Port Bay Super Post

[J Francho]

Episode I

Let's see, Fishing with Noel Good (wnybassman), prefishing and tournament day with Cam (bassguy9), etc.  Lots to tell, so bear with me.  Lots of pictures, too.

I got a call from Noel Good to see if I wanted to fish Port Bay with him.  He was in Honeoye with his father, and Port was on the way to Oneida, where he was fishing the 6 man team tournament there.

He said he'd poked in Port years ago, but didn't really get to know the water too well.  No problem, I've fished there for as long as I can remember.  My optimism turned to horror as  we pulled up to the North ramp.  There was a weed eater moored to the dock, and the conveyor sitting right on the retrieve ramp.  this was a little shocking, as I was following the ongoing weed saga via the Port Bay Improvement Association's meeting minutes: http://portbayny.com/minutes.aspx.  Look at the past few meeting documents, and you can see the weed harvesting was scrapped due to lack of funding.  This has resulted in two full years of solid, classic milfoil leading to deep coontail beds, with the resulting clear water, and GREAT fishing.

Once on the water, most of the best weed beds were gone, and the water was pea soup!  It broke my heart, but I got it in my head to adapt, and show Noel a good time.

I can't remember what he started with, but I started with a Sammy, and stuck a rat on the 1st or 2nd cast.  Good sign.  As we moved on, I watched Noel alternate between a Spro frog, and a t-rig worm.  Wait a minute!  Isn't this the dude from Erie that fishes dinky minnows and leeches on spider web line?  Yeah, but Noel is a stick, and he knows how to fish.

I threw a frog, jigs, Fat Ika, drop shot Robo worms,  and t-rigged beavers and otters. We found fish in between the docks, on the ledges, in weed patches that were still uncut, near wood, you name it.  It was bass fishing.  Just get your bait wet, and you'll get bit.  It was the type of day that makes me love this bay so much.

We caught a bunch of fish, many rats, and a few of the 2 lb. cookie cutter fish I see here a lot.  No slobs, but a great day, lots of laughs.  I only tried to kill Noel twice on the "swing and a miss!" hook sets, but did manage to hook him in the "back pocket" with a drop shot hook.  "Hold still buddy, I like ya and all, but don't get the wrong idea...."

Thanks Noel for a great time on the water.  Next time I'll get lunch, and won't be in a hurry to get back so soon.

Some pics from our day:

Noel with a typical Port Bay rat.

I can catch them too!

They were loving Noel's frog.

I love it when the frog works the way its supposed to, rotating out of the way like that.

A few better fish.  I was glad we were able to put some decent fish in the boat.

[J Francho]

Episode II

Prefishing and fun fishing with Cam (bassguy9) and his family.

Cam came down earlier in the week with his family to get a feel for the bay, since he knew little about it.  On Tuesday, our club had the draw, and we were paired up for Sunday's tournament.  Perfect!  I've prefished with Cam before, and the hardest part is setting up a game plan so we don't clobber each other's water on tournament day.  No problems here, we were going to clobber it together :laugh:

Cam had already built up a good repertoire of spots to fish, and they all suited our preferred style of fishing: jigs, beavers, and drop shot.  A few spots were good producers that were even new to me.  I've said this before, but fishing with others really opens new doors in lakes you think you know.  I know I get caught in a pattern of fishing just a few prime spots, and seldom go exploring, since my spots are built on a lifetime of success and failures.  Its one of my goals to learn more about lakes I think I already know.

Back to prefishing...we mainly threw beavers and jigs, checking on spots that Cam had found earlier in the week, spots I knew did well, and a little more exploring.  Fish were scattered.  Find weeds or wood, and you'd find fish.  Surprisingly, there were very few fish under docks.  Cam thought he found something, catching several fish off the front two pylons on several docks.  That seemed to disappear by Saturday.

After a couple of hours of just getting bites, and not setting the hook, Cam says, "stick the next fish so we can see what's biting."  No problem, I've got one now!

Normally, I'd be thrilled to catch a beast like this, but not the day before a tournament.  Especially not a tournament that I expected to do well, seeing that its my "home lake."

Hole in one a day early, unweighted and unmeasured.

I was so disappointed that I stuck this fish.  I just stood there a second, shaking my head in disgust, with this beast in the water beside the boat.  Cam was more optimistic about it, as it proved that there were big fish in between the docks, just off where the weedline should have been.

I'd say he was hungry for the jig.

A bit later in the morning, both Cam and I were rerigging to try some deep ledges with a dropshot, when we drifted out into the middle of the large cove we were working.  I said, "Cam, check this $&!~ out!"  We were on a huge hump, way off shore, with healthy milfoil receding to coontail off one deep ledge.  I knew about the spot, but really its marginal, considering all the other good spots on the bay.  But this was one spot the weed eating monster hadn't visited.  We got a ton of bites here, and decided to leave it alone.  Cam did bet a few fish drop shotting the deep edge outside, trying to locate a secondary pattern.

We had to better than this, come Sunday!

We had great confidence as we pulled out, and went to camp for a snack.

[J Francho]

Later, Cam, his father, and his younger brother drove down to Fairhaven, just in case the lake was open come tournament day. it was a long shot, but we wanted to be sure of what was going on there, just in case. Fishing was actually pretty slow for both places, but both Cam's dad and brother caught some nice fish, which was really cool.

