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Fishing Reports
Water Temperature: 83
Water Clarity: 1 foot
I fished the Farm today with Tricia and Bart from 12:30pm to 5:30pm, we fished Crumplers Cove and the Nursery with the quality fish caught in the Nursery.
We started in the cove with spinnerbaits, Bomber long A's, and Rippin'Sticks, 1 ate the s-bait, 2 on the long A, and 8 on the Rippin" Sticks (junebug) before things drastically slowed about 3pm.
I decided to hit the Nursery, an area where we have caught fish since the opening through the levy to Farm 13 was cut. Believe it or not I lost a fish over 8#'s on my first flip on a "Rippin' Stick from www.STICKMARSH.com I slightly modified the bait with a 1/16oz. belly weight as the wind came up a little and we were fishing 6 feet of water.
In the next 2 1/2 hours we caught 9 more fish bringing our total to 20 between 3 anglers, not incredible but the quality was good with most fish over 3#'s and one at 5#'s.
Many fish have definately moved shallower and onto the wood in the south and sw sections of the farm, there are also lots of pickeral that will ruin spinnerbaits and jerkbaits making my suggestion the soft plastics, "less flash,less trash" Don't kill yourself looking for the clearest water, we did best in the dirty stuff today.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
www.trackermarine.com www.powerpro.com Ray's Outboards Grant,Fl (321) 768-2147
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Regards, CurtisDavid
Water Temperature: 84
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Back to Garcia today on a topwater quest armed with a 18 bags of Zoom Horny Toads, you can never have too many toads.
Tricia and I arrived a little after 4pm because we have been doing better in the afternoon especially if the amount of cloud cover and breeze have increased throughout the day. My friend and guide Roger Hayward had called me earlier from the Stick Marsh and told me he was not catching fish with his clients and it didn't look like anyone else was doing much, the spillway was covered up with guides and others so he was heading to Garcia.
When we arrived at the ramp I called Roger to see how they were doing and they were already catching some fish on Gambler Flappin' Shads, 1 of his guests caught one just under 6#'s, nothing wrong with that.
Remember, Garcia is not a stocked catch and release reservoir like the Stick Marsh and more often than not you will have to work a little harder for a little less but there are times when Garcia out produces if you know the water.
Tricia and I fished Perry Flats and 3 Pad Flats for about 3 1/2 hours and we were chased out by lightning at 7:26pm, we caught 14 bass, 8 were over 14" and the biggest was 5#'s caught by Tricia, our 5 biggest were over 14#'s, wow, look at all those 14's, is that a lottery sign ?
Roger finished at about 6pm and they caught 12 up to almost 6#'s in 3 hours.
Our biggest trick lately is that we throw the toads the whole time, if it hits the right spot it will get blown up, patchy hydrilla next to solid mats have been better than lily pads.
The grass is very thick but very fishable, we usually fish 2 tournaments a week here and it seems that most boats don't have a problem though it is getting thicker every day.
Most boats also weigh limits and if you don't have at least 18#'s your chances of winning are USUALLY slim, a clear sign of an awesome fishery. Remember my spoiled Stick Marsh fishing friends, we all love the marsh, that is where I realized how incredible bass fishing could be but at Garcia you will usually have to work at it a little bit harder.
It may sound silly but I fish as if I am in a big tournament and a 14"er will win it, one fish at a time, it's different for everyone but I'm not there to relax.
WHACK an 8#er and don't worry about re-tying with 65# Power Pro braid, you can with no problem, put down the Power Pole from Ray's Outboards (321) 768-2147 and catch more.
Don't expect it to be quite that easy everytime but we can all dream !!!
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits ,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Looking foward our next trip with you. Good fishing to you and your wife
Kevin Kenneally
Thanks again,
Scott&Dennis
Thanks again.
Susie
Thanks
Gary
Mark & Nancy Hall
To: guaranteedfishon@msn.com
Subject: friday may 18th
Hi Randy,
It's Bill Sobanik - the guy you took out on last Friday morning and caught the 9 and 7 pounders. Thanks again for a great morning, and for a fish almost twice as big as any I'd ever caught before. Also, thanks for the tip on where to go in Farm 13. We cleaned-up on Monday with the Zara Spooks there. My brother and I each caught 7 pounders, 6 pounders, and plenty of 5, 4, and 3 pounders. It only worked if you kept it going sid-to-side but barely going forward.
Water Temperature: 66
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Repeat customers Richard Bacon and son Jim fished with me from 8:10-11:30am today and caught 41 BASS up to 5 1/2#'s.
28 were caught on shiners and 13 were caught on small worms with LIGHT SPINNING TACKLE(upon request) which resulted in several break-offs but more than not the BASS made it to the boat for photos.
I dropped Richard and Jim off before noon and headed back to the south end but before I did I called Steve P. who was at at the Stick Marsh to see how his luck was, he had caught 2 and decided to come and join me.
I threw a rattletrap and watermelon worms for about an hour and caught 8 more before Steve showed up and things slowed down, I was getting a little bummed out thinking that he drove over but missed the bite, trust me here, never worry about Steve P., he will catch fish, just leave him alone, he is there to chew bubble gum and kick azz but he's all out of bubble gum (in his own words)
So anyways he bust out that gosh derned' Bomber Long "A" and starts to twitchin' like he's on something, crack maybe but I'm not sure, then I notice a bend in his fishing pole, not once but about 6 times before I can find my gosh derned Bomber Long "A" and get in the action.
For the next few hours we caught 70 fish between us, Steve 44, me 26 but please remember I'm relatively new at this jerkbait fishing (1 year max using Steve's advice) it works but YOU HAVE TO ACTUALLY TRY IT to realize how incredibly productive it can be for suspended fish.
My perception of fishing a Bomber Long "A" jerkbait (remember this is new to me)
You can catch fish out of 1 to at least 15 feet of water (Stick Marsh, Garcia to my knowledge)
A 6.6' medium light action rod seems best.
A 6 to 1 ratio feels right TO ME.
I like to reel the bait down and then snap the rod tip twice towards the water, gain slack and repeat.
You will usually not feel the bite but your rod will simply bow over on your next twitch, no need to to set the hook, if the rod bends she's usually hooked.
If you are consistently getting the hooks fouled in your line you are probably twitching too eratically or waiting for the bait to hit the surface before twitching too eratically, either/or.
If you are tireing yourself out you are probably using you arm more than your wrist or using a rod that is too heavy or long, use your rod and wrist to twitch, the reel just gains line, it does not move the bait in this technique, hope this helps everyone to catch more fish.
Have fun be safe !!!Randy Sanders
Water Temperature: 68
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Ditto, c-rigs, shiners, and long A jerkbaits produced 34 fish with 2 over 8#'s for Bobby Morin, Steve P and I.
Randy Sanderswww.basstrips.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 94
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Despite extreme heat I have forced myself to fish Garcia at least twice a week with poor results, the whole south end has been sprayed and is clogged and dirty at best, making it to the main lake via south canal was impossible, I even tried the long way to rt.60 and got cut-off by massive islands. The North end is very matted with hydrilla but has clear water, Zig Zag canal has clean water and slow current but I caught nothing in either spot, the only are I have caught fish at Garcia lately is at the rock pile in the main North canal but only a few and all on a firetiger pop-r. I haven't fished the tournaments lately but "Don the lawn mon" (my yard dude/fellow basser) says it takes 12-15#'s to win, that's about 5#'s below normal but someone is still catching them pretty good.
It has been a little tough coming home from these slow-hot trips and reading my good friend Steve P.'s fishing reports and emails, he says" Randy, "you NEED to come check out Farm 13 with me NOW !!!" it got to me so I went the Tuesday,Wednesday, and Thursday just to stop the harrassment of course.
Tuesday the heat, holy crap ! I fished for an hour at the most before I got so dizzy I had to sit down and wait until I felt safe to drive to the ramp.
Wednesday I waited a while and then fished from 6pm-7:30pm and caught 11 fish to 3 3/4#'s all on rattletraps on a ditch in about 10mph East wind, the fish were on the East side of the ditch and I lost a couple as well.
Thursday I met Steve P. and we headed to his ditch of choice, the shad were there and the bass occasionally busted the surface but things were slow, lots and lots of casts were the key as well as realizing the fish were feeding only a foot or less down in the water column, ie most fish bit at the very beginning or end of the cast but would not eat a chug bug or long "A". We caught 10 fish all on traps except for this silly 5#er that bit a swimbait.
At one point Steve collapsed on the deck from the heat, it appeared that he would need mouth to mouth to survive so I was looking through his tackle box and trying to figure out what to do with the body when I accidentally broke open a senko, salt must have hit his nostrils because he began twitching, I tried to push him out but he grabbed my foot and screamed "you can't have my Bass Cat!" Steve is big but not that bright so I was able to convince him I was just trying to dip his head in the water to save his life.
I think I can speak for the whole BFHP Florida gang when I say thanks for the awesome and accurate reports Steve P.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 82
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Back on Garcia for the tournament and hoping to hit some more topwater fish, the fish were still there and we caught 16 or 17, we only missed two which is good for us when fishing Zoom horny toads.
At the weigh in it was Jim and Annie in 1st ( a common sight) with almost 19#'s in less than 3 hours, wow !
Second was Tricia and I with 14.13#'s3rd was Allan Tr-X series and Wayne with 12.3#'s
Jim and Annie got big fish with 5.7#
Trish and I had second biggest with 5.6#
John P. just called (8am) and he is at Garcia catching fish on chug bugs, Power Pole, Rays Outboards, Power Pro braid and all that other stuff, I gotta go !!!
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 79
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Tricia and I shot out to Garcia late Tuesday and fished from 5:30-7:30pm, we already knew 3 areas that are holding big topwater fish for our tournaments so we looked for something new.
We began in the mid-south end of the lake and worked North towards the pit. We quickly noticed finding fish was simple, fish the sparse hydrilla with topwater frogs of any sort and you will get pounded by bass of all sizes, in only 2 hours we caught 23 bass up to 6 1/2#'s, 10 were under 2#'s but 13 were keeper size and our 5 biggest was over 16#'s, not bad if you know tournament fishing.
Sunday Jeff Cox and I fished the Garcia tournament and got 3rd with 17.5#, second was Buddy with 17.15#, winning was the red gambler dudes with 22.6#, while at the ramp we talked with longtime Garcia local Jim Osier who caught an 11 1/2#er and an 8#er, if you know Jim then you know you can believe him.
The bottom line is that Garcia is producing big bass on topwaters all day but very few people know it and the place is nearly empty, 8 hour days are easily capable of 70 fish or more all eating at the surface.
Garcia is full of hydrilla, eelgrass, lily pads, and more bass holding cover than you can imagine, buzzbaits and anything topwater is working now. Garcia is fishing large with grass in every flat, "Yes" I checked !
With a Minn Kota 101 and a Power Pole you will feel like you own the place, with Power Pro braid you have no excuses !!!
Care should be taken with navigation, I am now printing and labeling a few aerial photos for my friends, they are not for sale but if you give me fair warning I will give you one free at the ramp.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits ,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 79
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
On the way the to the Stick Marsh this morning I noticed the wind was up from the NE so I opted to hit Garcia for more protection and clearer water. In my OPINION, Garcia is almost always a better choice if the wind is hard from North or East discounting any running pumps or open spillways in Farm 13 or by the ramp at the Stick Marsh.
I began a little late at 9:30am in the lily pads at the North end in a flat I call "The Promise Land", this place has saved my butt a few times including in last Sundays tournament. Within 20 minutes I caught a 5#er and a 3#er on a Nemire Red Ripper spoon so I put the Minn Kota Pro 101 on high and got out hoping they'll stick around until Sundays Tournament.
At the extreme North end of the middle North/South ditch I went South throwing Zoom speedworms at every patch of pads I could find the whole way through four corners and all the way to the South end, it took some work and there was some down-time and I didn't break any records but I had a great time catching 15 bass, 6 were over 14" and my biggest 5 was 13.4#'s.
I fish both Zoom Horny Toads and Speedworms with a 1/16oz. Gamakatsu EWG Superline hooks with 50-65# Power Pro braid, for fish that miss the bait I throw a Rippin Stick from www.stickmarsh.com with 30-50# Power Pro and 4 feet of 30# Yo-Zuri Flourocarbon, 7 foot heavy action Falcon Rods for both on 6.2:1 ratio reels.
If you happen to notice the remote control on my belt, that's for the Power Pole, touch a button and stop in up to 6 feet of water in high wind or current, wanna see ? fish with me.
Get your Power Pole at Ray's Outboards in Grant,Fl (321) 768-2147
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits ,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 80
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Saturday at the farm-
Tricia and I started about 8am in the south end of Farm 13 and she caught a 5#er on her first cast with an "electric craw" 1/2 oz. rattletrap, I was scared that was bad luck but before she released it I caught a 3#er and the action was good for an hour or so but at least half of the fish jumped or pulled off.
At about 9am things slowed for us but we did still see fish of good size being caught on shiners in Pinball Alley, I had promised Tricia that we would carolina-rig today so we headed to the ditches to drag baits through the shellbeds.
The GPS is critical here as I placed the bouy near previously found shellbeds along the ditches, our first stop produced c-rig fish from 2-5#'s and even though bass would chase shad we couldn't get bit on the trap, next stop same deal except one fish ate a trap. I called my good friend Robie on his cel phone and he and a friend came out and joined in for a bit but Robies craving to fish the heavy wood got to him so he ran deep into the SW corner of The Nursery but it didn't pay off.
By noon we had about 20 fish and we were hitting almost every shellpile I know of looking for that every cast bite, the GPS was smoking and the Power Pole was soaking as we caught a fish almost everywhere we stopped but only two spots seem to hold good numbers, and YES, the Power Pole will stop you in high wind in the middle of the farm at the touch of a button, I'm scared these things will be tournament banned.
At about 3pm we decided to give Pinball Alley another shot but after about 1 1/2 hours and only a couple more fish we were back to the best c-rig spot for the day, upon arrival we could see the fish were up top more consistently chasing small threadfins so we took advantage of the moment and caught them good on chug bugs and traps.
We left about 6pm with 48 bass up to 5#'s and a nice rod/reel combo T dragged up from the south end with a brand new trap on it, this was one of the best days Tricia and I have had together on the water for a long time.
C-rig was 3/8 oz. with 2 feet of leader, the best baits were junebug Rippin' Sticks from www.stickmarsh.com
Sunday Tournament at Garcia-
Things started out rough for us as I lost a 4#er and Tricia lost one atleast that size in the first hour with Zoom Horny Toads, by 9am I had lost two more so I put it down and we grabbed the flippin' sticks for two hours, I caught a 2 1/2#er and T caught two 1 1/2#ers.
At 11am our flip bite died so we picked up the toad rods again but struggled hitting atleast 5 spots with no more bites, with 1 hour to go we hit the north pads and found a hungry pile of fish waiting, T quickly caught a 5#er, I caught a 3 1/2#, she lost one over 6#'s and then caught a 3#er, etc.
In that last hour we caught 6 keepers and a few dinks, we culled four times including all the fish that were in the livewell before we showed up, we didn't have a monster bag of fish but I knew it was near 13#'s and alot of guys including us have been getting stuck in the 11-12# range so I felt we had a shot plus Tricia's 5#er might take second biggest bass.
Our predictions were accurate as we got 2nd with 13.6#'s and second biggest bass with the 5.0#.
Jerry Austin and "Pop" won with 15.4# and had the biggest bass with a 6.2#. Needless to say I know where we are starting next time !!!
Thanks for everything especially the Power Pole Rays Outboards of Grant ,Fl (321) 768-2147.
Line from www.powerpro.com will help you hook fish you maybe didn't deserve to.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits ,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
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Water Temperature: 80
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Ron Kavula from Tampa, Fl joined me Friday for his first trip on the marsh and he was not dissapointed as he caught the most, and the biggest bass of his life, 25 up to 6#'s in less than 6 hours, not at all uncommon for these waters as higher numbers and weights are very possible on anyday.
The big bass are at the south end of the farm and eating junebug Rippin' Sticks from www.stickmarsh.com, 1/4-1/2oz. rattletraps, Bomber long A's, t-rigs, and shiners.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 79
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The Stick Marsh and Garcia Reservoir are both hot right now with numbers of sizely bass catchable with artificials or live shiners.
Today I started fishing about 7:45am deep in the south end of Farm 13 armed with weightless t-rigged junebug and green pumpkin Rippin'Sticks, a 1/2 oz. "electric craw" rattletrap, and a Steve P. signature model black/orange Bomber long "A" jerkbait, the fish were there and aggressive but I lost as many as I caught with the treble-hooked baits.
If I have my choice I would prefer to hook fish with a 4-5/0 EWG Gamakatsu so when I found the fish with the search baits I would put down the Power Pole and slowly drag the Rippin' Sticks over the wood, the strikes were definite and hooksets felt like moving snags, the fish here are strong as most will agree.
My total for 8 hours was 33 bass up to 6 1/4#'s, John P., Scott W., Steve P. and "Champion" Don were also catching their share + ,Steve P. and Don were still at it when I left.
The Rippin'Sticks are from www.stickmarsh.com are I fish them with a 7' medium/heavy rod, 50# Power Pro braid attached to 30# flourocarbon and a 4/0 Gamakatsu EWG superline hook.
