What do you, for somebody that's around that doesn't have vegetation, they're on bait, they're on those tiny thread fin, what should they even be tying on to try to get trigger fish into eating?

I mean, there's a lot of baits to throw.

I mean, any kind of shad imitator is good, but it's hard to imitate anything that size that you can throw or, you know, work effectively, especially if you're getting a little wind.

It's kind of, there's two ways you can do it.

You can try to match it as best you can.

And, you know, the other thing I've found is just to go really big, have something that really stands out.

It doesn't work all the time, and a lot of times if you do get bites doing that, they'll be a little bit bigger than average fish.

If you were to look at top three baits that put the most fish in the boat for you, like a percentage, what was the major chunk? Let me think about this.

Ooh.

And I realized that the water level fluctuated based on what kind of water they were dumping out of Tenkiller.

When they would turn the water on, that water level would come up, and when it went, when they weren't, that water would fall.

So those fish naturally, they don't wanna get on the bank where that, you know, that water level will affect them.

They like to get out a little deeper where that they have some stability with the water level so it's not gonna mess up their, uh, you know, mess up 'em, mess 'em up when they're spawning.

'Cause we see it here all the time on the Tennessee River, we have the water level fluctuations from winter to spring and summer.

And when that first wave of fish moves up, a lot of times it coincides with a raise of the water level.

Um, going into days three and four, once, uh, once, once the, once the field is cut and, you know, you're really starting to kinda inch your way towards your first win, man, where was your head at going into the third and the fourth day knowing that you got a really good shot at this thing now?

Yeah

...

I figured out, you know, after the first day, I'm like, okay, it seems like they're coming to me.

If I can find some new water, I said, you know, maybe you can, you can [laughs] and, uh, after the first day, I'm like, okay, it seems like they're coming to me.

If I can find some new water, I said, you know, maybe you can, you can... to load in any tournament, but especially hard when you have limited time to fish on.

I was, I was only getting four or five hours to fish, so I, it's, it's hard to, to have any time to expand or feel like you covered enough water to, to find productive water.

But just kind of, just kind of worked out.

Was that just something in practice you decided just to do something different, or is that something you found pre-event, map study type of deal? Like, h- how did you figure that area out?

A beautiful lake.

Yeah, dude, it, it, I mean, that water was gin clear.

And, uh, like, you know, like I said, I felt like that looking at Google Earth and stuff before the event, I'm like, "Well, obviously that's gonna get a bunch of pressure just w- because of the clean water." Um, but, you know, I never, I, I didn't realize how good, I didn't realize what was happening until, till late the first day.

I, um, I had fished through that area first thing in the morning and caught 13 or 14 pounds pretty quickly and, you know, was feeling pretty good about it.

And, uh, I left and went and ran some of the other areas I, I had found, and I, I caught one big one doing that, and I'm like, "Well, I got some time to kill." Like, I had like 45 minutes to kill before I had to lock back to crew, so I'm like, "Well, I'm just gonna go back up there and fish through that same creek I, I fished in and, you know, see if, see if I can catch one or two more." And I got in there, dude, and I started, I saw like four or five pairs that had pulled in and started spawning in the two hours I was gone.

Jeez.

And caught like two three-pounders and like a four-and-a-half, and they were just, they were relatively easy to catch too.

It was just so I'm like, "Okay, I think..." 'Cause, because the, the biggest deal up there was was that water temperature was, uh, like anywhere from five to 10 degrees cooler than, than what it was on the actual Arkansas River.