Brad, with a nice largemouth caught on a Norie's Bug that I just gave to him. "Keep the whole bag kid!"

Cam's dad, with a respectable largemouth, caught on a t-rig worm.

After dinner, we drove down to the Port Bay outlet, to fish for smallies from shore. The wind was howling out of the north, and that is usually a good thing. Cam's brother stuck a HUGE smallie on a tube, and that made his night. I didn't have my camera for that, but there might be some dark cell phone pics. Cam and I decided, one quick trip up here on tournament day might be worth it.

Episode III

Tournament day!

Cam and I drew 1st boat out for blast off, early Sunday morning. This was good, as we planned to park on the big hump where we found all the untouched weeds the day before. We knew most guys would be cruising right over it, never realizing what they passed by.

A Sammy produced the first fish in the well, with several more coming from both Cam and I. We had a limit in the first 40 minutes of fishing, but these fish were only temporary livewell residents, measuring just over 12".

We alternated beavers/otters and drop shot on the deep edge, all the while slowly upgrading to cookie cutters. We occasionally checked a small group of docks where Cam caught a big fish early in the week. AOY two years running, and points leader so far, Perry, was working up to this string of docks, and we wanted to be sure he didn't catch her, LOL. We never got her, but we did put a few temporary upgrades in the well.

We eventually left our hump after an hour and half or so, since it wasn't producing any size, to work a string of wood, and another spot across the cove with docks extending out over deep, deep water. I managed a really nice fish on a otter. Cam had another nice fish. So we had two good fish, and three dinks in the well.

Cam commenced on a complete tear of the deep water docks, upgrading the three dinks in a matter of minutes to solid 2 lb. fish. now we felt confident enough to fish jigs at will, fishing spots rather quickly, looking for a few good fish. We must have caught a dozen 2.75 lb. largemouth, some culled out fish, but no real lunkers to give us the boost to the 15 lbs. plus I felt it would take to win. To make matters worse, our biggest fish was going belly up, so we were tending to her every ten minutes. I hate baby sitting the livewell, but it payed off, since she was alive for the weigh in.

We took a quick trip to the outlet, where Cam's little brother caught a huge smallmouth from shore the night before, but nothing on. We then decided to fish the area that I like to fish with jigs, even though the weeds were very spare. We did get an upgrade there, but just couldn't shake the last two cookie cutters in our sack. I felt OK about finishing in the money, but I really thought we either needed a lunker or a couple better fish to win, but that never materialized.

So, we did our best, fished well, only missing two or three fish that weren't even big enough to matter, and figured we had about 13+ lbs. in the well. Not great, but not bad either. From what we saw, the shallow dock skippers weren't catching anything notable. I wish I had a shot of Perry with two dinks on the balance beam at midday.

Once at the weigh in, one of the other teams was all smiles, and I knew they did well. We were 1st weight in. 14-2, and a 3-1 lunker. Nice sack.

Cam submits our 3-1 largemouth for the lunker pool

Our complete 14-2 sack.

Ron Wickings blowing our lunker off the board with two 4 lb. + fish to weigh in for lunker

Club President, Mitch Reff with a nice limit.

Perry's "Lunker"

Not really sure what Reggie was demonstrating here, some kind of jigging technique?

Dan and Ron weighed in right after us, with two four plus.  We then had to wait and see if we could hold up 2nd place, nervously watching the rest of the club.  Every boat had a five fish limit, which was great, and a testament to this place.  There are always fish to be caught in Port Bay, it just takes work to find the big ones.  

Two 13-7 limits were weighed in, and they were the closest calls.  So Cam and I took 2nd, and I felt good about it.  Just needed a couple of bigger fish.

Final results.

Dan accepts the cash for 1st and lunker.

Some more pics of some nice fish:

Bill Lacy always catches some good bass

Critter with a couple nice ones.

The winning sack, getting weighed in.

[roadwarrior]

Great post!

;D ;D ;D

[Captain Rhino]

Awesome post J, thanks for sharing!

[aarogb]

Great post!

;D ;D ;D

x2.

I love detailed post like this!!!!!!

[Paul Roberts]

Yes, great detailed post. So...what did it take to win?

[J Francho]

Yes, great detailed post. So...what did it take to win?

17-11.

[Paul Roberts]

Yes, great detailed post. So...what did it take to win?

17-11.

Ouch! That's a good bag.

[J Francho]

Yeah, we just couldn't shake the last two cookie cutters in our bag.  had we done that, or caught the monster I caught in practice, we might have had it.

Its really OK, though.  Winning means everything works perfectly, and toss a bit of luck on top.  I'm for consistency, and despite the 9th place finish on opening day, I've been in the top 4 for all the rest.  Currently I am tied for 7th, the highest standing non boater, and well above many boaters for the AOY standings.  The top 8 (there are 24 members) fish the classic.

[Quitlimpin]

Excellent read as always, J.  

[Dan:]

way to go, dude. Great post.

[SausageFingers23]

Excellent job and great post!  Im loving the fact that I caught a Bills hat in one of those photos.   8-)

[J Francho]

Thanks guys.  I like to put in a little time with these reports, and will continue, if you like them.  Lately, I've been carrying my camera, weather permitting, and I think the pictures really add to the report.

[David P]

Great story, always fun to see photos and tournament results.

[CWB]

Too bad you got that horse a day early!

Nice work.