Rattletraps are thrown on 7' medium action rods with straight 30# braid and loose drag, thumbing the spool when necessary.
Jerkbaits require straight 20-30# braid on 6'6" - 7' medium/light action rods with a relatively loose drag as well, I am not talking finnesse tackle, just loose drag using your thumb when needed, there is more wood down there than we can imagine but if you lock your drag down these fish will straighten treble hooks with ease.
The Power Pole undoubtedly helps me catch more fish and is available to you at Rays Outboards in Grant,Fl (321) 768-2147.
Garcia Tournaments are Sundays at safe light to 1pm, Wednesday from 5:30pm to dark and are open to you.
Wednesdays results:1st Buddy Perry and son 15.12#
2nd Tricia and I 15.5#
3rd R.Kimbrough and wife 13.12#
Biggest Bass
1st Buddy Perry and son 6.15#2nd Tricia and I 4.15#
Stick Marsh or Garcia ?
The Stick Marsh and Farm 13 have more and bigger fish with lots of wood and grass coming back in some areas but is very open on the surface, the south end of Farm 13 seems to be the best there right now but is exposed to high north and east winds, that's when Garcia is handy.
Garcia is much more vegetated and wind protected with very little wood, most of the reservoir is producing fish from 1/2 to 4#'s but 10#ers are possible while 8#ers are a common sight at weigh-ins.
The Stick Marsh water level is good now, Garcia WAS low but now sits at 24.8' above sea level.
Wherever you chose to fish doesn't matter as long as you fish.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 77
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Today was the first day out with the new Power Pole, a hydraulic shallow water anchor that will stop the boat at the touch of the remote button, high wind, current, doesn't matter, it works up to 6 feet of water and I felt like we were cheating, thanks Rays Outboards for doing it right, contact them at (321) 768-2147 for your Power Pole or almost anything else marine related, I am happy to demo this thing for you if interested.
Jeff Cox and I hit the Wednesday night tournament and we threw nothing but Zoom horny toads, we caught almost 30 fish, 8 were keepers and the 4#er in the last 10 minutes vaulted us into first. Edwin and Joy got 2nd and had big fish with a 5.2#er.
The fishing at Garcia is still on fire but navigation is tough.
Bring your GPS, phone, Power Pro braid, and a boat load of toads.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Saturday Bart Brown and I hit Garcia to see if we could duplicate Fridays action when Jeff Cox and I caught 31 bass.
We began flipping 1.5oz. tungsten weighted tubes in ivey mats while the sun was high and the wind was low, we caught 11 fish to 4#'s in about 2 1/2 hours.
At about 3pm the wind and clouds appeared so we broke out the Zoom horny toads and Rippin' Sticks from www.stickmarsh.com as follow baits, the action was fast and furious and the topwater explosions were incredible as the front approached.
At 7:30pm we bailed out with 59 fish from 1/2 to 6 3/4#'s on the boga grip, I was personally so fished out I skipped the tournament on Sunday.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Jeff Cox and I hit Garcia for 5 hours and caught 23-26 fish, most were 1-2#'s but a few were closer to 4#'s.
We began in a ditch flipping 1.5 oz. tungsten weighted craws and tubes to ivey mats but we only caught 3 fish so we hit the north end flats with Rippin Sticks, frogs, and speedworms for the rest.
Rippin' Sticks from www.stickmarsh.com get bit.
Power Pro braided line from www.powerpro.com pulls em' out.
Rays Outboards in Grant, Fl (321) 768-2147 makes sure my guests and I get to the fish and back again everytime.
Without the help of these companies and businesses my job would be twice the work.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Today was very slow for us as we caught only 9 fish in 4 hours, 4 on spinnerbaits, 3 on buzzbaits, and 2 on Rippin' Sticks, Oh well, we try again tommorow.
Randy Sanders(321)544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 1 foot
GUIDES BEWARE !!!
Chad Gates will show up late, borrow sunglasses, break your rods, drink your water and it's worth every second because you will laugh the whole time.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Back on the marsh today after spinning a hub and bending a prop shaft in the south end of Farm 13 last week, I love my new fast-dry ride but my flats boat with trim tabs, hydraulic jack plate, hydrofoil stabilizer, and four blade prop spoiled me as I could run almost anywhere fearlessly.
Be patient, get well out of the south end before jumping on plane.
Greg Culpepper and his friends Chad and Brian met me at 9am. for some artificials and live bait fishing.
We went directly to the south end and began drifting shiners while casting plastics in thick wood, we never caught a fish on shiners but we did collectively catch 23 bass on Rippin' Sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com or Nanny's Bait and Tackle on Babcock road in Palm Bay (321) 676-0693.
Chad caught a 5 1/2# and several 4's as he was in the hot seat, Brian caught a pair of 4's and other 2's and 3's, Greg let everyone get a head start but then came back with multiple 3's. I accidentally caught an 8 1/2# and was harrassed by some crazy dude in a white/black Bass Cat who said I was supposed to let my clients catch the big fish, who knew ?
I soon realized that character was the infamous Steve P. infamous because it sucks to fish behind him, he is a bass vaccuum and if you ever pass up the opportunity to chat with him at the ramp or on the water you are missing out on a chance to talk to a great guy full of fishing information, that's how we met.
Today I forced my victims to fish with braided line from www.POWERPRO.com and they are now spoiled.
Ray and Amanda at Rays Outboards in Grant,Fl (321) 768-2147 are so good to me that I would rather pay them than to pursue warranty issues at no charge.
As I was loading the boat my tilt/trim relay went out and guess who shows up to save the day ? Yep, the mechanical magician Steve P. Thanks again Steve.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Garcia Tournament results are as follows: 21 boats 1st Danny Hand 18.3#
2nd Bart Brown 14.3#3rd Team Scout 12.8#
4th me and Tricia 11.14#
5th Tom Henderson 10.6#
Big Fish Team Scout 6.14#
2nd Bart Brown 5.14#
Then to the Stick Marsh Tricia and I went for 3 1/2 hours where we caught 17 fish and several over 4#'s but no hawgs by marsh standards.
All fish were caught in the c-54 flats on wacky-rigged Rippin' Sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com and 3/8 oz. single thumper Booyah spinnerbaits.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
After trailer repairs I got to the marsh about noon, fished a couple hours and caught 8 fish including two 5#ers on back to back casts with a wacky-rigged junebug Rippin' Stick from www.STICKMARSH.com
At about 3pm I ran back to the ramp to get my secret fish catching weapon, my wife Tricia. We decided to c-rig a couple spots with no luck so back to the south end of Farm 13 where Tricia quickly caught 3 fish on a 1/4 oz. trap, I'm positive color doesn't matter, when they are biting a trap the are biting a trap period.
We fished until almost dark, Tricia caught 10 and I caught 11, her 3rd fish was a 5 1/4# weighed on the Boga Grip, scales are so humbling, don't call it a 7#er if you didn't weigh it, it's misleading to the anglers with scales.
Today we shall return, hope you're there already and catching some chunks, in my opinion this place is the best I have seen it in 5 years, getcha sum !!! "Stick Martian"
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Today my family lost our leader, the most important person in my life, my grandmother, "Grams", Norma Irma Rose.
Grams basically raised me, "bailed me out" literally a few times, helped sponsor my Amateur and Pro surfing career along with multiple companies, check Kelly Slaters' (6 Time World Champion) book if you have doubt, Grams gave me all the opportunities to rich and fame but I partied it all away at a young age, when I recovered in "88" fishing took over and my best friend Bart kept me out of trouble.
The news came through the cel phone while we fished the same body of water I was fishing when my fathers body was found, different story, I promise a fishing report is on the way but many of you are part of my family.
My incredible wife Tricia and I where fishing the south end of Farm 13 today when the call came through, we anchored, we cried, and talked, we agreed that Grams was better off but that doesn't stop the emotions.
Once we talked to Mom and agreed that Grams would want us to relax and catch a few fish we decided to continue fishing for 3 hours and caught 18 bass up to 7 lbs, sounds silly but I have never set the hook with tears in my eyes except when I hooked a 1# bass directly after I lost a 10#. Sorry and thanks for listening.
Randy and TriciaWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 1 foot
After my semi-tough guide trip today with only 13 fish and 1 6#er I decided to go back for more and I went straight to the c-54 flats for 2 hours, the idea was to pitch wacky-rigged Rippin' Sticks into the brush, it worked for 5 fish from 2-5#'s and another chunk that escaped boatside.
About 4:30pm I got a serious flippin' craving and hit the mats where I caught a 5# and a 6# with a black/red flake Gambler tube mounted on a 5/0 EWG Superline hook and a 1.5 oz. tungsten anchored with 65# Power Pro, why mess around ?
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The fish at Garcia are fatter, meaner, and healthier than ever but still ready and willing to eat.
The water is low and the running is dangerous with any outboard-powered boat but completely doo-able if you know where to go and where not to set down.
TRIM UP WHILE BACKING OFF PLANE !!! please trust me on this or possibly spend big $ or injury.
With the current conditions I feel safest recommending the Stick Marsh/Farm 13, however the ones that know Garcia and can get to the deeper areas can and will catch numbers and sizely bass.
,P>Todays victims, Joe Fernandez and friend Jim arrived from New York and met me at the ramp at 1pm.Heavy rain in the AM, 25-35mph winds, and severe high pressure made things tough, NOT !!!
Joe and Jim caught 25 FAT bass in 3 hours armed with Middletons shiners, YEP, 3 HOURS !!!
4 fish were under 3#'s, sorry. ,br> 17 were between 3-5#'s.4 were over 5#'s including Joe's 7 1/4#er pictured above.
Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Today I fished with Willie Howard of The Palm Beach Post from 9-11:30am and he caught 10 bass and 2 mudfish, Garcia article and pictures will be in the above mentioned paper Thursday April 7th.
At 2pm Veto Hunter showed up armed with the wildest of shiners from Middletons and off we went for 4 hours of catching, waiting, catching, waiting, etc. Veto set the hook very well when necessary and caught 19 bass up to 5 1/2#'s and 2 pickeral. Both trips were fished at the dead south end of the reservoir directly at the end of a N/S ditch, the shiners were bobbered 2 feet down but frequently smashed on the surface. Where is the water going at Garcia ?
The 5 Reasons I Have Heard And the 1 that is True.
The water is being drawn down because..…1. The bottom will be scraped of rotted vegetation for better bass spawning habitat, yeah right, we can only dream.
2. The land has been purchased by d unlimited and will be managed as a waterfowl preserve, sorry duckheads (JR) it aint' happening.
3. The water is going into a new bass fishing heaven-type reservoir, nope.
4. The water will be lowered to rebuild and widen the foundation of the rt# 60 bridge, wrong again but they should probably take advantage of the moment on this one.
5. The water is being lowered for breeding Apple Snails which are fed on exclusively by the endangered Snail Kites, Apple Snails lay their eggs on reeds, cattails, etc. Boat wakes and high winds cause the eggs to be washed off the vegetation resulting in no Apple Snails and no Snail Kites.
The water is being drained for the future of Snail Kites, for now the water is 23.6 feet above sea level, that is very low and I don't reccomend full sized bass boats unless you know exactly where you are going.
Don't let that discourage you, the Stick Marsh Has plenty of water and the fishing is hot discounting weather changes.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Walt and Bill from Wisconsin jumped in for LESS THAN 4 HOURS TODAY AND CAUGHT 24 BASS, 4 huge mudfish, and a pickeral, sorry.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Dennis Flynn with a 7 1/2# Garcia bass.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Dennis Flynn with a 7 1/2# Garcia bass.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Pat Flynn, brother Dennis, and son/nephew Nate were my victims today and shiners were the weapons of choice.
The bite for us was not incredible but fairly consistent with mostly largemouths (the only real bass here) a few chocolates (mudfish) and the not so elusive pickle bass (pickerel)
The highlight was definately when Dennis caught a 7 1/2# bass, then Pat hit one over 8# within 5 minutes both weighed on the boga grip.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Today I had the honor of fishing with David Sync and 9 year old daughter Corrinn (hope I spelled that right, I never claimed to be smart) but I do know where some fish are.
This fun Father/Daughter team fished a little over 5 hours and caught 13 bass up to 6#'s weighed on the boga grip, 2 catfish, 2 pickerel, and 2 mudfish, it was like we were on Noah's Trash Fish Ark or something, sorry if I just somehow belly hooked your beliefs.
I won't lie, it wasn't easy, 20-30 mph winds in the afternoon forced me to anchor 6 times and forcing 5 shiner rods into the spread caused me to fix a couple knots happily, " NO !!! Customers do knot deal with knots or any "dirty work", that's my fun" and I will do it all day for you as long as you catch a fish and smile every once in a while.
Serious tournament-style fishing with relatively experienced fishermen is clearly my specialty, my favorite, and comes with a GUARANTEE that you will learn new techniques, and/or new twists to old techniques will catch fish.
However.......Shiner fishing with family or friends is a GUARANTEED fish-catching fun-filled day whether you like it or not.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 70
Water Clarity: Not reported
Bonnie Butler and son Sam were back again for the 3rd or 4th trip but this time Papa couldn't make it, the good news however is that they brought their very cool niece Macie, the gang caught a combined 18 bass, 2 chocolate bass (mudfish sounds so ugly) and a pickerel in about 5 hours.
Shiners from Middletons Stick Marsh Bait and Tackle in Fellesmere are as good or better than any shiners from anywhere in our area.
Macie caught the two biggest by far, Sam caught the most as usual, Bonnie was the most patient and gave up her hot spot to Macie where she caught the biggest bass of the day on her last shiner, even though the fish wrapped around the Optimax she was still landed thanks to 50lb. Power Pro.
The neatest thing for me today was to see the way this family cared and shared with each other, Bonnie wanted the kids to catch fish but she also didn't mind setting the hook when necessary as she caught her fair share. Sam was happy with handing his rod to Macie AFTER the bobber was under, he also netted the bass on several occasions.
I hope to see this gang again soon !Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 65
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The benefits of information sharing ran full circle yet again today as my brother-in-law, Mike McGee (17) and I (old and smelly) ran wide-open from the ramp to Farm 13 on a hot tip from the reliable butt-ugly STEVE P. It appears that Steve had found more fish than even he could handle.
As we fished along-side of Steve for 5 hours we caught 37, Steve caught nearly identical numbers by himself. Mike, Steve, and I had multiple 3# fish and a couple double hook-ups between Steve and Mike.
Mikes' fish pictured above went 4 3/4# on the boga grip butt Steve P. caught 2 over 6# and 2 or 3 over 5#.
All of our fish ate Rippin' Sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com
I think Steve might have been drop-shotting with beef jerky or something really technical cause he was on fire.
Thanks Steve, that was a blast for both me and Mike.Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 65
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Sunday Open Tournament at Garcia
1st. Mike and Scott in the Procraft win with..............15.14#
2nd. Bart and I fished together this week and caught......15.7#
Big Bass Mike and Scott................................5.13#
2nd biggest Bart and I with a.................................4.2#
All above placings paid cash at the ramp, a beautiful thing.
I don't know what they did but we threw frogs and flipped 1 oz. tubes and craws.
Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 70
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Back on the marsh today since Don (wwf) says he misses me, I planned to find him by the cloud cover over his boat so I could throw topwater plugs at him, as luck would have it there were clouds everywhere so after 3 big circles I realized I couldn't find him, I was sad but I must go on.
I tried three areas in the Farm and was on a solid pickerel pattern ruining 2 spinnerbaits before I decided to put down the shiny stuff and start flinging my weightless texas-rigged junebug Rippin Sticks available from www.STICKMARSH.com.
I covered alot of water biteless until I got deep into the south end of the farm when I hit a 3#er, then I missed 2 in a row so I knew I was in a good area but something was off. I soon changed to a wacky style rig with a 3/0 Gamakatsu live bait hook that I modified myself with a heavy wire wood/weed guard and began fishing in small circles for 3 hours, I caught 11 fish to 5lbs and only missed 2, all on the wacky-rigged Rippin' Sticks.
About 4pm the wind picked up and I felt more confident in my area and my spinnerbait, a 1/2 oz. chartreuse and white Booyah with under sized double colorado blades, I apparently made a good decision with 4 more fish including the 9 1/2 lber. above weighed on the boga grip, I thought she was over 10 for sure on the first jump, my 5 biggest were over 23#'s and I was a happy camper, sorry I didn't see you Don, kind of.
"The Stick Martian is back"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 70
Water Clarity: 1 foot
A last minute cancelled trip forced me to fish by myself today with an attitude, just as well as I struggled to catch fish until an hour before the rain when the action picked up slightly, I caught 9, 5 were keepers but none were over 2 1/2#'s, I worked hard for what I caught so I decided to make you look at one, SOME DAYS SUCK !!! I sincerely hope yours didn't.
Randy Sanders(321)544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 62
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Dr. Ed Destarlais and wife Betty went shiner fishing and gator watching for a half day and caught 17 bass on 27 bites, not bad considering every fish that bit ran right to the boat regardless of boat positioning which makes slack retrieval challenging at best.
