BassBlaster

Elam and Scanlon Open baits, Target on your topwater? Hack downsizing now

Today’s Top 4

Captain Donuts wins another Okie Open.

Tight tourney at Grand (= lots of dinks), with Elitist James Elam takin’ home the bacon — or should I say a # 5 and 4 donuts. 50 large…the boat he won was most of it.

His 36-14 over 3 days beat fellow Elitist Casey Scanlon by a few fins (10 oz) and the next 2 guys by no more than 2 lbs.

2nd Okie Open win for Elam — won at Fort Gibson in 2015. What he did in this one:

> Why the Pompadour: “it’s a great bait that draws strikes, it’s different and something they haven’t seen that’s similar to the Plopper deal. It worked great on the shallow-water flat fish early…and when there was good wind blowing into some of the places up shallow during the day.”

> Carolina rig: 6″ lizard (gp), 4/0 Owner Rig-N-Hook, 3/4-oz tungsten barrel weight with bead, 20″ leader of 17-lb Seaguar InvizX fluoro, same rod, same reel except 8.5:1.
> Shakey Head: 1/4- and 3/16-oz Owner Shakey Ultrahead, trick worm (gp), 8-lb Seaguar Tatsu fluoro, Shimano Stradic 2500, 7′ M McCain Hi-Performance Wacky/Plastics Rod.

> “Other than [the Pompadour], I fished mid-depth flatter-water stuff that had a little break and lots of larger shade around. Flat points, flats, small ledges on flats, main creek or main lake. Brush was always great to have around.

> “Some guys caught them in the backs, but for the most part the fish haven’t made it that far yet. I was catching the fish kind of between summer stuff and fall stuff that were shad-related and moving with them.

> “Some places were 4-8′ spots, some were 8-10′, some were in 14-16′.”

Few more Elam morsels….

Gitcha champeens breakfast!

Morsel = food, and Elam is Capt Donuts cuz he’s sponsored by Daylight Donuts — which I love because EVERY bass-head should have a fast-food sponsor, right??

Daylight Donuts also will probly be the #1 donut shop in the U.S. soon because they have SAUSAGE ROLLS:

> Elam: “My favorite is the original plain-old glazed donut, the standard go-to like a black and blue jig [hahaha I love that!]. I love the cinnamon rolls, and I always get sausage rolls to go with my donuts. I like the plain ones, but usually get the cheese ones or the ones with jalapeños and cheese!”

Daaaaaaaaang. Who else is craving at least one of those right now…. [drool emoji]

New way to shakey-head?

Vertical shakey? lol

What up with the water camo?

Said it makes him feel like a cloud. All floaty.

Okay he didn’t say that….

Ike sending flowers?

Thanks to Elam’s win, Mike the Ike is now in his 17th consecutive Classic. Actually credited Elam 2x for that:

> Elam was the runner-up in the AOY Championship at Mille Lacs Lake and Iaconelli was 11th in that event, and [Ike] said his finish would’ve been much lower had Elam not been so cooperative about sharing the starting spot both had found in practice.

> Ike: “We worked together on it in a really good way. If we’d fought each other, it wouldn’t have turned out so well. That was really nice because it doesn’t always happen that way.”

Doesn’t always…. Ike may have been a-winkin’ at KVD’s “You ain’t part of the community” comment, which still cracks me up.

Elam said Ike “said he was going to send me flowers or something.” Pics or it didn’t happen, man. All I’m going to say about that….

Casey Scanlon’s Grand baits.

Docks were the main deal for Elitist Casey Scanlon. Here’s how he did it:

> 1/2-oz Trophy Bass Pro Jig (black/blue) with Bass Kandi Speed Bug (blue sapphire, bait no longer produced).

> Bass Pro Flipping Tube (black/blue), 5/16-oz Bass Pro tungsten weight, 4/0 Hayabusa TNS Offset Hook.

> “Caught at least half of my fish on those two baits behind docks in the mornings.”

> Luck E Strike Con Man finesse worm (Okeechobee craw) on 1/4-oz shakey head. “On front and sides of docks with brush later in the day.”

> “Was struggling early on day 1 on the docks with the cloud cover, so I ran upriver and fished isolated logs with a Luck E Strike Series 3 squarebill (green minnow, hooks replaced with Hayabusa TBL 930 #4 trebles). Boxed a quick limit and came back down to the main lake and culled 2 on docks.”

“I don’t want anything with size, flash or thump.”

– Greg Hackney talkin’ ’bout his low-low daily driver:

Seein’ a little flash there Hack? Lol okay, he’s talkin’ ’bout baits this time of year:

> …I can tell you as an angler that what really moves the bass are cool nights. That drops the water temperature even though it may go back up in the late afternoon. I think that’s by far the biggest factor in the fall migration.

