LAST CAST
SECRETS ON THE SEAMS OF CHANGE
Back in May, Walmart FLW Tour rookie Buddy Gross of Ringgold, Ga., could sum up his Tour win on Pickwick Lake in one word: eelgrass.“ Eelgrass?” I questioned, making sure I heard him right during an interview on the second day of competition.
“ Yes,” Gross responded.“ I’ m catching them out of eelgrass. I don’ t think any of these other guys even know it’ s growing in Pickwick.”
Gross was right. No one else in the tournament was onto his eelgrass game. Even Pickwick experts Randy Haynes and Mark Rose were unaware of the eelgrass propagation in the lake. In essence, Gross had cornered the market on eelgrass in Pickwick for that event, and it turned out to be a highly profitable week for him.
Gross’ eelgrass discovery – and subsequent win – is yet another example of how new bass fishing patterns are born from the seams of ecological changes in lakes. Whenever a new species invades a lake where it previously didn’ t exist, the influx impacts the aquatic environment, which in turn affects bass and ultimately adds new wrinkles to fishing in some form or fashion. The anglers who are the first to recognize such changes are the ones who get a jump on the learning curve and score big. In the case of Gross, he had become familiar with eelgrass by fishing it in Guntersville over the last few years. So when he discovered it in Pickwick, he capitalized on it.
Looking back over the last 20 to 30 years, these kinds of environmental changes have been a fertile ground of sorts from which new techniques, innovations and bass fishing“ secrets” have sprung up.
Other than perhaps floods, nothing changes a lake faster than an influx of new vegetation. Gross’ win in eelgrass is one example, though minor by Rob Newell
when compared to the milfoil and hydrilla infestations that swept the country during the 1980s. Once these aquatic plants found their way into lakes, they proliferated quickly, changing the entire landscape of the bass fishing business with everything from“ weedless” lures to“ weedless” props for trolling motors.
The spread of zebra mussels constitutes another environmental change that has had a domino effect on bass fishing across the country. One of the primary impacts of zebra mussels is increased water clarity. A serious infestation can turn normally off-colored water the clarity of spring water in just a couple of years. Great Lakes anglers have witnessed it, but a more recent example was seen at the Costa FLW Series event on Oklahoma’ s Grand Lake in April 2015. Grand, a lowland impoundment known for its fishy, off-colored, fertile( continued on previous page)
ILLUSTRATION BY JOE MAHLER
120
FLWFISHING. COM I AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 2016