All bass except one were over 2#'s, most were 3-4#'s, a couple were over 5 and the one above hit 6#'s on the boga grip. Thanks to Power Pro braid some not-so-hot hook-sets still caught fish, only use Power Pro if you care about catching the fish that bite.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 62
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
DON'T WORRY ABOUT THE DINK ABOVE !!! Stacey King of Bass Pro Shops Pro Team and I caught lots of bass, some big bass and got great footage but I can't show you yet, you'll have to wait until summer or early fall to see the Bass Pro Shops show on The Outdoor Channel.
Stacey is incredibly quiet and modest and made me feel like a long-time friend in his boat for a day I will never forget.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 67
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
I got a call last night from Stacey King of Bass Pro Shops Pro Team who got my info from John Fox, he had heard the news that Garcia was hot and wanted to shoot some footage for the Bass Pro Shops show on the Outdoor Life Network , after a 20 minute conversation I threw him some GPS numbers to start with and told him I would see him on the water.
Upon arrival the winds were howling with the occasional downpour, Stacey and John decided to shiner fish and even though they fought the winds hard they managed fish to 5#'s. Meanwhile I noticed the water has fallen out of Gulp Flats so I snuck off to check a deeper spawning hole I call the Promise Land, speedworms and rippin'sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com were the only necessary weapons as the old flats were full of new beds, 19 fish later my 5 fish limit was over 15#'s but no fish were over 4#'s.
Stacey, John, and I all talked at the ramp and they will be on shiners again tomorrow but it looks like I may get to drag Stacey along with me thursday for some artificials footage
. Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits ,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 62
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Kyle Neely and I hit Garcia "the little O" again today in search of a hawg or numbers of chunks, Kyle isn't picky and he can fish a little bit of everything which is a good thing because I have been patternless since the cold front.
We began slop-fishing Gerald Swindel style and scraped up 7 bass to 4lbs. with traps and junebug rippin' sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com in 2 hours fishing the north canal before the action fizzled minizzel.
With 2 dozen monstrous farm raised shiners from Middletons that I really didn't want to baby-sit overnight I decided to run to SOB's, it was as good as it gets for 45 minutes until all baits were gone, Kyle caught 20 bass on 24 bites, all 2 1/2 to 6lbs.
Next to Gulp Flats, then the Killing Fields, and finally the Pig Trail with several follows but no takers but Kyle was happy and will be back tomorrow, he has fished with me 5 or more days in a row for 4 years now and knows some days are better than others but most are good through patience and persistence.
Randy Sanders(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits ,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 71
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Kyle Neely of Michigan books at least five consecutive days of bass fishing with me every year for four years now and I always look forward to seeing him.
Today was day 1 and we caught 20 fish, not bad but we were on a missin' mission and we should've had 35 or more.
2 were over 5#'s, 1 was almost 5#'s, and the rest were about 1-3#'s.
The best baits were clearly Zoom horny toads, speed worms, and rippin'sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Charlie Chodorow came back again but this time he brought in the big gun, his son, Harry "the hawg catcher" Chodorow, 8 years old.
Charlie (Dad, cool Dad) has taught his adorable and extremely witty son to surf, fish, and catch bait from their own boat and home on the beautiful Indian River.
We started at 9am and the first 2 hours were very slow, no wind and the hottest day I have seen in 4 months, we tried everything but they wouldn't eat anything, still no wind. We finally managed a few at SOB's on Rippin' Sticks, they still wouldn't eat the shiners and I was in 2 hours already on a 6 hour trip with 3 fish and the expensive live baits were basically untouched.
At 11am we bailed out to "The Fox Hole" , a lily pad, hydrilla, and eelgrass flat full of beds known for holding BIG fish but not a numbers hole, the goal here is to catch as many of the males and females as possible, photograph, release, move 30 feet, rinse and repeat, making sure you don't set your anchor in a bed.
Upon arrival the breeze was still nowhere to be found and action remained dead for another 1/2 hour, this bothers me as much as anyone, trust me, free-lined in the dorsal, anal fin (ouch), bobbered vise-versa, didn't matter, the bass would not cooperate, I was up a creek without a trolling motor.
About 11:45am the surface rippled and the action picked up, not incredibly, but better and consistent, 3 hours and 30 bites later we got chased out by lightning, the first I have seen here in a long time but not before Harry and Dad could land a catfish, a gar, and 19 BASS including two over 7#'s.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 63
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Tournament day at Garcia , Bart is back looking to defend last weeks win including biggest fish, we are hoping to steal his thunder and improve on last weeks runner-up position.
Until recently every time Bart had been to Garcia it was on my boat as my partner in a tournament so now that Tricia is my regular partner Bart just follows us in his 13’Lagoon Flymaster, his other days off he tries to spend on his 31’ Contender in Kingfish tournaments or chasing tuna on the other side of the Gulf Stream. Don’t let that distract you, Bart and I grew up together fishing for snook, trout, reds, bass, and anything that would bite, he has always adapted quickly to any fishing technique.
I guess my point is that this fish-catching monster is always in view and it can be distracting watching him pull in 3 keepers to our 1 from “our” spot , we are always rooting for him but yes, a little distracting.
SOB’s dries up so we head to “The Knot Hole” where Bart quickly hits his fourth keeper, “Yeah” we yell as I begin to pluck my fingernails with pliers, can’t feel a thing. His 4 fish and our 1 were all caught on the same baits, june bug Rippin’ Sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com.
A few minutes later Tricia sets the hook and her rod bows as 30# Power Pro peels from her reel before a hawg launches into the air, looks 7#’s but after a hard scrap we netted the fish and guessed her at 5#’s . Believe it or not the wind picked up and the bite stopped so off to the Gulp Flats we went, I was overjoyed to see no other boats besides ours and thought for sure we were about fill the wells. I soon realized why we were the only ones in, to my amazement the big fish were not active and the 12” bucks were beyond aggressive chowing down on green pumkin and watermelon Rippin’ Sticks, fun but not what we need to win.
Two more spots and a run down the Pig Trail ends us up at the “Killing Fields” a massive spawning flat with several other boats already in. Bart heads west and we go south for about 5 minutes before we hear Bart whistle holding up a fish that looks over 7#’s, “that’s a limit” he modestly mutters.
Tricia and I have 2 fish but 1 is fat, it’s about 11:15am and weigh-in is at 1pm but we still have hope after seeing Bart’s hawg. We all continue working, Tricia catches a 3 ½#, I get a 2 ½#, that’s 4 and Tricia catches our limit fish, a 2#er at 12:15pm. In the next 35 minutes I catch 3 small keepers but none will help and with 10 minutes left to go Tricia hooks a 3#er that snags in a lily pad and escapes, time to go.
Weigh-in time shows Jim and Annie WIN with 15.2#, not an uncommon sight. Bart is 2nd with 14.14# and wins BIG FISH with a 7#er.
Tricia and I take 3rd with 13.5# and 2nd BIG FISH with Tricias 5#er.
We will of course be on Garcia and back to the tournament Sunday so we will let you know what goes on.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 67
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
John McIntosh joined and good friend Jeff joined me at 9am for 6 hours today and learned how to catch fish and get around the lake safely.
I showed them the Gulp Flats where we quickly caught 22 chunks to 3#'s on Rippin' Sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com, next to SOB's where we caught 9 more fatties and missed as many more.
I did a big ole' detailed report earlier and somehow lost it on my computer, now it's after 1am and I have to be up by 4am, call me if you want the details, I pull no strings, ask anyone.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 65
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Bob Bachman and his father-in-law Roger from Ohio jumped in for a 6 hour big bass hunt. We started with 'Rippin' Sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com and caught 4 before flopping out the shiner rods. Both men caught their biggest bass ever.
The bass bit live shiners under floats and free-lined live shiners, but the three biggest fish ate dead shiners on the bottom, three fish were over 5#'s while one went 6.4#.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 61
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Off to the weekly tournament at Garcia with Tricia and my good friend Bart, only 2 people a boat so the Bartman headed out in his brand new '14 lagoon flymaster. Bart told me his flipping bite was dead so I told him to follow us to s.o.b.s.
S.O.B's is a 3-6 foot drop with sparse hydrilla where schools of prespawn fish stage before heading shallow, but more importantly we have been hammering chunky fish there for 6 days now.
I began with a trap and a few small fish when I heard a loud splash and turned to see Bart on a good one, he netted it and yelled "Rippin'Stick" , the rippin' stick is the cream of the crop for soft stickbaits at a fraction of the cost, I get mine from Jim Porter @stickmarsh.com and so can you or just stop by The Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters (321) 952-4435.
We switched baits and by 9am both boats had limits, we culled twice, Bart three times and no one ever got bit after.
At the weigh-in Bart was awarded top weight with 13#'s and the biggest fish with a 4.2#, we got second with 11#'s and you can believe we made Bart buy at Cracker Barrel.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 62
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The rattletrap bite was solid again today with 17 fish up to 6 1/4#'s and nothing under 2#'s in 2 hours.
lAbout 3pm the shad and bass showed themselves on the surface so we tied on chug bugs and went to work.
I wouldn't normally fish topwater at 62 degrees but the bass were acting like it was 70 and the water began to churn so we were'nt about to argue, we left at 4pm with 36 fish hoping to save a few for tournament day, our 5 biggest were over 19#s weighed on the boga grip as always.
There are plenty of slow days, I share more of the positive moments in reports to get you fired up, I don't tell you about my backlashes, snags, and hours of biteless casts so don't get frustrated if it doesn't work on the water like it did on paper, it doesn't for me either.
Keep casting and don't do anything for longer than a half hour without a bite.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 65
Water Clarity: 1 foot
If your lucky enough to see water temps go from 57-65 degrees in the course of the day, and you realize the fish have completely left the mats for the nearest drop to take advantage of increased shad activity then you too can catch fat fish on every casy until temperatures reverse the process.
As temperatures rise the bass will move to the edge of the warm mats and become more vulnerable to more aggresive baits such as the 3/8 oz. texas rigged lizard.
Clear water means watermelon, slightly stained means green pumpkin or junebug, dirty means look elsewhere and chartreuse tails never hurt anywhere.
What else do you want for nothin', a rubber bisquit ?
Flippety-doo-dah-flippety a, my oh my I slayed em' today.
A cold start calls for a big weight in my book. Dead vegetation is warmer than the live stuff.
A small bait with few appendages is easier to eat than a big bait with "water moving stuff" hanging off its body.
Bass detect size of prey more by lateral lines (water movement) than by sight itself.
Sorry about the technical junk so here we go in "I wanna catch a green fish" terms. Flip a 1-1 1/2 oz. tungsten weighted craw with no legs, just claws into a floating mat of dead ivey pads,hyacinth, and whatever else that provides cover and warmth.
Concentrate on seams between two or more types of veggies and if the water is below 62 degrees fish each flip for up to a minute, most of these fish will bite a foot or less below the mat.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 66
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Into the Gulp Flats we go and Steve P's streak continues as he drills 5 more fish with a purple stickbait quicker than I can say you !@#$%! Yep, 12 to 5 and I'm sweating in 70 degree weather but at least he's modest about it, NOT !!!
He has me on tilt but I manage 2 fish, he catches about 5 more chunks from 1 1/2 -3#s before he hooks the nail in my coffin, the 7 1/2# fat beeeotch pictured above, his biggest Garcia fish ever !!!
The bilge flushed my tears as Steve whooped me 18 to 10 plus the biggest fish but I was very happy for him, NOT !!!
He will be receiving guide bill in mail.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 67
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Back out with a rattletrap in hand I stumbled onto a school of 3-5# fish in an area I call "SOB's", the fish were staging on a 6-2' drop occasionally coming to the surface schooling on shad preparing to move shallow to spawn.
Staging fish always offer the best opportunity to get numbers of fish and quality fish so I did for an hour before I realised I better save a few for you.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 68
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
We started the tournament in the Gulp Flats fishing beds with rippin' sticks twitched quickly across the surface and caught our limit quick but they were only 2 pounders. I had seen over 50 beds and many had females on them but the males had been beating them to the punch.
At about 10:30am we decided to leave the fish for an hour to let them settle down so we flipped 1oz. tungsten tubes in ivey pads and caught a 2 1/2 # fish and culled a fish. No more flippin' so back to the Gulp Flats.
I made some mental notes on which beds showed good fish earlier so I could throw to them before I was on them, we started dead-sticking "rippin'sticks and size increased, 3#, 3 1/2#, 4#, then a 5.1#, by 12:45pm we had culled 9 times and caught over 40 fish.
I assumed that because we had a good day so did everyone else but there were plenty of long faces back at the ramp, I'm guessing that 8 boats out of 15 or 16 weighed fish with the biggest fish a 7.11# caught by the nice guy in the Sling Shot/Suzuki rig.
Tricia and I won first overall with 14.6# and we got 2nd biggest fish with a 5.1#
Many other boats fished within sight of us but didn't catch much, we were the only ones using rippin' sticks from www.STICKMARSH.com
We also got in and around hundreds of lily pads with no break-offs thanks to Power Pro line available at Wal-Mart or www.POWERPRO.com
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 61
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Bobby Morin originally from Alabama caught 15 chunky bass in 4 hours on shiners and just when we thought it was all over we caught a few more on "Rippin' Sticks" from www.STICKMARSH.com including a 4 1/2 and 5 lber.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 55
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Oops I did it again, 8 1/4 lbs. on the boga grip.
Get your "Rippin' Sticks" at www.STICKMARSH.com
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Water Temperature: 72
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
7 hours of flippin' 1 oz. tungten-weighted craws accounted for 16 bass from 1- 5 1/2 lbs.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Temperature: 69
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Jeff Cox and I arrived at about 11am with 2 dozen shiners from Middletons, I felt after the front passed yesterday that things would be slow until afternoon if not all day. We started by anchoring at the end of a ditch on the south end of the reservoir and free-lining the shiners, freshly spooled shiner reels in one hand, hot coffee in the other. As expected the fishing was slow, it was chilly but sunny and comfortable with a sweater.
The shiners were excellent and at about noon the bass started to realize, the bites were lethargic as the fish would slowly move off with the bait, we had to wait up to 20 seconds, reel tight, cross her eyes and then they would come alive and scrap us to the boat. Nothing huge but nothing small and by 2pm all the shiners were gone and we had caught 15 fish out of 24 baits, that's not too bad in my opinion especially considering the quality, all the fish were fat and healthy from 2.5 - 5.5 lbs.
Next plan was to pitch Rippin' Sticks along the deep side of the same ditch we just shiner fished, why leave fish to find fish ? The plan worked for about an hour and we caught 4 more fish in the 2-3lb. range but just like someone hit the lightswitch the fish were gone. Rippin' Sticks from Jim Porter are available @ www.stickmarsh.com or the Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters.
At about 3pm I guessed the fish had moved under the mats of vegetation preparing for a temperature drop so we dug for the flippin' sticks, with an once of tungsten each and 5/0 superline hooks we hit the thick stuff, the stuff that as a kid we were taught not to cast into. Sorry but with 65# Power Pro line you can cast, flip, or pitch wherever we want. www.powerpro.com
By 4:15pm we had caught 5 more fish from 3lbs. to the 7lber. shown above. At 24 fish we were fairly satisfied with the day considering the size of the fish but we just couldn't get enough so we stopped at 1 last spot to flip but before we could even grab the flippin sticks we saw shad jumping, running, and just basically getting violated in multiple ways so we scrambled for the rattletraps.
For about a 1/2 hour we got bit on atleast every 4th or 5th cast adding another 13 fish bring the days total to 37 and believe it or not most fish were 2.5 - 3.5 lb. chunks. Usually every decision isn't necessarily a good one but today It seemed like we just couldn't go wrong and we appreciate !!
Randy sandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 12/2/04
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Jeff Cox and I hit Garcia a little late today (10:30am) hoping to catch some topwater fish, didn't happen, rattletraps ? spinnerbaits ?didn't happen, for about 2 hours we were fishless on fast reaction-strike type baits in places, and weather that should have been productive.
By 1:30pm I comitted us to fishing slow and chose a few ditches and intersections with good water flow and vegetation that I was confident in. Jeff and I both rigged our new Rippin' Sticks from Jim Porter.
Things changed dramatically as we fished in and around the ditches lifting the baits well off the bottom and getting bit consistently on the fall about 3 feet down in 5 feet of water, the ditches are 5-7 feet deep while levies are 2-3 feet deep, most bites were on the deep side of the levy.
Jeff fished "junebug" and "watermelon" while I fished "green pumpkin" and "chartreuse pepper",I caught more but Jeff caught bigger, lots of fish were caught in the last 2 hours but I couldn't count them, put it this way, "I got 110 Rippin Sticks, used them the first time today and I need more already"
Rippin Sticks are awesome, affordable and available @ www.stickmarsh.com
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 11/28/04
Water Temperature: 69
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Tricia and I hit the weekly tournament at Garcia today and the weather was beautiful ..... but not for catching fish on artificials.
We all started at first light (except the fish) and everyone ran to their first fishin' holes.
Tricia and I started in our favorite ditch chucking rattletraps right down the middle hoping for the reaction bite from suspended fish due to the colder weather, 1 small keeper, obviously not the best pattern.
Slow-rolling heavy spinnerbaits through hydrilla and eelgrass was next on the agenda, felt good , didn't work.