> With that in mind savvy anglers will look a this time period as a time when the bass might be starting to move, or considering it, but they won’t look at it as a time to hit the shallows.

> …I’m not going to fish real shallow right now. The bass aren’t there yet and even if they’re headed in that direction they’re being tentative about it. What I am going to do is attack with smaller baits that are less aggressive.

> I’ll shorten my worm considerably and I’ll switch to a 1/4-oz weight. That’ll still give them something to look at, but it’ll be smaller and less aggressive.

> I’ll do the same thing with my spinnerbaits. A 3/16-oz model or a 1/4-oz model is plenty big, especially after I swap out the big blades for little ones. I don’t want anything with size, flash or thump. A Strike King Pro Model Series 1 crankbait is big enough.

Texted him and said he likes green gizzard and blue gizzard in the Strike King Hack Attack Select spinnerbait, which I believe is Academy-only and may not be made anymore? If I’m thinkin’ the right one, looks like the KVD Finesse spinnerbait (double-willow and willow-Colo). Here’s the green and blue gizzard colors — subtle differences:

His fave 1.0 colors are green gizzard, natural shad and chrome sexy shad.

News

1. Grand Open shout-outs.

18-yo Andy Ortega had the lead one day, pretty cool — ended up 9th:

That pic makes me think Yammy needs an updated derby shirt look…. Also shoutin’-out NJ homie Dave Mansue (11th) — uh, Dave you shouldn’t have moved dude, we have bigger bass in NJ!

One more: Some guy named Gary Clouse (12th), who’s supposed to be running a boat company — can’t remember the name, something to do with AZ or birds or something — showed he can catch ’em:

Hahaha good job Gary! Love it when bassin’-biz folks go out and catch ’em….

2. Learn ya about new B.A.S.S. owner/operator Chase Anderson.

Interview on the Bassin’Fan. Glad they did it. Sounds like Chase has fished but isn’t a hardcore bass-head…but no one at the top of B.A.S.S. is now either (don’t get mad Jerry!) and Helen Sevier wasn’t either, so guess that’s okay?

3. NY: TN guy speaking tonight about bass fishing $$$.

How Dayton, TN (Lake Chickamauga) built an economy on bassin’.

4. Team USA 2nd in world bassin’ champeenship.

New-ish international deal just happened in South Africa. Here’s our team. All good fishermen who ultimately lost to the hometowners, but dang it kinda feels like the U.S. hoops team losing — you (I) just don’t expect it.

Good news is one of these deals will be at at Murray, SC in a couple years. Takin’ all my lawn-mowin’ money to Vegas for that one.

5. WI DNR holding smallie meeting at Sturgeon Bay Oct 18.

6. IA: Zebras may be in Big Spirit Lake.

7. Shimano has new marketing honcho.

Grayce Weber, congrats to her. Shimano release says she worked for other fishing brands but doesn’t name ’em.

8. Big Rock Sports parent buys Maurice.

Distributors. Maurice had been hurting financially, sounds like a solid buyer.

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Tip of the Day

Do you paint a target on your topwater?

In this vid Alton Jones is talking about how to catch smallmouth bass when it’s glass slick, which is cool, but what stuck out to me is the part about painting a target area by the front treble. Gotta believe that’ll work with largemouths too….

Quote of the Day

That day, I gambled, and fished 95 miles from the spot I’d fished the day before.

– Brandon “call me high rolla” Palaniuk talkin’ ’bout day 2 of the St. Lawrence Elite. He was 72nd after day 1, then rocketed into the top 10 after baggin’ 25 lbs of smalls.

Said the secret that day was making sure every fish he landed rubbed his armpit:

I was like, “Dude that’s a little weird.” He’s like, “No it’s not.” So I was like: “Dude is that the new iPhone 8?”

Shot of the Day

Gonna take a reeeeeeeeal risk here and say the Chickamauga bass were schoolin’ like cray that day…. Who needs an A-rig when you got yer Strike King Sexy Dawg bein’ beat up like a sausage thrown to a pack of hungry chihuahuas:

Random

McDonald’s Unveils Vegan Burger

In Finland, but WTHeck?? Called the McVegan. Almost made this a top news item cuz ift affects just about every bass-head that’s ever towed a boat….

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Git on these yo!

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Jay Kumar is the guy who created BassFan.com, co-hosted Loudmouth Bass with Zona, was a B.A.S.S. senior writer and a whole lot more in bassin’. Jay Kumar’s BassBlaster is a daily-ish roundup of the best in bassin’, and is the #2 daily read on any given day in the wide world o’ bass.

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