year I spent more time on it.
He cranked the shallow part of the shad-spawn area, but his best fish hit a wakebait that he declined to name. He often finished his limit from the area with a shakey-head.
After the shad-spawn bite was done, he went and flipped shallow bushes, as well as trashpiles in "the back ends of little pockets."
> Shakey-head gear: 6'6" medium-action G. Loomis rod, Shimano Stradic 2500 spinning reel, 6- and 8-pound Seaguar InvizX fluorocarbon, 1/16- and 1/8-ounce Strike King shakey-heads, 4" unnamed finesse worm (watermelon).
> Flipping gear: 7'5" heavy-action G. Loomis Mossback flipping stick, Shimano Chronarch casting reel, 20-pound Seaguar InvizX or 50-pound unnamed braid, 4/0 extra-wide-gap hook, 1/2-ounce tungsten sinker, Strike King Rodent (watermelon/red-flake).
Clark Wendlandt figured many of the better-quality fish were already in post-spawn, and he was right.
3rd: Clark Wendlandt
> Day 1: 5, 7-08
> Day 2: 5, 15-06 (10, 22-14)
> Day 3: 4, 5-00
> Day 4: 5, 14-12 (9, 19-12)
Clark Wendlandt, a two-time Beaver winner, rode the up/down roller-coaster. He opened with 7 1/2 pounds, then caught the best bag of the event on day 2 and moved into the cut from way back at 100th. He came up a fish short on day 3, then rallied with a big sack on day 4.
He started the event by sight-fishing, but soon abandoned that and worked a full post-spawn pattern the rest of the time.
"I was mainly throwing a crankbait," he said of his post-spawn pattern. "I was fishing it fairly shallow and I had two or three different cranks I caught fish on. I was fishing mainly points and the water where I was fishing was a little bit dirtier.
"They were either main-lake or secondary points," he added. "The main-lake points generally had a little more wind, and I liked having a little bit of wind."
He added a few fish the final day on a Carolina-rigged creature bait.
> Cranking gear: 7' medium-action Falcon Lowrider CLC 4-17 cranking rod, Abu Garcia Revo STX casting reel, 12-pound Berkley Trilene 100% fluorocarbon.
> Of the crankbaits he used, he named only the Lucky Craft RC 1.5 (shad color).
Jason Christie targeted trees in 9 to 10 feet of water.
4th: Jason Christie
> Day 1: 5, 11-08
> Day 2: 4, 11-12 (9, 23-04)
> Day 3: 5, 12-15
> Day 4: 3, 5-12 (8, 18-11)
Jason Christie focused on largemouths the entire tournament and caught a limit of them 2 of the 4 days.
"My main area was the back of a creek," he said. "But the water dropped a little the final day, and I think it pulled the perch and the baitfish and everything out."
He flipped trees in 9 to 10 feet of water with two different baits.
> Flipping gear: 7'3" heavy-action Falcon Cara rod, Pflueger Summit casting reel (7:1), 25-pound XCalibur Silver Thread fluorocarbon, 4/0 XCalibur Tx3 hook, 3/8- to 1-ounce XCalibur tungsten weights (pegged with bobber-stopper), Yum Garrett Tube and Yum Wooly Hawg Craw.
> He said the 1-ounce weight helped generate reaction strikes. "Sometimes it would only sink 3 or 4 feet and I'd pick up on it and there'd be a fish."
Keith Combs tried to stay 'loose' and fish what the day gave him.
5th: Keith Combs
> Day 1: 5, 9-08
> Day 2: 5, 11-13 (10, 21-05)
> Day 3: 5, 6-04
> Day 4: 5, 10-10 (10, 16-14)
Keith Combs was another who worked a split pattern. In the mornings he targeted the shad spawn on points in 3 to 8 feet of water. A few points had isolated trees, while other points just had a hard-bottom area.
"If the shad were spawning, I'd catch them on a crankbait," he said. "If there were no shad present, I'd just forget about that deal and go back in short pockets off the main river channel and flip the heaviest stuff I could find.
"I was trying to (flip) my bait into 3 feet of water or less," he added. "And I was keying on the green trees. There weren't that many of them – most were dead from the high water last year. The tree either had to be green, or there had to be some type of horizontal cover on it, like a laydown."
If he still needed to fill a limit, he'd fish for spots with a Carolina-rig.
> Carolina-rig gear: 7'6" medium-heavy Power Tackle PG104 rod, Shimano Curado E7 casting reel, 15-pound Seaguar CarbonPro fluorocarbon, 2/0 Owner offset hook, 1-ounce weight, Strike King Game Hawg (green-pumpkin).
> Cranking gear: 7' medium-action Power Tackle PGC 170 rod, same reel, 10-pound mono, Norman Deep Little "N" (nutter shad) and Lucky Craft RC 1.5 (shad).
> Flipping gear: 7'6" heavy-action Power Tackle PG104.5 rod, same reel, 20-pound Seaguar AbrazX, 3/0 Owner wide-gap hook, 5/16- and 3/8-ounce Tru-Tungsten worm weights (green-pumpkin), Strike King Game Hawg (green-pumpkin).
> About his bait choice, he said: "That Game Hawg's the deal. It's so soft it won't last through many fish, but if one bites it and you miss it, he's going to hit it again."