The one good thing at this point was that we realized nature in general was slow, there were no visible gators, turtles, baitfish, cormorrants, etc.
At this time we both agreed it was time to flip, we both flipped 1/2 oz. XPS tungtsten weights with Gambler BB crickets in "watermelon" and "watermelon candy" and we both caught several short fish around reeds and cabbage, fun but no help.
It was now 11:30am and weigh-in is at 1:00pm so we were feeling a little desperate, we were catching fish but too short so we doubled our weight and went to the some thick mats.
The thick mats that I prefer consist mainly of water cabbage and ivey pads (both floating veggies) but because the best mats are stuck along ditches they also consist of peppergrass and lily pads(rooted veggies) the more the better especially if it's near a ditch or any deeper water even if it's only a foot deeper.
3rd flip 2 pounder, 2 in the well, a few minutes later I hook a good fish, hang her up and shes gone, I saw her and I think she was over 3 but you know how that goes. Maybe 5 flips later I hit a good fish, put it in the well so quick I really didn't know the size, 4-5 I guessed.
3 in the well, Tricia hammers a decent keeper in my "used" water, 4 in the well at 12:38pm, 22 minutes to weigh-in and I run out of BB crickets in my color preference so I grab a craw I poured myself in some kind of "garbage green" type of color, First pitch I get drilled, set the hook and a fish over 4 pounds surfaces, comes almost to the boat and hangs me in the "V" of a lily pad, I troll over, follow my line down with my hand but I could already tell, GONE !!!
Time for weigh-in and I felt kicked, stomped, and spit-upon if that makes any sense. We missed winning by less than 2 pounds, Jim & Annie won, Buddy Perry got second but we did capture big fish, I caught it but Tricia is pictured because I'm just plain ugly and I didn't want to ruin your dinner.
Sunday Garcia tournaments are open to anyone, artficials only, 5 fish over 14" per boat ,safe light to 1pm, $25 per boat, just be there.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 11/25/04
Water Temperature: 72
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Tricia and I didn't fish long but the action was good for about 2 hours and we boated 33 fish on red rattletraps at a ditch intersection.
Most fish were caught while burning the bait but when that failed a few casts in a row sweeping the bait and allowing it to fall would sometimes provoke the bite. If there was a bad point it would be that all the fish were under 3lbs. but pretty scrappy.
Find fish at Garcia by fishing the ditches quickly with reaction baits, traps, spinner baits , etc. Parallel the levies and cross them bringing the bait with the wind, I concentrate on only 2 angles and I stay with the angle that works first but never exclude the other possibility.
Rarely is the best angle throwing directly downwind, you CAN drift IF YOU HAVE TO but you should cast sideways to the wind as you drift so you are more likely to approach the bass's face for a reaction bite as opposed to passing him rear-first and forcing the fish to chase which is less likely.
Once fish are found I begin circles to see how far the school expands into the surrounding flats or if it does at all. If I'm cruising down the ditch for a half hour without a bite and then catch 2 fish or more in 100 feet or less I circle the area with the same bait for 10-15 minutes, if nothing else happens I may throw a weightless bait like a senko, fluke, trick worm, or your favorite in watermelon, green pumpkin, or even one you've never heard of "JUNEBUG". Don't fish slow for longer than 10 minutes if you don't get bit, move on.
As the front moved through the clouds dissipated and so did the bite, we weren't as done as the bass seemed to be so we headed to heavier cover in a lily pad flat called "Gulp Flats" or "Pig Trails" in the SE corner of the reservoir where we caught 6 more bass and several large pickerel, again no big bass but no complaints.
I don't reccomend fishing flats with only lily pads on them in Garcia but if you can find the ones with hydrilla, spatterdock, eelgrass, or all of the above mixed into the lily pads and near a ditch you could be in business. ESPECIALLY FROM DECEMBER TO MARCH.
Many baits could work in these flats but my favorites are Zoom speed worms, Redneck Baits flutter frogs, Martian Baits model "S", and the good ole' fluke, or a snatchin' shad also by Redneck Baits.
Hopefully this can help someone out but sometimes it seems like nothing works and I would be a liar if I said I didn't have slow days, keep on casting !!!
HAPPY THANKSGIVING !!!Randy & Tricia Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 11/13/04
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 1 foot
My mom finally got some time to join me for a boat ride on beautiful Garcia Reservoir, she didn't care much about fishing but I was going to make sure reeled at least a couple in.
After we spent some time sight-seeing we tossed rattletraps and Martian Baits but we only caught 3 small fish on artificials, I say "we" but I actually didn't catch any. I just happened to have 3 dozen shiners fresh from Middletons (no accident) so I anchored at an intersection and tossed a couple out, 4 fish came quick and mom reeled them all in, nothing big but she was more into it than I thought she would be. Soon the wind stopped and so did the bite.
A little more gator hunting with a camera as I trolled (no wind) more shiners near the south wall, action was slow until we crossed a hidden ditch and hooked a 4.8# and a 3.4#, again mom reeled them in like a pro, I anchored and for the next hour or so the action was basically non-stop, mom hooked most of the fish and caught 18 very quickly including a couple 4#ers and many 2-3#ers. I prefer artificials but shiners saved the day for me, I had to see mom catch fish and she did.
take a family member fishing, it's awesome !(stick martian @ garcia)
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 4/21/04
Water Temperature: 77
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Water temps are perfect now to catch fish on any bait in the boat !!!
Randy Sanderswww.BASSTRIPS.com
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 11/5/03
Water Temperature: 77
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Robie Jones, owner of RJ Surfboards in Floridana Beach, Fl was the first person to bring me to the marsh in "1991", on that day we collectively caught 20 fish on gold traps, me - 11 fish 1 at 9lbs. Robie- 9 fish 1 almost 7lbs.
It was much different as trees were standing overhead and thick lettuce all over the marsh, there was no Farm 13 access but I heard you could drag a small boat in, we never did. It took a half hour to get to the west end of the marsh in Robies 15' aluminum rig through the junk.
Alot has changed at the marsh and in our lives since then and now it is me taking Robie fishing. The marsh now fishes like a lake rather than a marsh and it is much more important now to establish patterns, chuckin' everything at the junk doesn't always work anymore and quite frankly Robie hates that. I have to get tricky to get him to fish what he can't see, intersections, shellbeds, anything submerged.
Tuesday we fished and Robie directed me deep into the SW corner of Farm 13 so he could make sure we scratched up the new boat, a couple fish ate 1/2oz. spinnerbaits while a couple more bit red texas rigged worms but it was slow, a couple more drifts and it was still slow.
An approaching storm coming from the same direction as a quickly moving Bass Cat owned by Steve P. alerted me to also get going. Steve informed us at the first cut that he felt the "electrical storm hum" in his poles and knew it was time to go. That's a good call.
Being as bright as we are we decided to make a couple quick casts in the c-54 flats, the back lot, whatever, on my first cast I hooked up and when a 6 lber. jumped and simultaneously broke my supposedly unbreakable spinnerbait in half while the knot slid right off the end. "Son of a BI"G BOLT of lightning came down and we ran to the ramp like little woosies. Drank coffee at the ramp and waited, talked to Steve and then we went back out to the flats where we occasionally caught a fish on spinnerbaits and 1 on a shallow crank but nothing big, 13 fish was our total but it was pretty slow for us and everyone we talked to FOR NOW BUT THINGS CHANGE QUICKLY HERE AND ITS ALWAYS POSSIBLE TO CATCH THE FISH OF A LIFETIME ON ANY CAST !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 10/29/03
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Dr David Lindow D.D.S of St. Pete, Fl
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 10/18/03
Water Temperature: 78
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Our first cold front followed by high pressure and relentless winds made catching bass challenging but by using the "throw it all at em" technique 55-60 bass were brought to the boat.
Everyone in the gang, Alex, Jay, Jason, and John(above) from Atlanta caught fish on spinnerbaits, crankbaits, soft-jerkbaits, and live shiners.
Thanks to Brian @ LineSider Charters for the 2nd boat who was also responsible for Jasons 5#er not shown, Jason promises he lost a bigger one.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 10/2/03
Water Temperature: 78
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
4 tournaments a month have kept me busy but Thursday Jeff Cox and I were back on the marsh in the new boat, it took a few hours of searching before we found a school of fish willing to crush 3/8 oz. Nichols Pulsator spinnerbaits in the north end of the marsh.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.basstrips.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 8/28/03
Water Temperature: 84
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Fishing in between storms Thursday I was able to boat 22 fish in 4 hours on a carolina-rigged Martin Bait including the 5.13# above. 2 fish ate weightless Martians in 5 feet of water while the rest were in 11 feet.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 8/3/03
Water Temperature: 85
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Bart, Trish, and I hit the marsh Sunday and caught 21 bass up to 4.9 lbs.
One fish ate a crankbait in the Stick Marsh while all other fish ate model "rf" Martian Baits, ( a soft-jerkbait with built in eyes that rattle www.BASSTRIPS.com)
Several colors worked but watermartian/chartreuse tail worked best. We worked the bait inches under the surface during cloudy phases and fished slower when the sun popped out.
Go feed em' plastic !!!"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 7/23/03
Water Temperature: 85
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Chase Ryland(5) and dad Steve joined me for a half day on the marsh Wednesday, fishing was a bit slow but we still managed 7 fish to the boat.
About half ate Chases shiners while dad caught the other half with a BPS Tr-Vibe and a red worm, Steve had a fish jump off that he said was in the 15# class, I honestly didn't see it as I was working with Chase but I heard the splash and thought it must have been an osprey until I heard Steves cries of disbelief, they'll be back in about 2 weeks for another shot at a marsh monster.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 7/20/03
Water Temperature: 88
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Sunday I fished with my wife Tricia and best friend Bart for about 4 hours in the Stick Marsh and caught a combined 23 fish.
We never moved from a 50 yard area and never threw anything besides rattletraps, color didn't matter as long as the bait was "swept" or "yo-yo'd". What or what did he say ?
SWEEPING BAITSI like to cast and then point the rod at the bait while reeling the slack, now sweep the rod until it almost touches the opposite shoulder, now reel the slack as you point the rod at the lure and repeat, most strikes will occur immediately after the sweep.
WHY ?I believe many fish nose a bait not striking because something seems unnatural about the bait but the angler induced pause causes the bass to literally run into the bait provoking the reaction to strike, "force-feeding" if you will.
Don't get frustrated with hang-ups, the more snags you get the closer you are to catching a fish, you need to hit the wood occasionally.
Don't cast behind the boat so you don't have to back track to retrieve baits, tell you partner or clients too, look at the bow as 12 and fish the 9-3 zone.
If you hit an area where you hit more cover than on most casts, repeat casts to the area while changing angles and consider weighted or unweighted texas-rigged plastics in that brushpile.
I and many others prefer Power Pro braided line but other good guides and fisherman use mono and do just fine, I recommend at least 17# line regardless of brand if you are fishing near grass or wood.
It's great to see some new reporters getting involved and always helpful to hear from the regulars.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 7/17/03
Water Temperature: 84
Water Clarity: 1 foot
I fished solo today for 6 hours and caught 17 fish, 16 were caught pitching 3/16 oz. florida-rigged Gambler bacon rinds in black/chartreuse.
One fish, a 6.7# ate a 1/2 oz.rattletrap in the west end of the marsh, the rest were caught on the pre-mentioned bait in Stick Marsh rim canals.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 6/12/03
Water Temperature: 83
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Tyrone Spry from Maryland and his good buddy Benny hit the water with me from 1-5:30pm.
The wind was brutal but these guys were not going let that deter their plans, I aborted my topwater plan and was forced to check more of my holes than I like during one trip but you gotta do what ya gotta do, we needed cleaner water.
On the 6th hole we found the clean water we needed and quickly established a pattern, deadsticking carolina-rigs on shellbeds surrounding a sunken culvert in 11 feet of water rather quickly produced six fish before a nasty lightning storm cleared the lake of life except for Hugh.
Ty and Benny brought me a very cool Orioles hat, thanks guys and see ya in July !!! Don't show Freddy all my spots, just kidding, you guys are the reason for the term "GOOD PEOPLE"
Oh yeah, 1/2oz.Carolina -rigs with Model "S" Martian Baits in black/chartreuse and 8" Gambler ribbontails in junebug both worked just fine.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 6/10/03
Water Temperature: 90
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
23 fish to the boat today in about 5 hours of fishing for Tricia and I today as we scoured the the shellbeds of Farm 13 with carolina-rigged Martian Baits, a blue emerald/chartreuse tail (shown above) was most productive and several fish also fell for poppers and rattletraps.
The new Martian Bait models "S" (sand-0) and "RF" (rattlin' fatso) are done and can be seen on our site.
www.BASSTRIPS.com"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished: 5/15/03
Water Temperature: 83
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Yesterday Dan & Tracy Kenney of Massachussetts fished Farm 13 with me for 5 1/2 hours and caught 22 bass with the majority on topwater baits. Excalibur Super Pop-R's, Gags Grabber poppers, and chug bugs all got blasted and many fish were missed. Most fish bit 1-3 seconds after the angler-initiated "pop" and we rarely got bit if we fished too quick.
Later I went to Garcia Reservoir with Jeff Cox for the wednesday night tournament and I was fortunate enough to claim Big Fish honors with a 7.6# pitching reeds in 3 feet of water.
Today Jim Papp of Illinois jumped in for a 3 1/2 hour "squeezed in" trip to Farm 13 where he experienced the most aggressive topwater action he has ever seen. At first things were slow and only 2 fish were scraped up in 1 1/2 hours, then the surface slightly rippled with breeze and the place came wildly alive for about an hour as 13 fish were landed and many more missed or were missed, Jim's 5#er. above is not the biggest we had shots at but that's another fish story.
During this "window of opportunity" speed nor color mattered, the rest of the trip the baits most productive were white-bellied and fished relatively slow very near topped-out grass.
twitch let it sit twitch let it sit GET THE NET !!!"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:05/10/03
Water Temperature: 84
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
The weather was great and fishing on the marsh today with my wife Tricia was a blast, literally a big blast on our topwaters and others I talked to at the ramp.
8amAs we approached a ditch intersection in Farm 13 we noticed fast and furious shad busting so Excalibur Super pops and chug bugs went flying, for about a half hour we experienced some incredible aerial assaults as more bass missed our baits than connected, most were strong 2.5 - 4 lb. fish.
8:45Topwater action slows and carolina-rigs emerge, occasionally a fish is scraped up by casting to the middle of the ditch and dragging the baits up the levy. The C-rigs we were using are 1/2 oz. Gambler rattlin' weights with 30" of leader and "blood red" model "S" Martian Baits. The ditch is roughly 10 feet deep in the middle with soft bottom yet as the baits are dragged up the levy to the 6 foot zone the bottom hardens with clay, gravel, shells, clams, mussels, snails, occasional logs and sparse hydrilla. This is where our bites came. This type of cover is typical on all the old irrigation canals with the east levies and intersections USUALLY being the most productive for several reasons but that's a different story but put bluntly, "roadbed".
10:30Warming up quickly, further south along the ditch, more grass, lots more, topped out on each side of the ditch. We both opt for the change to a florida-rig which proved worthwhile and draws a decent fish every 20-30 minutes but no hawgs by any stretch. The Florida-rigs are Gambler 3/16 oz. rattlin' florida-rig weights threaded to 10" junebug ribbontails and pitched to holes in the hydrilla.
12:30The fish are still active but it's hot, no wind, time for a ride into the west side of the Stick Marsh to hopefully find some crankbait fish, we began with baits that dive 5-6 feet when they aren't bouncing through pepper ,fruit, and palm stumps which we caught lots of but no fish at that depth. Our next bait change was to crankbaits that operate in the 3-4 foot range, that was much more rewarding as the fish were suspended in the brush tops and though they were not smashing the baits they would occasionally STOP the baits dead, usually after wood contact. The crankbaits used were Spro Prime crankbait 25's in chartreuse, the western side of the marsh is about 6 feet deep, the fish seem to be relatively scattered and many casts were needed as well as patience with snags.
3pmAIR CONDITIONING
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:05/06/03
Water Temperature: 78
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
I have had several trips this week where my customers do not throw what I recommend, the results are that I end up with 5 times the number of fish as my guests and I get over baby sitting. it's their time.
Jeff Cox of Ohio (above) and Bobby Morin of Georgia jumped in, fished the right baits and caught fish throughout their 6 hour trip. Tie a bunch of knots if you like but you really don't need more than a chug bug, carolina-rig, and a soft-jerkbait.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:05/02/03
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Palm Bay, Fl local Larry Masser and son Sean (11) fished 4 hours for 16 fish including a 5 and a 6lb. bass for Sean
.Farm 13 SW corner drifting a ditch 5-8 feet deep. Bomber Long A caught 3 fish 3/8 0z. gold/chartreuse double colorado spinnerbait slow rolled for 1 fish. 12 fish ate shiners drifted behind the boat mostly while we weren't looking. Minimal fishermen on the lake, huge amounts of boatless water, come on out, troll backwards in circles if you like, whatever it takes to safely have fun, theres plenty of fish for all. (notify partner first if planning to try the trolling backwards circles pattern)
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:04/22/03
Water Temperature: 75
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Joe Benanti jumped in the boat with me for 6 hours and scored 20 fish, all fish were caught in the farm on a ditch.
