drumking, chickamauga, crappie, 6/11/09, fishing machine

[FishNews]

I had the great pleasure this morning to take Fishing Machine (Terry Rogers) crappie fishing. We fished a total of 4 hours plus about 30 minutes travel time in the boat to and from our fish. Fabulous day of crappie fishing. We landed 89 crappie (my 6th TARP) this year and 1 largemouth bass by Terry. Our fish were caught mainly on 1/32 oz jigs but I did catch several on 1/16 oz when we fished bluffs.<br /><br />The count started out about 9 and ended up at 14 or better as the storm that was approaching ran us off the lake. Just barely made it home before the bottom dropped out. We had our sights set on 100 crappie today and would have made it easily as the fish were biting like mad when we heard the thunder and saw how rapidly the storm was approaching. That is it for this chicken. We saw some awesome lightning bolts as we were nearing the tyner lane ramp. We basically caught fish in every place that we stopped today. Some places much better than others, but we caught at least one fish from every area.<br /><br />Terry caught a nice largemouth bass on one particular dock. He thought it was a catfish for a minute or so, until I saw it swim by and saw that it was a nice bass. I netted it for him. It never did want to jump. Panfish assassins and bg shads and a southern pro 1.5 inch worm did the trick on the crappie today. Blue/chartreuse was best, but pumpkinseed/chartreuse also worked. <br /><br />We saw Jimbow up at the intake wall and talked to him for a few minutes. He was just finishing up for the morning. He caught several bass and a few crappie too. He mainly bass fished this AM. And I saw Lone Oak and his son at one particular dock, but wasn't sure that it was him and didn't get to talk to him until I got back home and he called to see if I made it back safely as the storm hit that place about 5 minutes after we left. Perfect timing. Got the boat back in the garage just as the rain began at the house.<br /><br />What a wonderful birthday gift. Fishing with a great friend and catching all those crappie too. It just doesn't get any better than this. Thanks Terry for going with me this morning. Believe me, there will be many more days together for us in the future. I learned a lot from you today too. emoBig emoGeezer