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Wal-Mart FLW Tour Stop #1 Lake Toho By Duke Jenkel I recently competed in the first stop of the FLW Tour on Lake Toho in Florida, to say the least it was a good experience. Here’s a recap of practice and the tournament. Practice This was my first trip to Toho, not knowing exactly what to expect, I brought any lures that were effective in vegetation. The fishing was pretty tough on both Toho and Kissimmee, I did not practice in Cypress or Hatcheneha, so I can’t speak for them. On Toho, you could get bit up shallow in the pencil reeds and lily pads by throwing a texas rigged baby brush hog, Reaction Innovations Skinny Dipper and a Senko type bait. I was able to generate very few bites flipping mats. Overall practice resulted in very few bites until the last two days of practice, which is when the Zoom baby brush hog began to really shine. By the end of practice, I had my arsenal of rods ready for the tournament. Here’s the list: 1 flipping stick rigged with 65lb braid, an ounce and three eighths weight tied to a 4/0 Reaction Innovations BMF Hook. 2 GLoomis GLX MBR 843C rods were rigged with Senko type baits, both had Maxima 15lb fluorocarbon for line. One Senko rod was rigged with a one-eighth ounce bullet weight, one was rigged un-weighted. 1 GLoomis GLX model MBR 844C rod was rigged for the baby brush hog, this bait was coupled with a 3/16 ounce weight and a 4/0 Gamakatsu EWG hook. The last two rods I carried were a lightweight Carolina rig (3/8th ounce weight and 10lb Maxima fluorocarbon leader) and a Rattle trap rod. Tournament Day 1 Finally Tournament day is here. I was drawn out as boat 72 and paired with Cabelas’ Pro Scott Dobson from Michigan. He said he had been catching some fish out in the lake on the hydrilla lines. He also stated that he had some shallow fish areas as well, that included one area that held some schoolers. Morning one of the tournament began with a temperature of 38 degrees, which by Florida standards is “bone-chilling cold”, this would play a big role in the way I caught my fish. We ran down Toho and locked into Hatcheneha. The water was significantly dirtier down there as opposed to the water on Toho. We were fishing a hydrilla line that ended with an eel grass bed; I managed to catch my first keeper here on a lemon-lime trap. After approximately one hour we locked back up into Toho and began to fish the hydrilla lines out in the middle of the lake. After several hours of no success we ran into an area on the north end of the lake to fish more hydrilla. Some of this hydrilla was matted up on the surface fairly well. As Scott began to fish the submergent vegetation, I was within flipping distance of the mats. I used my flipping stick with the 13/8th ounce weight to punch through the mats while Scott fished the submergent grass with a 10” power worm. On about my fifth flip, I hooked and landed a 3.5 lb bass. This fish was followed up with another 1.5 lb fish 15 minutes later. In the two hours, I managed to catch three more keepers and several short fish out of the mats. All of these fish were caught on a Reaction Innovations sweet beaver in black neon. We were in the second flight, so check in was at 3:20 p.m. When I weighed-in, my limit weighed 10lbs and 1 oz. which put me in third place, when the dust settled for the day, I was in 4th place. I failed to mention that fishing with Scott was a pleasure, definitely a good draw. From our conversations in the boat, I hope I draw him during the Detroit River Tournament in July. Tournament Day 2 My day 2 partner was Mark Pack of Minneola, Texas. Some of you may know him as the Lake Fork fishing guide that began a tackle company named Lake Fork Trophy Tackle. Day 2 began much better than day one, at least temperature wise. It was a balmy 41 degrees! I would never have believed it if someone would have told me I’d have on my under armour cold gear for this tournament. Mark was also fishing the main lake hydrilla lines on Toho; he had found an area that had a good defined edge to the grass, as well as a shell bed that was located next the hydrilla. Just to give you an idea of how amazing some of these guys are at locating fish, the area Mark fished and the area Scott fished was about 5 acres in size, and there were probably 30 boats in this general area. Several of the anglers in the top twenty after day one came from this location. Back to day 2’s activities: We began by fishing the grass line next to the shell bed. Mark quickly hooked and lost a 2.5-3lb fish on a trap. He then caught a 3.5 lb fish just minutes later on the same bait. We continued to fish this general area for about an hour and a half with no success, however, during this time period several other anglers in the area were catching some nice fish. Some where around 9:15 Mark caught his second keeper of the day on a Carolina rigged Lake Fork baby creature. I meanwhile was struggling to get a bite. To count, that was just the third bite in a little over two hours. We fished another hour without a bite and then moved to an area that had a great looking hydrilla line. This area was very similar to the hydrilla I fished on Day 1. The grass was mostly submergent with intermittent mats. This grass line ran for over a mile and we fished every inch of it. I managed to get my first bite, again with the flipping stick and big weight. Unfortunately, this fish would not measure, but things were looking up. We were fishing mats and that seemed to be where they were at. After fishing several long stretches of grass, for several hours, with only two bites to show for it, we moved back out into the lake to a new are of submergent hydrilla. I managed to get another bite in this area, on my Carolina rigged baby brush hog; this fish was also too short. After an hour in this area we moved back to Mark’s initial area to finish out the day. As the day wound to a close I realized that my hopes of making the cut were disappearing quickly. Time ran out before I could boat a keeper. So much for day 2. Tournament Notes: In retrospect, just as anybody would, I wish I could’ve caught just a few keepers on day two; I missed the cut by 4lbs and 13oz. I fell from fourth place to thirty-second place. Obviously, day two’s efforts really hurt me. I will say that in no way was my day two catch a reflection of my day-two partner Mark Pack. Mark gave me a ton of fishing room; he was nothing short of accommodating, I just couldn’t get bit. I’d like to thank both of my pro-partners for two excellent days in the water. If you get a chance to meet either one of these guys, introduce yourself, they’re good guys. All in all I got paid and scored some excellent points! What a way to start the year, one step closer to the Forrest Woods Championship! Good Luck and Good Fishin’, Duke Jenkel |
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