7 fish ate Excalibur poppers and many fish missed the bait, the other 13 were caught on carolina-rigged watermelon Martian Bait model "F" and black/blue 8" Gambler ribbontails.
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:4/20/03
Water Temperature: 75
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
8am Sunday-
My best friend Bart, my wife Tricia and I began at an area that has been good to my guests recently in the mid-westish side of the Stick Marsh.
We started throwing Berkley Frenzy and Bomber crankbaits that run about 5 feet deep. The water here is about 6-6 1/2 feet full off pepper tree and wild fruit tree brush plus the occasional palm stump, about 65 % of the wood cover is about 3-4 feet down and grass is sparse for now. Our efforts were occasionally rewarded with a 2-4 lb. fish but I wasn't exactly busting backflips on the deck or anything. We all agreed contact with the wood was essential but after 4 hours we only had 9 fish and several jump-offs and log-hangers.
I love pulling crankbaits through the stumps and brush and it was the original plan for the day but the ditches of Farm 13 were starting to sound pretty good and "I think I know where their might be some fish in the farm" I said as Tricia lashed out at me "you THINK you MIGHT know where SOME fish are ?" are you a guide or what ? then Bart says" yeah, what's the deal with that ? See I had thought I was a husband and a friend today, my bad.
NOON-Somewhere in Farm 13 on a ditch towards the SW corner dragging carolina-rigged Martian Baits in several colors we found those fish and left a bouy trail that formed a lop-sided triangle that we retraced for four hours with c-rigs and Berkley Frenzy pops putting together a collective 35 fish including Barts 5 lber. shown above.
What baits where ?In the sticks I believe any crankbait that runs 4-5 feet in firetiger or chartreuse will get bit, wood contact is highly recommended and I suspect a slow-rolled gold colorado bladed spinnerbait bite is also prevalent.
On the farm there is a plethera of baits that will work depending on your location in the farm, we fished relatively off-shore on a old irrigation ditch that drops to 10 feet in the middle, 4.5 feet on the bordering levy's and the adjacent flats are 7 feet.
1/2 oz.carolina-rigged Martian Bait "fatso's" hopped with 3-4 feet of 30# flourocarbon leader in watermelon worked best with 12/50 Power Pro braid as the main line.
They will not bite what you don't throw."stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:4/17/03
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Today I fished with Father and Daughter, Rhonda of Tampa, Fl and Richard of Ohio.
7am.Richard and I started in the Stick Marsh throwing SOB Rattlin Shads in 6' of water through brush as Rhonda drifted shiners, both offerings were bit but we didn't do much on numbers (20-24) but size was good with Richard catching a 10.8 (we tried to make her look 15 for the picture) and several 4-5 lb. fish weighed on digital scales and bogagrip, Rhonda also caught several in the 4-5 lb. range.
1:30pmWe went to the farm and caught a good bite until 3pm, on the last drift of the day 2 bobbers went down, both Richard and Rhonda set the hook and pulled in the same 3 lb. fish !!! was she hungry or what ? Get out there and feed those bass !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/29/03
Water Temperature: 77
Water Clarity: 1 foot
I chose 1 spot in the middle of the Stick Marsh where I know there are fish and 1 spot near an irrigation ditch in Farm 13, I would fish each spot in 1 1/2 hour increments for 9 hours. My reason was to cool off on the 6 minute runs back and forth as the wind was non existant.
Running around the lake is not the way to catch fish but going from spot to spot cools you off and gives the back an occasional rest but if you don't have a plan including catching fish at the end of your run your just pleasure cruising.
My Stick Marsh spot is about 200 sq. feet and near center of the marsh, about 7.5' deep, sparse grass, and lots of stumps. The area has little bait but still holds scattered fish. Throughout the day this area produced about 15 bass mostly on a "chartreuse" SPRO Prime crankbait 25 reeled medium speed about 3 feet down, the fish were suspended atop stumps and fishing deeper resulted in less bites and more hang-ups.
My Farm 13 spot is about a 100 sq. foot area along an irrigation ditch where the fish have been exploding on massive amounts of threadfin shad and anything thrown near the surface activity gets eaten, a 3/8 oz. SPRO hair jig did the work there for 38 fish.
53 fish was the total for the day with no big fish but lots of fun, the farm was definately more productive than the sticks for me.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/28/03
Water Temperature: 74
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Jeff Marsh and sons Jordan and Dan of St. Louis, Mo. fished a half day with me friday and pulled an even 20 fish out of the middle of the Stick Marsh before having to high-tail it to the airport. Jeff tried to change his flight plans to stay and fish saturday but unfortunately the airlines would have none of that. The Marsh gang did however make the most of their time on the water, they caught many 2-3 lb. scrappers plus a 5, a couple 4's, and Jordans 8# er. above. He caught the big Fish On :
- Bomber crankbait that runs about 3 feet in "firetiger" reeled steady medium in 7.5 feet of water over pepper, wild fruit, and palm stumps mostly at least 3' down. BY FAR THE BEST BAIT OF THE DAY FOR US (15 fish)- 3/16 oz. texas-rigged 8" GAMBLER ribbontail in black/blue fished slow(1 2# fish)
- shiners tossed out the stern bobbered at 3' (4 fish, 1 5#)
After I dropped off the gang I reapplied sunscreen and headed to the ditches of Farm 13 to check for shad chasing activity, I caught 32 fish quick on my second stop.
- all on a Spro prime 25 crankbait in "chartreuse" but these 1-2 lb. fish would have eaten anything.I ran to another ditch to see if I could find the same scenario for future reference, 1 more dink and I headed back to the Stick Marsh side with hopes of a big fish, 1 3#er on the same Spro crankbait and off the water at 3:45pm. SUNSCREEN WATER SUNSCREEN WATER (trail mix)WATER SUNSCREEN WATER
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/15/03
Water Temperature: 78
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
59 fish for Ralph Hockenberry and Ron Gray, 90 % on c-rigs, I wrote a more detailed report Saturday but someone has been removing my reports, HMMMM !
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/11/03
Water Temperature: 75
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Ray and Jack from SE Pennsylvania caught 16 bass today on artificials though nothing was over 5#'s except our effort.
1 bass ate a trap1 bass ate a jerkbait
14 were caught on carolina-rigged and texas-rigged Martian Baits in black, blue fleck w/chartreuse tails but many plastics will work and color is almost my least concern.
2 days in a row with 16 fish, wassup widdat ?
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/10/03
Water Temperature: 78
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Jeff Duval was already booked to fish so he gave me the honors, Tommy, DJ, and Randy from North Carolina caught 16 bass on shiners today including a 7 and a 9.5#.
Drifting was the key as the fish would rarely hit an anchored bait. In other words, giving the bass a limited opportunity to eat was more productive than leaving the bait in its face. Freelined shiners got bit more than bobbered baits, clear water is the reasoning here.
Power Pro line pulls them out but double-uni knotting 3-4' of flourocarbon to your Power Pro will get more bites.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/9/03
Water Temperature: 77
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Met up with Steve P. this morning about 8am and headed off to the south end of Farm 13, we first tried fishing on the old irrigation ditches, Steve hit a nice fish on his first throw of the chug bug, I got several including a 7.25 lber on a carolina-rigged Martian Bait, black w/chartreuse tail.
With 5 fish and confirmation of a school of good quality fish in the area, we hit the topped-out hydrilla in the SW end of the farm, nothing, then way back into the reed islands where we hit 3 more, all ate black/chartreuse Martian Baits.
One more stop at on of Steve's spots on the south end got him 1 more on the chug bug and a nice chunk for me on a 3/8 oz. Hawg Caller double gold colorodo with char/white skirt.
At 2pm we ran for the ramp with 10 fish boated, no broken records today but plenty of fun with someone who likes to fish as much as me.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/8/03
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Tyler Walters and Dad John of Ft. Lauderdale, Fl joined me for a hawg hunt on the farm today, we caught Fish On shiners and carolina-rigged Martian Baits in "pumpkin fire" with chartreuse tails, the WEIGHED 8.5# er above ate the c-rigged M.B previously described.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/8/03
Water Temperature: 76
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Did I fail to mention John Walters caught a bass that weighed a hair OVER 10#'s today ? oops !
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:3/3/03
Water Temperature: 72
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Kyle Neely with 1 of 27 bass landed today in Farm 13.
Kyle, his nephew Dillon (12)and I caught Fish On:
soft-jerkbaits-
Martian Bait sand-o's in "pumpkin fire" color twitched about a foot down in 4.5' of water in the SW corner.
Gambler flappin' shads in "arkansas shiner"
Manns baby 1 crankbait in chartreuse ripped over grass also in 4.5' of water.
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:2/21/03
Water Temperature: 70
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Today I took out my little brother-in-law, Mike McGee (14) Mike is just starting to find his love for jumping green fish so I am providing him a crash course in bass fishing.
Wednesday I took him to Garcia in the Gheenoe to show him spawning beds, Mike got to see bass eat his offerings and other bass cruising the shallows which seemed to excite him quite a bit, that's good, me too. We caught 11 on "baby bass" Martian Baits.
Today it was the SW corner of Farm 13 for rattletrap and spinnerbait class, I also picked up 2 dozen shiners. I POSSIBLY LOST THE BIGGEST BASS I HAVE EVER HOOKED IN 12 YEARS OF STICK MARSH FISHING TODAY, she broke my 50lb. braid and it don't break !!! She ate a tiny shiner.
Mike scored bass on all 3 chosen methods, we caught 13 bass in 5.5 hours, not 50 fish in 2 hours but fun enough. Mikes and I caught Fish On.
-3/8 oz. Hawg Caller spinnerbaits with double gold colorodo blades slow-rolled 4 feet down ticking grass. BY FAR THE MOST PRODUCTIVE BAIT OF THE DAY FOR US.-1/2 oz. Rattletraps in "limon" color pulled med-fast through grass and stumps in 6.5 feet of water.
-shiners drifted behind the boat while we fished artificials, don't forget to set the reel clicker.
EXPECT OFF/ON PHENOMENAL FISHING FOR THE NEXT MONTH WITH PLENTY OF HAWGS SHOWING UP FOR PHOTOS !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:2/20/03
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
I chopped off Jeff Cox head but I got the fish, Jeff and I caught 16 Fish On :
-Martian Bait Sand-O's texas-rigged with an eensy-weensy, itty-bitty shitt splot or split shot twitched down deep.-3/8 oz. Hawg Caller spinnerbaits with gold blades and char/white skirt slow-rolled 4 feet down.
-1/2 oz. Rattletraps in "limon" color ripped through hydrilla in about 6.5 feet of water.
-smelly wild shiners (bass filet mignon)
"stick martian"
Randy sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:2/20/03
Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Martian Baits Pro-staffer Capt. Brian Shafranek custom ordered his own color Martian Baits, "Captain Morgan" is the color named after Brian & Sarondas beautiful new baby girl, Taylor Morgan Shafranek. Must be contagious, TRICIA IS PREGNANT !!! The 6.5 #er. above liked his color choice and so did many other fish for Brian and his clients today. One of his clients landed a 10.5 but I was too far away to get the picture, Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters & Guide Service (321) 952-4435.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:2/16/03
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
The Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters booked the trip, Doug Fox caught the fish, a Farm 13 hawg that weighed just under 9#'s. My guests tossed a little bit of everything at em today, some fish were caught on shiners but the majority of fish including our photo fish were caught on hand poured Martian Baits, "San-Do" is the model bait, june smoke is the color and all are now LOADED with salt and stinky sauce.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:2/2/03
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Jeff Cox originally from Ohio hammered a Farm 13 hawg that inhaled a slow twitched soft-jerkbait.
"stick martian"Randy
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:1/21/03
Water Temperature: 58
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Terry Bell and Larry May (above) called Jim Porter to go fish the Stick Marsh, he was already scheduled to fish so he gave me the honors, thanks Jim.
We fished the whole day in the SW Farm area and totaled 15 bass up to 5 lbs. About half hit shiners while the other half ate "Martian Baits" that I make myself, my baits consistently out produce senkos and stickos at 25% the cost, my baits are tougher and catch more fish per bait guaranteed !!!
When the fish stopped biting completely we rigged the same baits wacky-style and scraped out a few more bass. George Welcome taught me the wacky-rigging technique, thanks George !
With the shiners we got best results lip hooking them, they swim less aggressively and hooking the bass that are just killing bait becomes more possible.
"Martian Bait" left on the bottom was best for our t-rig bite, wacky-rigs were twitched 3 feet down over hydrilla.
Check your shiners frequently to make sure they are alive and not buried up in the grass, a split shot 6" above the shiner helps keep the birds from seeing the flash of the shiner.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:1/20/03
Water Temperature: 55
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Joe McCann of Marylang shown above with a Farm 13 chunk of not much weight. Joe fished with me from 7:30-11-30am with little success though he did catch a couple on a 7" Gambler "blue emerald" texas-rigged worm and that one ate a Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters shiner.
Brian Dovel of Palm Bay, Fl with friends Susie and Trevor fished with me the rest of the day and also only caught a few fish. The weather was great and everyone laughed a bit but the fishing for us was honestly very slow, not Stick Marsh/Farm 13 like, luckily both are repeat customers and have seen this place on a different level of action.
This place (stick marsh) has alot more positive energy between anglers than one might think.Thanks Steve P. for some excellent Long "A" advice in your reports.
Nice work to Jeff Duvall who obviously put some hawgs in the boat for his guest this weekend.
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:1/19/03
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
That's Parker Brendall from Georgia with a Farm 13 chunk that ate another perfect shiner from Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters.
SW corner of the farm also produced some fat fish on a thunderstick JR and my own hand-poured martian baits.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:1/9/03
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
17 fish in the SW corner of the farm today, all on "deadstuck" soft-jerkbaits. A 5.5" homemade green pumpkin with red/purple flakes worked best with a Gambler 3mm. rattle in the butt for a horizontal fall. Never did get the biggun', maybe tomorrow.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:1/5/03
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
That's the Bartman with 1 of 36 fish caught Sunday.
Every fish ate a soft-jerkbait as it sat on the bottom, color did not matter as long as it sat on the bottom.
For the best in Stick Marsh info, attitude, and equipment, you need to fish with the stick martian himself, not cocky, just very confident and fully sponsored by the best names in bass fishing for good reason, results.
Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:1/2/03
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
January 1 & 2, 2003
Gary Johnson and Ryan McElroy from Lake of the Ozarks jumped in the boat wednesday for 5.5 hours and score 27 fish up to 4 lbs. on soft-jerkbaits and shiners, then on Thursday we fished 8 hours for 22 fish up to 7 lbs. Gary is shown above with his Farm 13 bass that inhaled a jumbo soft-jerkbait.
try it, you'll like it, if you don't keep your $ !!!"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:12/27/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
That's Sam and his 5# Farm 13 bass.
Shiners were the ticket for repeat guests Sam, Bonnie (mom) and Papa Lee in the SW corner of the farm.
15 bass mostly 2-3 lbs with one 4# and one 5# in 4.50 -4.75 hours."stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:11/9/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Saturday, November 9th, 02
Thanks to Jeff Duvals Guide Service the boys from V.I Pruitt & Sons Hosiery in Ft. Payne, Alabama were on the water again. Live shiners were the order of the day with a big fish tournament on the line. My guests were John and Matt and the day would prove to be tough as the fish played hard to get until mid day. However about noon our baits began getting knocked out of the water and 11 fish were landed from 12- 1:30 pm. Other boats had luck early and then things slowed down, our fish were obviously on the second shift.
Anyone may enter the waters of the marsh and catch fish but your chances greatly increase when you jump in the boat with a regular marsh guide, either way have fun !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:11/08/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Friday, November 8th 02
Rusty Kemper and Steve Simon came out with me Friday for a half day of artificials and shiner fishing. Rusty is a diehard texas-rig man while Steve hadn't fished artificials before. Our first stop was at the north end of the east ditch in Farm 13, we tossed a shiner out the back and threw t-rigs and rattletraps out the front. The shiner went untouched but Rusty quickly nailed a 5 lber. on an 8" Gambler ribbontail in X-mas color behind a 3/16 oz. bullet, then a 3, then another. Steve had been tossing a trap and was ready for a change, Rusty was eager to help Steve decypher the texas-rig code so I let him do the explaining. Nice work Rusty !!! Steve caught 3 on a texas-rig, it's not as easy as it sounds for newcomers to plastic fishing especially since the bite was very subtle and windy conditions made detecting strikes a real challenge.
About 10:00 am we hit an intersection on the E/W farm ditch and caught some little guys on t-rigs and c-rigs but our shiners never got assaulted. We were at the ramp at noon with 13 fish landed and several more escapees.
Rusty and Steve did not know each other before this but both wanted to fish the same day and same hours, I paired them up so everyone was happy at half price each, I can also do that for you. The bass fishing match maker.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:11/5/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Tuesday November 5th 02
I met up with 3 generations of the Bartley family tuesday, Jasmine, Emma, and Bill Bartley were at the ramp about 7am as we planned on about 4 hours of shiner fishing. The weather was perfect but the first light bite was not to be . After 3 stops we settled into an area in the SW corner of Farm 13 that has consistently been putting quality fish in the boat recently. Bill landed a 5 and lost one near 7 at the boat so my guest chose to extend their trip a few hours. At about 1:30pm we headed back to the ramp with lots of pictures and some new fish stories.
