TEXAS wadefishing rod

This rod is a Rainshadow XSB822.5 that I cut down to 6'6". It has a prickly pear cactus butt with an inlaid TX quarter. The split is western diamondback rattlesnake. The wood trim on the grip is a piece of mesquite. It has a Minima real seat, an inlaid hook, a Recoil snake guide hook keeper, and a TX flag wrap. The guides are spiraled size 4 Fuji titanium micros. This one was a long time coming, so I hope it was worth the wait!!

ABM Tuesday nighter 10/19

The lucky streak stayed alive tonight at the ABM tuesday night tournament on Lake Travis!! I hooked up with Lance Hale this week and we fished out of his new Skeeter. We got 1st place out of 21 teams, and we had big bass of the tournament!! We had our limit within the first 45 minutes, and culled a couple of times to make our 3 fish bag (6.69lbs). Lance caught the big bass (3.01lbs) on a crankbait. He hooked a small fish that jumped and spit out the crankbait. As soon as he started reeling in the lure, the big one hit it!! We caught fish on crankbaits, shaky heads, frogs, and poppers. It was a fun afternoon, and a nice payout of $350!! Gotta keep the luck going for the 2 day tourney on LBJ this weekend!!!

Choke Canyon Hawg!!!! 10/17

Had a great time this weekend fishing with the bass club at Choke! The highlight of the weekend was catching this 10lb 2oz, 26.5" monster!! This was my new personal best bass, and it gave me the best bass fight I've ever had. I hooked her on a Texas rigged 8" black neon GrandeBass Megatail Rattlesnake, with a Gamakatsu 4/0 superline hook and tru-tungsten sinker. I was fishing 20lb test flourocarbon with my custom "rattlesnake rod" built on a Phenix 707H blank. She was hanging on a deep point in a hydrilla bed in about 15'. I had my drag cranked down tight, and once she realized she was hooked, the fight got very intense. She ripped drag and took me on a big loop around the boat and came close to breaking me off on both the trolling motor and the outboard. I was very happy that I had the extra length of that 7'7" rod to be able to sweep under the engine and keep things under control. When we finally got her in the net, I was shaking, hyperventilating and my heart was pounding out of my chest, and that didn't stop for about 20-30 minutes!! I'm so excited to have caught this fish, and am very happy to be the newest member of the double digit club. Of all the fish I've caught, this one will be one of the most memorable. We kept her in good shape, and she was released in great condition. This fish won big bass for the tournament and took the lead for big bass of the year for Big Sandy Creek bass club. If it holds up, it's going to be a nice payout in December!! The last pic is to give some perspective. The fish on the right is a 14.5" keeper bass! Big thanks to Bryan Cotter (http://www.texashawgs.com/) for running me around the lake all weekend and putting me on the fish of my lifetime so far!

ABM tuesday night tourney

No pictures for this one, but I fished the Austin Boats & Motors tuesday night working mans tournament on Lake Travis this evening. It's a team tournament, but I fished it solo out of the jonboat! It's a 3 fish tournament, and I ended up in third place out of 19 teams with a three fish sack of 7lbs 2oz! It was a fun afternoon of fishing, and I caught keepers on a Strike Pro Hunchback wake bait and a green pumpkin straight power worm on a spot remover. It was the first tournament run in the jonboat, and it felt good placing above most of those 30k+ bass boats!! Third place was just out of the money, so I won a tackle pack. Can't wait for Choke Canyon this weekend!!!!!

Lower Laguna Madre 10/2-10/3

Rachel and I headed to the RGV this weekend for a quick visit. I met my dad on saturday and we headed straight to Port Mansfield and out to the jetties to try to find some tarpon. We fished the jetties and outside bars in the surf for most of the afternoon, and couldn't make it happen for tarpon. We didn't see any rolling fish, and there were quite a few boats out there to contend with. We decided to spend the last couple hours of the day fishing in the bay, and found some fish just south of the port. We caught 4 keeper reds and 5 keeper trout in about an hour and a half.

The next day, I went out with my father in law, Frank. We fished out of Arroyo City, and had a good day. We started south of the Arroyo, but ended up finding fish north of Green Island. We ended up with 19 fish. 16 trout, and 3 reds. We brought a nice 10 fish limit back to the dock and we really enjoyed the cooler weather! Frank caught this bruiser trout with a big appetite! The hot bait this weekend was a Strike Pro Baby Buster. I had alot of fun fishing this bait, and can't wait to head south again to give em another dose of it!!

Stinky Pants Rod

This is a rod I just finished for Jason Paul, the owner of Stinky Pants stringers. This rod is a Phenix 700M blank with a Minima reel seat, spiraled black pearl recoil guides, and the new "Midnight" black prickly pear cactus butt grip. I also did the Stinky Pants logo inlaid in the cactus. The idea on this one was to go dark on the grips and just black and white for the threads. I'm looking forward to checking out my new Stinky Pants stringer!!!!

San Luis Pass 9/29

I made an early morning trip to Houston on 9/29 to meet up with James Andreatos. The plan was to run the surf and try to find some big tarpon. We ran all the way from San Luis pass to the Galveston jetties without seeing a single tarpon. When we got back to the pass at about 3:00, we headed for a rig offshore and crossed paths with a huge school of rolling giants. There were several 6'+ monsters in the group. Unfortunately, I got a little "tarpon fever" and after a comedy of errors, I missed our best opportunity of the day. From there, we chased tarpon for the rest of the afternoon. We got some good chances, and casted to several really big fish, but couldn't quite get them to eat. Finally right at sunset, we got a double hookup on this big bull redfish and a nice sized Jack Crevalle. The jack had this little remora cruising with it, so I picked it up for a quick picture. It was a fun day on the water & James put me on some nice fish... It was a learning experience... You definitely have to be 100% ready out there at all times, because the big ones don't usually give you a second chance!!