The best shiner bite was from 11am -1 pm with bass blasting the baits on the surface. Shiners were placed 24" under floats and my guests waited from 3-8 seconds to hit the fish depending on the strike.
Reel til' you feel, then cross her eyes !!!"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:11/02/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Saturday November 2nd 02
A live bait trip to the Stick Marsh with Jerry and Eddie from V.I. Pruitt & Sons Hosiery in Ft. Payne, Alabama produced many strikes yet only 12 fish to the boat. The fish bit very well in the NE end of Farm 13 from 8 - 9:30 am, neither had fished live bait before mixed with a little bad luck resulted in 0 fish from the first 8-10 strikes, Eddie lost a fish in the 7-8 lb. class right at the boat while Jerry boated several over 4 lbs. and the 5.5 shown above. The bite nearly died about 9:30am but we still caught or missed a quality fish every 30-40 minutes .
About 11:30amWe hit the SW corner of the farm for 3 more fish and once again the big one got away. Back to the ramp about 2 pm to find out we actually caught more fish than all but 1 other boat in a 16 man/ 8 boat trip corporate trip not to mention the 5 foot gator that snuck up on Eddies shiner, I didn't want to leave her with a float and a bunch of line hanging fom her face so I had Eddie reel her up and I cut the line about a foot from her snout, scary stuff but great for a picture, possibly a last one, NOT RECOMMENDED.
This was my first live bait trip in months, I prefer my guests fish artificials if skilled yet when the shiner bite is on it is very fun. Some people have heard the only way to catch a double digit fish is with shiners, this couldn't be more false. All my double digit fish, almost 20, including Tricias' 14 have come on artificials. Though some of my guests have caught bass over 10 lbs. on shiners, my largest client-caught fish was a 13.4 on a floating rattletrap by Doug Levota on 2-15-02. However, don't fish artificials if you don't fish artificials and you only have a day or two to fish here.
Power Pro line floats and gives your shiner less drag for a more natural presentation not to mention no stretch for the best in hook-sets. Some people believe the lack of translucence in braided line spooks the fish, bass are not smart, even in the fish world bass are not smart. If you are still worried about it, use a double-uni knot to about 5 feet of co-polymer, mono, or flourocarbon line.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:10/25/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Friday, October 25, 02
To put things straight to the point, the fishing at Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 reservoir is simply incredible right now, cast a lure, catch a fish, do it again. Rattletraps, spinnerbaits, crankbaits, texas-rigs, c-rigs, whatever you want to fish. 32 fish Friday, 29 Saturday.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:10/19/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Saturday October 19th, 02
Charlie Stewart of Philadelphia, PA, son Mark of Merrit Island, Fl, and nephew Tom of Grant, Fl jumped on board today for a full day of lure tossin' bass jumpin' action at this place they have heard so much about.
8:15amFirst stop was at "Carolina Corners", an intersection on the middle E/W farm ditch for some rattletrap fishing, things were pretty slow at first but we did manage to catch a few small fish.
10amDeep into the SW corner to fish a school of fish that I know has big fish in it, when we caught 3 good fish in five minutes I committed us to fish this 50 yard circle for about the next 5 hours simply because the fish were there and I know what my boat rides like. It paid off with 29 bass, two over 7 lbs. and two stinky pickerel.
Charlie and the gang are going back for more with me tommorrow (Sunday)All fish hit 1/2 oz. rattletraps of any color, firetiger, clown, silver/purple back, didn't matter, just keep casting !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:10/16/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Wednesday October 16th, 02
Charles McCaskill of North Carolina and son Chuck now in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl were so eager to fish the Stick Marsh and Farm 13 that they beat everyone except the mosquitos to the boat ramp.
7:15amAs usual lately I planned to hit the SW corner of Farm 13 first to give these guys a shot at a hawg or at least some quality fish. We fished with rattletraps through "Slingshot Slough", (a ditch along the west side of the reservoir), for about 300 yards where I know there are fish but we only hooked 3 fish in the first hour. We then U-turned and fished it again in the opposite direction, I tossed Chuck a 3/8 oz. Gambler Ninja Spin in "firetiger" with gold blades. The action picked up and by about 9am 10 fish had hit the boat with Chuck scoring a 4 lber on the spinnerbait.
9:15amA ditch intersection on the middle E/W farm ditch I call "Carolina Corners", I guess I should have called it "Trap Corners" because Charles was on em', bites on almost every cast for a little while and they were all 10 lbs. and up, just kidding, most were small but fun to catch and watch as they busted shad into the air, I know the bigger fish were there as well but we couldn't entice the strike. Many fish jumped off on traps but we left for bigger fish about 11am with about 20-25 fish, we honestly weren't exactly sure what the count was, they were small anyways.
11:15amOnly 1 boat at the East pump and it's trickling, we checked it out and caught another fish or two before running to pitch florida-rigged tubes and stuff in the hydrilla pockets on the east side of the farm, one 3 lb. fish on a Gambler Bacon Bit in "junebug".
1pmBack to the SW corner of the farm for more traps and spinnerbaits looking for a few more quality bites, it worked, no double digit fish 3 more fish from 3- to the 6 lber. above biting Chucks thumb We headed for the ramp about 2pm with little idea what our honest numbers of fish were, more than 25 and less than 40 to be safe with about 20 % being good quality, strong fish.
Charles and Chuck fished the new Pinnacle Limited Edition reels spooled with Power Pro line and loved them, you will to.
The weather was perfect, the reservoir is in great shape. Check this place out if you haven't already, you won't regret it.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date fished:10/11/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Friday October 11th 02
Starting a little after 8am Friday with my step-dad Ron Gray, he has never fished with lures and was ready to give her a shot. Our first stop was at a ditch intersection in Farm 13 that I call "Carolina Corners", dad hit a fish on his first cast with a firetiger rattletrap and I had to explain that it wasn't always that easy. The fish were occasionally busting shad and casting anywhere nearby resulted in a strike.
With about 7 or 8 fish by 10:30 we shot back down "Slingshot Slough" to the "Tombstone Flats" and fished floating rattletraps for 5 more fish.
About 11:30am we went to another intersection known as "Soupys" where we caught a few more on traps before a sudden shut down at about 1pm.
We had to be back at the ramp by 2pm so we hit 1 more spot on the east side of the farm, I pitched a florida-rigged Gambler Bacon Bit in "junebug" while dad tossed a Gambler flappn' shad in "rainbow trout". We managed 4 more by 2pm and headed for the ramp with 22 or 23 fish landed.
The fishing was a bit slow but due to patience and persistence Ron caught fish with lures his first time out, people who regularly fish know that is kind of special. Ron is also special, he's the coolest dad a guy could ask for and I hope I get to see him more often, love ya pop !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:10/10/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Thursday October 10th, 02
Over the river (C-54) and through the woods (Stick Marsh) to grandmothers house (Farm 13) we went, she wasn't home but her grandkids were.
Trish and I started east of "Slingshot Slough" ripping rattletraps through the grass and stumps with little success, 3 fish by 9am is not what we were looking for so we hit the intersections with high hopes and found the entertainment we saught, is that a word ?
From 9:30-11am fish from 1/2 -3 lbs. were slamming shad out of the water and were also happy to eat traps, pop'rs, and carolina-rigs in between.
At 11:15 with 34 fish in the boat we decided to go pitch some tubes to hydrilla pockets on the east side of Farm 13, the action was a bit slow and by 1pm we only managed 2 more fish.
At 1:15pm we returned to the SW corner of the farm where we caught 3 more on rattletraps on "Felony Flats" bringing the total to 39, lots of fun but no 10 lbers.
Any 1/2 oz. rattletrap will work, I like orange bellied lures alot !!!Carolina-rigs vary severely, we use 1/2 oz. Gambler Rattlin' weights, 30-36" leaders of 25lb. mono palomarred to 2/0, 3/0, or 4/0 Gamakatsu superline hooks.
Pitchin' rigs are 1/4 oz. Gambler Rattlin' Florida-Rig weights also to Gamakatsu hooks.Soft plastics will vary with conditions from 6-10" in length and colors in red, blues, black, green, or purples.
Power Pro is always the main line on our Limited Edition Tetra HS Pinnacle Reels and SPX3 rods, try them, you will be spoiled.
STOP READING, GO FISHING !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:10/8/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Tuesday, October 8th 02
Even though I began fishing before Tricia she still caught more bass than me today, AND the biggest !!!
Not to brag too much but I'm amazed at her progress as a fisherwoman, in under seven years she has become efficient at many techniques and an expert at several. Tricias ability to pay attention to detail makes me proud, she often notices important details that I miss, today was a great example. I taught her yet I learn from her.
Tricia and I pulled into the SW corner of Farm13 today just east of "Slingshot Slough", I began fishing 3.5 - 5 feet of water with beautiful hydrilla pockets full shiners, needlefish, and other little edible bass stuff. Recently the lipless crankbaits have worked well so that's what I grabbed and within 5-7 casts I had 3 fish from1-2 lbs. I was fishing a steady fast-pause-retrieve and was quickly confident that it was the preferred retrieve, without realizing it I had briefly closed my mind to other possibilities. Tricia started 3 fish down, then she was 5 fish down, then 6, same lure as mine. Soon my partner hooked a fish, about a 4 lber., then another shortly after about the same size, then the 6.5 lber. (shown above) all fish were bigger than any of mine.
My mother raised an ugly child but not a dumb child so I asked her what she might be doing different than me (now with 9 smaller fish).
We eliminated several possibilities before deciding our retrievals were definately the difference, she was retrieving steady medium and not pausing unless grass or fish made her. I switched to her style and began catching better quality fish with the ocassional dinks as we ended up the day with 33 combined fish, T- 19 R- 14. Her 6.5 was the biggest.
Tricia also caught an 11 lb. redfish and I caught a 6.25 lb. flounder Monday at Sebastian Inlet, Fl. in case you care.
Oh yeah, see the band aid on her right elbow ? Just a few moments before this she had her crankbait go directly from a jumping fish into her elbow past the barb, don't let the "bugs bunny" band aid fool ya', she's tough.
My whole point about the fishing is not just this particular situation, but more importantly to stay open minded, these fish are not completely set in their ways and will adapt to changing conditions, so should we.
Always pay attention to your fishing partner whether you think you know more or not, the fish are not discriminative towards experience, sex, boat size, etc.
The fishing at Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 is good - great now, fish health, water levels, and water quality are great, the dirt road in is dusty but not too bumpy.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:10/2/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Wednesday October 1st
On the water at 8am and off to the southwest corner of Farm 13 . We began throwing soft jerkbaits in watermelon to no avail. As winds picked up from the northeast detecting strikes became difficult so we made the switch to 1/2 oz. rattletraps at about 10am. We began fishing them fast on the east side of "Slingshot Slough" where they were occasionally assaulted by fish from 1/2 - 2 lbs.
With 9 fish at 11am we knew it was about time to hit the intersections, I picked one of my favorite ditches, anchored up in a nice breeze and commenced to catching fish pretty consistently on a 3/4 oz. carolina-rigged 8" Gambler icesickle worm in "sour grape".
The fishing was consistent for 3 hours and by 2pm we had 33 fish and I decided it was time to try to find that kicker fish, a picture taker. I am quite the advocate of "pitchin" and felt the urge so I chose an area on the east side of the farm full of hiding places for our hawg. We began pitching the hydrilla pockets on the east side of the furthest east ditch. Strikes were only about 1 every 15 minutes but the fish were bigger so we stayed with the pattern hoping for a double digit fish.
We left about 3:45pm with 45 fish, the biggest being 4.75 lbs. caught pitching tubes.For "pitchin" we rigged 4" watermelon tubes on 2/0 Gamakatsu superline hooks and 1/4 oz. Gambler Rattlin' Florida-Rig weights.
Pinnacle Limited Edition Tetra HS reels made pitchin' a breeze, and Power Pro line made yankin' em out easy !!!see ya there,
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/28/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Saturday September 28th 02
On the water with Tricia at 7:30 am, our first stop was the west shoreline of Farm 13 where we planned to catch fish on topwater. Along the west shoreline south of the shack and west of Slingshot Slough the water is 2.5-5 feet and loaded with needlefish and shiners cruising in and out of hydrilla pockets and timber. The water is fairly clear with over 2 feet visibility with polarized shades.
The fish did not care about our topwater plan as only 2 dinks hit firetiger pop'rs by 9:00. I then made the switch to an 8" Gambler icesickle worm with no weight, in "sour grape" pattern, Tricia switched to a watermelon Gambler flapp'n shad. We both began getting bites but Trish was not hooking up, she quickly switched to an icesickle worm and started hooking up.
At about 11:30am we had 19 fish including a 4 lb. fish Trish caught. Things got a little warm so we went for a boat ride and then came back to the same area except this time we fished east of "Slingshot Slough" until about 1:30pm. 28 fish mostly on 8" icesickle worms with no weight, I also hit a couple on a flapp'n shad and T still had the biggest bass.
With a pretty good day under our belt already we decided to hit one of our favorite carolina-rigging spots on a farm ditch, as we pulled up we could see 1-3" shad running for their lives and getting busted out of the water, we quickly grabbed our rattletraps and began hooking up almost every 3-4 casts and believe it or not Tricia caught 2 on 1 casts with a trap. In between the visible activity we c-rigged the same icesickle worms and also consistently caught fish.
At 4pm, oops ! wasn't supposed to fish that long we had combined for 93 fish, yep, 93. Most of the fish were 1/2 - 3 lbs. but we did get a couple 4 lb. fish. It was honestly a blast, anytime you can get that many fish it's fun even if they're not huge, those 2 - 3 lb. Farm bass fight very hard and they all think they're 10 lbs.
Sunday the 28thTo make a long story short we did the same thing at the same spots Sunday and ended up with 79 fish, sore arms, and a pile of used plastic worms.
Trish and I caught 172 bass this weekend on 12/50 Power Pro line and neither of us ever retied or broke off , HONEST !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished;9/26/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Wednesday September 25th 2002
Tricia and I headed to the marsh a little late Wednesday, by 10:00am winds were howling and with two new reels to be broken in we headed to one of those "secret spots" in the farm that everyone knows about. The water was flowing and after acessing the current and anchoring accordingly Trish and I proceeded to fish for 5 hours landing 59 fish from .5 -4 lbs. Tricia caught 24 on her 1/2 oz. S.O.B Rattlin' Shad while I caught 35 carolina-rigging a 6" Gambler Icesickle worm in "sour grape".
September 27thOff to the marsh by myself Friday, two ditch intersections, a point, 24 fish, 19 on the c-rig and 5 on a S.O.B Rattlin' Shad
151 fish were caught on 4 trips to the marsh this week, fish were split between the c-rig and lipless crankbaits.
Gotta go, they're bitin' !!!"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/23/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Monday Sep. 23rd
The pressure was on as I was scheduled to take my mother-in-law Vicki McGee for her first Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 trip. Vicki has some fishing experience mostly with live bait but it has been a little while.
Even in gusty winds Vicki quickly caught on and was casting like a pro. Several storms came through and cut our trip short but Vicki was persistent and did not let the weather deter her. We only caught 13 fish but the quality was good, good job Vicki, no charge.
90 % of our bass were caught on 1/2 oz. S.O.B Rattlin' shads by Bill Dee as gusty winds made fishing soft-plastics very difficult.
Most fish were caught on ditch 13 in the Farm with one caught by the ramp in the Stick Marsh.
Many lures and retrieves will work but if I only had two choices to fish with now, it would definately be the 1/2 oz. Rattlin' Shad by S.O.B. in any color with an orange belly, or a 1/2 oz. carolina-rigged 8" Gambler ribbontail in red shad or junebug.
Go fishing and relax, want pressure ? Take your ma-in-law !!!Get out there, have fun, hook a loved one !!!
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/22/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Sunday Sep. 22
Bob Wilisch, a Merrill Lynch man from Tallahassee, Fl fished the Stick Marsh /Farm 13 for the first time with me Sunday. Bob brought his boat down for a week but wanted to see where he could run safely and fish for the week
I showed Bob the way through the Stick Marsh and some areas to fish there but we mostly fished the farm ditches due to wind in excess of 20 mph, we caught fish evenly on carolina- rigs and rattletraps. Bob had never fished a c-rig but quickly adapted, Bob and I caught 31 fish by 1pm . Bob agreed without Power Pro braided line many of the c-rig fish would never have been felt in the wind.
Bob and I c-rigged with a 1/2 oz. of weight, 24-30" leaders to 3/0 Gamakatsu superline hooks and 8" red shad Gambler ribbontails.Pinnacle Limited Edition Rods & Reels did the rest.
My wife took my friend Bart out Sunday and caught 13 fish in the SW corner of Farm 13 on topwater before the whitecaps forced their Gheenoe back to the ramp.
Monday I saw Bob out again, he was managing to catch a few in each of his new-found honey holes, nice work Bob !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/21/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Saturday September 19th 7am.
Janine & Jim Shively of Ocala, Fl celebrated Janines 1-day belated birthday by hitting Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 with me today, Janine chose bass fishing over a trip to Aruba for her present and was grinning ear to ear like the cat that ate the canary all day. Both Jim and Janine were very persistent, thorough, and alert in their approach so I had no excuses.
We started about 7:15am on a ditch intersection in Farm 13 with winds about 8 mph, I had them both start with 1/2 oz. rattletraps in "limon" color while I searched the bottom with a heavy texas-rig and a carolina-rig. There was very little visible activity due to a small chop and the fish weren't quite jumping in the boat but the birthday girl was catching 2 or 3 every 30-45 minutes as Jim and I pretended to "let her" take the lead . We fished a 40 yard circle until the wind made my circle look like !#@*?!!!
11:00am.14 fish was the count, about 8 fish to Janine, 4 to Jim, and 2 for me. Our next stop was to a good windy day spot, a point between the Farm and the Stick Marsh. It was to be our last stop of the day, by 2:00pm we had hooked over 50 bass, at least 36 made it to the boat. All of their fish were caught on rattletraps, every fish thought it was 10 lbs., none were but they were all 1-4 lb. scrappers. About 8 or 9 of those fish ate c-rigged 8" Gambler red shad ribbontails but the traps were definately the chosen tool for the day, for the week for that matter.
4 days at the marsh this week and there is no doubt in my mind that a 1/2 oz. lipless crankbait is the way to go right now.The fish that I have seen this week have been primarily feeding on threadfin shad from 2-3" in length, not shiners, needlefish, etc.
During full moon phases the abundance of bait can make fishing confusing, too much bait.
To catch fish we usually attempt to "match the hatch" or use very similar sizes and colors to the preferred bait at the time. However, during these full moon phases in these "areas of bait abundance" I prefer to match the size of the bait but not the color, in other words I prefer wildly colored baits over chrome or other reflective baits that too closely resemble the thousands of shad in the area.
If your not in an area of bait abundance match the size and color of the preferred bait.Retrieves will differ but steady retrieves with occasional pauses to fall below the shad is usually a good start.
GET OUT THERE, HAVE FUN, HOOK A LOVED ONE !!!
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/15/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
September 15th
In the last 12 days I have fished the marsh 7 times with nearly identical results on every trip, to sum things up for us, larger fish have been in the wood of the Stick Marsh with numbers of fish being caught in the ditches of Farm 13.
I have been starting about 7 am.in the C-54 extension canal about 100 yards north of the boat ramp. The canal is about 12 deep now and casting buzzbaits and soft-jerkbaits to the south side of the canal is usually good for 6-12 fish by 8:30 am or so, the fish are usually 1-4 lbs. I like to start with a 6 inch soft plastic stick bait that I designed myself, my wife hand pours the baits and does an incredible job of developing my color requests, my exact baits are not necessary to catch fish however, they just help my confidence. First thing in the morning I like a color we call "milky june", it's a "junebug" and white mix with no glitter, why reflect darkness ? As the sun rises I will move to a "gold melons" color, it's translucent green with lots of gold flakes. A Gambler flappin' shad also does the trick.
Approx. 8 30 - 9amI run into the Stick Marsh and back to the NW corner by the palm forest, don't run there because you saw me run there, idle recommended. There are several small depth changes here with specific stump rows on them in 6 feet of water. Some days are better than others but we usually claim 3-8 fish here by 10:30 am on Bomber model "A" crankbaits in "firetiger" color. If the crankbait bite does not exsist we will pitch 10 inch Gambler ribbontails in "junebug" or "emerald blue" texas rigged to 1/4 oz. rattlin' weight and a 4/0 Gamakatsu superline hook, as you know Power Pro microfilament is always on all my reels.
Approx. 11:00 amNow that the sun is up and hot, many fish will congregate and suspend above the shellbeds located on drops in Farm 13 so it's off to satisfy the carolina-rig craving. I and others prefer the middle E/W ditch in the farm. Our chosen rig has been the 1/2 oz. c-rig with about 30" of leader. With the hot and sometimes still conditions I prefer a 8" Gambler icesickle worm or the same hand poured baits I described earlier which we call "Martian Baits". Any dark forms of blue, red, black, or purple seem to work.
By 1:00 pmI'm at the ramp with 10-25 fish, nothing was different yesterday as Trish and I caught 17 fish, no big fish. We were on a decent crankbait bite for big fish last week, several 7's, one 8 lb. fish and some 4-5 lb. fish as well. This week we have not had the big fish bite
In my OPINION the best place to catch fish is probably still the ditches of Farm 13, for us however they have been small fish which has been my reason for spending most of my time lately on the Stick Marsh side searching for hawgs
In my OPINION you should fish both sides of the reservoir, in summer the farm is especially awesome for c-rigging the ditches, 4-12 feet drops loaded with mussels, shell, etc.
The sticks is great for crankbaits and texas- rigging, 5-6 feet deep with oodles of palm stumps, pepper and wild fruit trees mostly submerged 3 feet below the surface. Bring your lure retriever as snags are to be expected.
Many lure styles will work on either body of water, these are just my first picks.I'm out there 4-7 days a week regardless of a paying trip to give you true Stick Marsh experience since 1992.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/6/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
September the 6th
Tricia "marsh mama" Sanders strikes again with an 8 lb. Stick Marsh bass Friday on a Bomber BO6A, G-fleck bengal fire tiger is the color name. Her fish was caught on a big submerged pile of crap.
Randy "stick martian" Sanders attempted to hang with her landing a 7 lb. bass on a Bomber BO5F in lemon lime color. My fish was taken from a beautiful log near the middle of the Stick Marsh.
RandyWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:9/4/02
Water Clarity: 6 inches
Wednesday , September 4th
In the last two weeks the fish quality for me and many other anglers has slightly diminished in Farm 13, the big fish are there but it seems the small fish are beating them to the bait, not all the time of course. The competition among bass in the ditches of Farm 13 is unbelievable when they decide to eat. Don't get me wrong, I will never complain about a fish that will bite and fight even if small but we were due for some big fish, I felt it was time to search for individuals, territorial ones.
I had spoken with Darren of St.Louis, Missouri and discussed his priorities the night before on the phone, " big fish " he said. I felt his best opportunity of getting a BIG FISH RIGHT NOW IN THE STICK MARSH ON "COVER" RATHER THAN "STRUCTURE". In other words on brush, stumps and grass, which have less potential to hold numbers of fish like the shellpiles and drops-offs of Farm 13, LESS potential, not unheardof by any stretch.
After a half days fishing only 7 fish came aboard with no hawgs, but no dinks either all on carolina-rigs. Darren tried one of my rods and was immediately amazed with Power Pro braided line, he said "this is my rod now", he's big, I said "ok". I dropped Darren off so he could rest up for Sea World with the family the following day. I shot back out through the Stick Marsh (NOT RECOMMENDED) to an area roughly a 1/2 mile south of Twin Palms, (you'll see me). I began fishing a roughly 100 yard area that has been good to me in the past for big fish, it has pepper trees , citrus trees, and sum-uda trees in water that is now about 7 feet deep.
Most of the "cover" in this area is about 3-4 feet down though some is visible above the surface. A great tool in this scenario is the Bomber BO5F , several colors are good but I chose chatreuse/ lime green back for the less than 1 foot visibility. I casted for about 15 minutes before I hooked a big fish that had me under "some type of wood" if I had to bet, we tugged back and forth about 10 seconds before my hooks straightened out and she was free.
I was pretty excited, I didn't see the fish but I felt very strongly it was over 6 lbs or so though I admit these fish have fooled me before. I straightened my hooks and continued crashing my crankbait into submerged branches and occasionally through hydrilla at a medium pace. In the next two hours I had 2 more good strikes, a couple "suspicious feelings" and a solid hook-up resulting in the above pictured fish who went just under 7 lbs. on the Bogagrip scale.
There may not be as many bites right now in the Stick Marsh as the Farm but from what I have seen they are quality bites well worth the casts.
Most brush is not visible though roughly 80% of the Stick Marsh side is littered with wood, every 3-5 feet, another log, another bass possibility.
Blind cast a crankbait that runs at least 5 feet to locate wood and then repeat casts to that area from different angles, then throw in the texas- rigs, etc.
Not everywhere holds fish though they may seem the same, watch your electronics for bait and bass. Pay close attention to the depth they are holding and target that depth.
I like to let the crankbait bounce of the wood and create its own strikes though many retrieves can work at different times, stay open minded and creative.
Hang-ups are part of the business and lures will be lost to fish and wood that you can pretend were fish, a good lure retriever will pay for itself quickly.
Be patient and persistent, you will probably get an opportunity to land a fat one, come with me, I'll get the net and take your picture !!!
MANY ADVERTISE BUT HONESTLY FISHING / GUIDING 4-7 DAYS A WEEK YEAR-ROUND ONLY AT THE STICK MARSH / FARM 13 IS SOMETHING ONLY A COUPLE CAN CLAIM.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:8/30/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Friday the 30th
22 fish did make it to the boat in 6 hours of fishing though things were not easy, the carolina-rig bite had all but dissolved and only 3 fish fell victim to the c-rig. Tricia insisted that if we weren't going to catch lots of fish then we should at least try to catch a big fish so I agreed, like I had a choice. At this time of year we always consider the buzzbait for big fish suspending under the grass, even 3 lb. fish hit them hard and pull enough to keep you guessing for a minute or two. We were already on a Farm 13 ditch that I knew had thick grass and bait on the south end so off we went.
Upon arrival I noticed very little shad activity but we threw buzzbaits for about 15 minutes anyways trolling on high speed , when we were just about to run somewhere else we noticed a needlefish skip across the surface once, twice, then dissapeared in what looked like a cinder block dropped from a helicopter, a big fish, as expected we stayed but could not hook up on the buzzbaits. We continued to see needlefish sometimes running for there lives, sometimes chasing our buzzbaits but no bass. We knew the fish were there, bait, grass, shade under the grass, hard bottom under the shade, and water from 5-11 feet deep. I couldn't stand it, I felt the surface was the place to fish, partially because of the activity we saw and because of the lack of success in the earlier part of the day. I then tried a bait that I am still finding applications for, a Gambler Flappin' Shad, this time rigged weightless, weedless, on a 4/0 Gamakatsu EWG superline hook and with glass rattle inserted, also by Gambler .
When fishing a gambler Flappin' Shad I will usually use a shad-base color however the fish were clearly eating the needlefish so I went with the "rainbow trout" pattern mostly for my confidence. If you ever have the pleasure of hooking a needlefish, NOT, you will notice a lizard-green color to most of there body and a slight pink tint on the belly, a near perfect match to Gamblers "rainbow trout" pattern. I fished the bait for a while with nothing, then at the end of a cast when I speeded the retrieve steadily for the last 10 feet I was visiously assaulted, no hook-up but I could tell it was a substantial fish. I began casting and steadily retrieving quickly, no twitching or stopping the bait but just retrieving and letting the baits tail slap the water's surface. It was the ticket for 19 fish in a little over 2 hours but we never did get the big fish, I was a little dissapointed but I didn't realize this would be the most excitement for at least a few days. All fish were caught casting to the east side of the ditch, I positioned my boat on the west levy.
* When fish strike in this scenario, do not set the hook when you see the strike, reel til' you feel, then cross her eyes !!!
Saturday the 31stCraig Alexander of Virginia was to be my victim for the day, I had plans of carolina- rigging a couple locations on the way to my new found needlefish eating Farm 13 bass. The fish were once again not on the c-rig pattern so I thought maybe all would be in order to go through a bag or two of Flappin' shads but boy was I wrong. Even with Craig's persistence and patience only 5 fish made it to the boat by 12:30, it was truly a tough day and without Craigs excellent company it would have been a really tough day. With things heating up quickly we agreed to try again Sunday. It was not the best day I've seen but if I said I never experience slow days I would be lying.
Sunday the 1stCraig had never caught a fish on a buzzbait and I really wanted to see a Stick Marsh monster scare the split shot out of him for lack of better explanation. One fish at the north end of the sticks took a swing but no hook-up. After hitting several areas in the farm with no success we came across some small fish at the east side, action had been very slow for 2 days now and Craig was ok with catching the smaller fish knowing the possibility for a hawg is always there. It didn't happen but we did manage to scrape up 20 small fish and have fun, that would be pretty good on alot of other lakes but I really wanted Craig to catch 100 fish from 5- 15 lbs., that's a near unrealistic expectation but I am always incredibly optimistic because I have seen what the marsh can do, it's powerful stuff. I cannot say enough about Craigs character, not to mention he told me on the phone he's a novice fishermen, he's an excellent fisherman and will be back with the rest of the gang. See you this winter Craig, Rob, and George Alexander.
Monday the 2nd (Labor Day )My wife Tricia and my best friend Bart said they could crack the big fish code for me so once again I was at the marsh on the hunt. Shad activity was up and so was the bass activity slightly but the fish were still small, 27 fish between all three of us in 7 hours biggest being just 3 lbs. Most fish were caught on c-rigs on farm ditches.
HONESTLY GUIDING / FISHING 4 - 7 DAYS A WEEK YEAR ROUND ONLY AT THE STICK MARSH IS SOMETHING ONLY A COUPLE CAN CLAIM.
I'm there regardless, guide trip or not because I love being there, I believe you worked hard for your money and deserve the best opportunity possible to catch fish and have fun.GUARANTEED SATISFACTION !!! Try it, you'll like it, if you don't, keep your $ !!!
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:8/26/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Saturday the 24th
34 fish with Robie Jones of Floridana Beach, Fl though it did take a full day with a lunch break in the middle. Most fish were caught on carolina rigged Gambler 10" red shad ribbontails though Robie also claimed a few on the old faithful texas-rig. We also had some topwater bites but no hook-ups. About half of our fish were caught on Farm 13 ditches while the other half were caught by the ramp. Robie has caught several fish over 10 lbs from the sticks and the farm with me but it was not to happen today. We even hit his favorite spots, SW corner of the farm and near middle of the sticks. Both these places can be good but points, cuts, and farm ditches have been best for us.
Monday the 26th18 fish for me, just me. I had already committed to pitching plastics into the thick stuff in hopes of doing battle with a double digit fish, I got a monster though it was no largemouth, a mudfish or chocolate bass as I prefer. I did get a few bass and some missed fish but at 11:00am my fish count was at a measly 4 fish. I just did not want to hit the farm ditches although they are about the best bet right now I was fishing solo and wanted to do different stuff.
When I get into a tough situation, the drop-shot rig always enters my arsenal, a florida drop-shot that is. I was pretty sure the area I pitched earlier had fish because I caught them there very recently and missed some short strikes earlier in the day. I nibbled some crackers, reapplied sunscreen and went back to the same area, once again pitching , yet pitching a drop-shot. The results were much more entertaining, in two hours I upped my catch from 4 to 18 fish. The reason to me was obvious, the fish were suspended and the only strikes I got earlier were when my texas-rigged tube dropped directly in front of the suspended bass. The drop-shot can be held in front of suspended fish for as long as you or fish can stand it.
My drop-shot rig which I call a Florida drop-shot rig is shown above.Our main line on baitcasters is 12/50 Power Pro, 8/30 for spinning reels. I use a 17-20 lb. Berkley Vanish flourocarbon leader about six feet for translucence though I admit that may be more for my confidence. I tie on an 1/0 Owner Mosquito hook with a palomar knot leaving about 24" of leader beneath the hook, then take the loose end of the line and go back through the hook eye from the top down. Now tie on a 1/4 oz.bass casting sinker at the end of that line about 22" down, obviously these measurements can be modified for your situation.
This rig can be casted, pitched, dragged, shakin, or swimmed. Anything can be rigged for drop-shotting, worms, tubes, soft-jerkbaits, etc. The same lures can be nose-hooked, texas-rigged, or wacky-rigged. Monday I pitched a nose-hooked 5" Gambler tube (shown above) to palm trees and scattered hydrilla in 4' of water and gently shook the tube, colors were black with blue flakes and "junebug". strikes feel similar to texas-rig strikes.
A little tip for the heat-Recently Mark English forgot his squirt bottle in my cooler, cold water misted on the face, neck, etc. can truly lengthen your fishing time but don't forget to reapply the sunscreen. Sorry Mark but you will have to come back for this one. I also occasionally drench a small towel with cold water and stand barefooted on it, sounds crazy but works wonders. I cannot always leave because I'm hot, I have to stay to find fish for you !!!
We will be at the tackle expo in Orlando, Fl wednesday loading the boat with more of the newest and older fish catching baits for you of course.
I'm sorry we didn't get to fish together again, Rest In Peace Steve Srok, you will be missed."stick martian"
Randy Sanders >br>
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:8/22/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Friday the 16th -
26 fish, nothing huge. 18 fish carolina- rigging the ditches of Farm 13 with 10" Gambler ribbontails of "emerald blue" that were being slurped up before wind forced us into the canal near the ramp known as the C-54 continuation. 8 more fish from 2-4 lbs. were caught pitching texas-rigged worms, Gambler 8" ribbontails in "X-Mas" color, it's black grape + green & red flakes, "junebug" is black grape with green flakes only.
Saturday the 17th -19 fish, same scenario, most fish on the farm ditches mostly on c-rig however 2 fish were caught grinding shellbeds with a lime-green bomber fat A about 6' down. The wind forced us to pitch the canal again not that we minded, it's not completely necessary to "pitch" the baits but it is certainly fun and you will usually catch a few more fish with lower surface splash, short pitches to sweetspots in cover will also cover water much quicker and effectively than casts.
Wednesday the 21st -21 fish in about 4 hours of fishing before storms ended the day, the wife and I cheated in the farm at one of those "popular spots" for a few and then caught some very near the ramp on t-rigs and c-rigs, due to extreme overcasts conditions our pitching fish were now in the middle of the canal and catchable on either technique but would not eat a crankbait. Some of these fish are ridiculously strong, a 4lber in the farm pulled at least 30' of drag from me before a beautiful jump.
Thursday the 22nd -23 fish, several storms, two 5 lb. fish in the farm on c-rigs.
Our carolina-rigs consist of 1/2-3/4 oz. Gambler c-riggin' weights, 24-30" of Berkley Trilene 25lb. test to a 4/0 Gamakatsu superline hook.
Our main line on baitcasters is always Power Pro 12/50 for the best in sensitivity and hooksets.Texas-rigs for "pitching" have same hook yet utililizes a Gambler 1/4 oz. Rattlin' weight, this may seem heavy to some but I prefer to fish the t-rig quickly up and down for reaction strikes at the depth I have read fish on the electronics, this also catches fish out from the cover suspending deeper than the fish on cover in the "ambush zone", suspended fish are usually just an occasional bonus and I don't recommend targeting suspended fish unless you have to.
Even though I am color specific about baits in my reports the fish at the Stick Marsh and Farm 13 are not for the most part, I change colors for weather and water conditions mostly for my confidence or if working the same school of fish for hours,days, weeks, etc. but don't kid yourself, if you throw a shoe full of poo in the right place it will get bit.
Finding fish and putting your lure in their face is the challenging part, not what color to throw.Go now, fish til your arm falls off, catch a fat one !!!
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:8/12/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Sunday and Monday (11th & 12th) I fished with Curtis Jenkins, a chemist from the San Diego, Cal. area. Sunday we spent more time running from foul weather than fishing, after several trips to the ramp, we shot back to Farm 13 and began to catch some fish when we realized something strange, when we raised our rods in the air they would make a whining noise and there was no wind. Our suspicions were confirmed when Curts casted a 3/16 oz. texas-rigged worm, the worm hit the water but the 12lb. monofilament line hovered above the water seemingly endlessly before descending to both of our total amazement, electricity in the air, too much too close so again we ran to the ramp and agreed to try again Monday.
Even though winds were prominent, Monday was much more user-friendly. We began the day fishing Farm ditches and hit about 18 fish on carolina and texas rigs, we finished the day at Cherokee Cove in the sticks with 30 fish, quality was good and with Curt fishing 8-12# mono he had his hands full , he landed some very hard fighting fish and was never broke off. Light line on spinning reels at the marsh scares me, I personally fish 50# Power Pro braided line with 30# mono leaders, in hopes of hooking that 18+ lber. out there someday. Curtis was an absolute pleasure to have on board, an excellent fishermen with matching personality.
SUMMERMany variations will work but here is my carolina rig. 3/8 oz. - 3/4 oz. Gambler C-Rig weight with 24-36" leader to 3- 4/O Gamakatsu offset hook.
Plastic selection varies with weather conditions, Gamblers 6 1/2 " swacky worms and other straight tail baits are great for slow-bite days but the majority of the time all I need are 8-10" ribbontails.
GO DROWN YOUR WORM !!!"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
guaranteedfishon@msn.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:8/7/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
AM Saturday -
Frank Lee of Louisville, KY (pictured) joined me at 6am for a 1/2 day of fishing Floridas finest, things started relatively quickly for Frank c-rigging a 10" GAMBLER ribbontail in "critter blue glitter" pattern. The bass didn't go crazy but bit steadily until 9:30am when things slowed dramatically , Frank managed 3 more to the boat by noon to put the total at 22.
PM Saturday -Dr. David Lindow D.D.S. and son Drew were my next victims, a nasty storm limited our trip from a 5 hour trip to a 4 hour deal but 20 fish were landed including 2 double hook-ups by father and son viewable at www.BASSTRIPS.com . 8" GAMBLER ribbontails in "moccasin blue" and "christmas" worked best.
Sunday- 2 boats, myself and George Welcome of Imagination Bassin'Ben Fleming and friend Craig jumped in my boat with me, Clay and Austin Booth fished with George. Even though the bites were there they were very subtle, many fish were missed some to angler error and some to tail biting fish, a quickly rising barometer with few or no clouds in the sky was making things challenging. 23 fish for the gang between both boats in a half day, a decent day anywhere else but nothing special to us spoiled locals. My guests had some bass fishing experience while Georges gang had none, he did an incredible job of teaching and entertaining as always, thanks George.
Monday-John, Jim, and Matthew showed up early Monday morning for a 1/2 day on the marsh, 12 or so consecutive days on the marsh caused me to forget their residing place.2 of 3 had very little bass fishing experience but were giving it a go, it seemed as though the subtle and somewhat slow bite was continuing making strike detection difficult except for John who pulled more than his share of the 10 bass in a half day.
Tuesday-Brian and Ryan Dovel showed up at 8:30am with friend Boo, Brian has fished shiners with me but this was a first for he or Ryan carolina-rigging, Boo has some experience and showed it by hooking the biggest fish of the 1/2 day trip, 4.5 - 5 lbs.
Wednesday-Mark English of Merrit Island, Fl and friend Champ from Texas fished the Farm with me for the first time, both were experienced and fished patiently and persistently for 16 bass on a 6 hour trip, all fish were caught on c-rigs on Farm 13 ditches.
I have certainly had my hands full with first-time carolina-rigging fishermen lately and though all have caught fish and learned, it is certainly challenging. I can bring you to the fish, patiently teach you the proper presentation, and teach you how to feel for the proper type of bottom composition that is condusive to catching summer bass but you must do your part, I cannot tell what you are feeling unless the rod tip moves which is usually too late.
Just a couple tips for fishermen new to Carolina, Florida, and Texas rigging , also applicable to Drop-shot and soft-jerkbait fishing.
-Always move the lure with your rod and use your reel only to gain slack.-All strikes are a little different but I generally like to see people SET THE HOOK about 3 seconds after strike detection and gain of slack.
Most anglers occasionally deep hook a fish or two, however if the only fish that you're catching have swallowed the bait you are not paying close enough attention and most likely missing other fish.
- If you are not sure at any time what you feel, SET THE HOOK.-If you are not moving your lure and your lure is moving, SET THE HOOK.
-If the boat is not moving and your line is being pulled, coming at you, or going right or left, SET THE HOOK.
You simply can't fish the c-rig too slow in my opinion USUALLY. You simply can't set the hook too hard c-rigging USUALLY.
You definately won't catch fish if your lure is not in the water.Stick Marsh and Farm 13 catches are consistently twice that all other Florida lakes, that's making the most of your time !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
(321) 544-4534
guaranteedfishon@msn.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:8/2/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Fishing in itself is an incredible experience, wether it be the sunrise, the nature encountered throughout the day, or the company your day is spent with, a few fish tugging on your line can make a day perfect, the Stick Marsh /Farm 13 can make your day incredible for lack of a more emphatic word. Even in between bites at the marsh, the wildlife is abundant from gators roaming the middle of the "lake" and basking on the shores, to ospey, herons, and even snail kites (hawks, nearly extinct at 1 time) perched atop flooded palm trees,occasionally otters and bald eagles are spotted.
On Tuesday I met up bright and early with James, Jared, and Jim Gaylord, I was early to the ramp and they were already there fightin ' mosquitos, "they go away after all your blood is gone" I told them. I got them in the boat, took off to Farm 13 trying to outrun the skeeters, gotta get that 225 hp. I told them we would spend the day dragging carolina-rigs over the levies and through the wood to largemouths houses we go, and over shellbeds but it didn't fit into my rhyme. Our day was full of laughter, harrassment, and most importantly bass, 26 fish were landed, biggest was 5.5 lbs. but the guide caught it and paid the price, the Gaylord Gang wouldn't let me forget it, I told them there was a 12 lber there and I was just getting the 5.5 out of the way, they were ugly but not stupid.(kidding of course)
Thursday it was Dr. David Lindow D.D.S, and son Drew who were ready for their shot at some world famous bass. Dr. David had told me on the phone that he was no pro, he wasn't exactly amateur either, setting the hook with authority this dentist sent many fish to the dentist including the 6 lb. bass shown above depending on the site you are viewing. Drew has fished many tournaments so we knew he would reap havoc on our "ready& willing" farm bass. At 2pm we had 18 fish, biggest was about 4 lbs. but one last stop put us up to an even 30 fish plus the 6 lb. fish, "you never know until you throw". For the most part these fish were not exactly jumping in the boat, however, persistence, patience, and paying close attention to bottom composition paid off for these new Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 fans.
There are some crankbait fish to be had on the levies of Farm 13, as well as some texas-rig fish to no surprise, but even if you're tired of hearing about it, the carolina-rig is still the dominate factor in my opinion.
A week ago I was fishing a 3/4 oz. weight with about 24" of leader but as the hydrilla reaches toward the sun at 0.5 - 2 inches a day weight must be decreased while leader length is increased, we are now throwing 1/2 oz. weights with 30-34 inches of leader, works for us, it'll work for you but only if it's in the water over hard bottom and fished fairly slow. Any dark colors plus pumkinseed and watermelon will work. If you're only getting bit when you quickly reel up at the end of your cast, try steady retrieves of your c-rig at the depth you were bit or select a crankbait that runs that depth, these are suspended fish reacting when the baits are pulled by their scaly little faces. Suspended fish are generally very hard to catch and I don't reccomend targetting them but in the previously explained scenario, these techniques can save a tough bite day.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
guaranteedfishon@msn.com
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:7/21/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
The fishing at the Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 is still great though rising temps may require a bit more persistence, patience, sunscreen, and water. Numbers of fish and large fish are still a possibility everyday.
Wednesday and Thursday I spent the day with Pete Saundry of Melbourne, Fl. Wednesday was Petes birthday and what better way to spend it than on the Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 reservoir. Pete is an excellent fisherman and no stranger to this body of water, he only needs me to show up to catch fish, we dragged carolina-rigged worms and soft jerkbaits through shellbeds in the ditches and on the levies of Farm 13 and between both days we caught about 50 fish, Pete caught the majority and didn't let me forget it, nice work Pete ! Some fish were hooked on crankbaits but not enough to leave the plastics on the deck.
Saturday and Sunday were with my wife of 1 year today, Tricia, and my best friend Bart Brown feared by all gilled species and apparently women, his birthday was Friday and he had a new custom rod from the Palm Bay Fishing Outfitters ready to be broken in, he broke it in and loves it. Bart is shown above with a 5 lb. Farm 13 bass depending on the site you are viewing. A 5 lb bass is no hawg by Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 standards but their strength will have you betting it's a double digit fish until you see them. Bart and Trish did most of their damage with 1/2 oz. carolina rigs both days while I fished a 1/4 oz. purple jig and caught a few more than my share. 32 fish Saturday and 36 Sunday by 1:15pm when we ran from a very ugly thunderstorm. At the ramp today we saw some really smart guys (not) heading out with a terrible storm upon us, I don't reccommend messing with the storms but if you do find yourself stuck in a storm in Farm 13 and absolutely can't get to the ramp, there is a shelter with a lightning rod about mid-way down the west shoreline, it's no Holiday Inn but it's better than dead.
There is no doubt that there are many fish along the Farm ditches, roads, and levies. The most productive method has undoubtedly still been the carolina-rig, no surprise for summer but when working the same school all day, all week, etc. may occasionally require some adjustment to continue successfully. 8" Junebug and blue emerald ribbontail worms were the preferred baits wednesday and thursday, however after the first few fish saturday, the fish caught on to our tricks and a switch to 6" watermelon finnese worms kept the bite going for for the rest of the day with some slow and some very fast times. Sunday they bit 8", 10", and 6" c-rigged worms but then shut down about 11:00am and would only respond to a 1/4 oz. purple jig.
When searching for fish I believe you need no more than a 1/2 oz.carolina-rig fished on Power Pro line , 25# Berkley Trilene leader with something 6-10" but once you have found fish, caught them, and things begin to slow, try 3-5 different colors and sizes to keep them eating, you don't have all that tackle for nothing but don't spend the whole day in the tackle box either.
"stick martian"Randy sanders
guaranteedfishon@msn.com
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:7/16/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
The Stick Marsh and Farm 13 have been living up to their reputations lately as most anglers are experiencing relative success with very limited pressure on the water. The visibility of the water is up to 3' in most areas of the sticks and the farm, the hydrilla is as healthy as I've ever seen it with no "slime" . The fish are occasionally smashing threadfin shad, shiners, and needlefish from the surface and they look incredibly healthy.
Those presenting there baits properly at the spillway and other water control structures are producing large numbers of fish 1-5 lbs. with larger fish always a possibility but these are far from the only places to catch fish, The marsh and farm are full of untapped honey holes but you must look to find them, the ditches in the farm are a good starting place to fish, the levys that border the ditches are topped with mussels,shellbeds, hydrilla, logs, fenceposts, some of my rods and reels, and whatever else.
Some areas hold better cover than others and can be stacked with feisty fish that have not seen a lure in who knows how long. Carolina-rigs and crankbaits are great for finding the hard stuff, the levys are about 5.5 - 7.5 ' below the surface now, the ditches are about 11- 13' deep and the surrounding flats are about 8- 10' , if you don't already know, the marsh is constantly fluctuating so those depths can and will change. Dragging carolina-rigged dark 8-10" ribbontail worms or cranking a tennessee shad Bomber fat A that runs about 8' so you can contact even the deeper levy obstructions with a steady medium retrieve is a great way to find some of these waters largest schools of fish and largest fish.
Once fish are located they will commonly hit multiple lure types and the large array of forage in an incredibly nutrient rich environment means your favorite crank or plastic bait c-rigged will probably work as long as it's thrown in the right place. Don't get me wrong, these fish will key in on certain prey at certain times but don't spend the day in the tackle box, location is the key.
Last Thursday John McClenney and Shane Newcomb joined us for 20 fish on a half day trip with several fish to 5 lbs. but no more 9 lbers. for Shane this time. These guys were truly a blast on both days we fished.
Friday it was Mike Baker and good friend David Hughes, they were introduced to carolina rigging and had no problem bringing in 32 healthy and willing Farm 13 bass, David busted out a dive that would have made Greg Louganis proud when rod and reel was yanked from his hands, the fish escaped but rod and reel did not. Thanks Dave, that's one of my new Pinnacle Reels but you're nuts !!! Mike is a great friend always fun to hang around with and has taken Tricia and I on some trout fishing trips in the Smoky Mountains that will never be forgotten but hopefully repeated.
Sunday another good friend, this one Jim McCann of Indialantic, Fl. Jim taught me to surf when I was about 11. He has incredible diving and offshore fishing experience but limited freshwater experience, we spent the hole day c-rigging farm ditches and had 27 fish to the boat at noon when Jim headed for home, my wife Tricia, and Bart Brown headed back out with me and scraped another 12 fish off the levys.
Today, Tuesday, I shot out to pre-fish a bit for wednesdays trip, I was bent on finding a crankbait bite and after a few hours and only a few dinks to show for it I managed to find a school of fish more than willing to accomodate my crankbait wishes, 15 fish hit the boat pretty quickly with two near 5 lbs. but I didn't weigh them. I left it hoping they will respond tomorrow. I don't have any special powers, you can catch them too but not if you don't get your butt to the marsh !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
guaranteedfishon@msn.com
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:7/9/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Now is definately a good time to see why the Stick Marsh is world famous, we are experiencing in my opinion the best fishing in three years, the bass are healthy , strong, and very aggressive crushing nearly every color plastic carolina-rigged, occasional crankbaits , and even a topwater bite if thrown in the right place at the right time.
John McClenney and Shane Newcomb of Tennessee snuck away from disney world today for a half day on the marsh, I found a school of quality fish along a submerged Farm 13 levy on a shellbed that were sucking up carolina-rigged anything about 3 pm Sunday and left them alone for my next trip which only ended up being a half day Tuesday, I wasn't sure if the fish would bite as well in the AM but as soon as I found the shellbed more than a half mile from shore (feel free to send GPS) the bite was on and the fish were mad about something as they assaulted 8" june bug and blue emerald worms carolina rigged 1/2 oz.with 24-30" leaders.
Shane caught his largest bass ever at 9 lbs, the fish jumped a long way out that somehow triggered him to repeat OH #$@!^%* the remainder of the fight which he handled like a pro if you couldn't hear him. I hope he doesn't do that if he meets "Mickey".
The keys to catching fish right now are current, hard bottom, usually mussels, shells, and snails with occassional stumps and sparse hydrilla preferred but not necessary especially in the case of the spillway or pumping station. Soft bottom retains warmth and is usually in areas of little current, great in early spring but the mussels and shells found in or near current are cooler and will hold the summer bass once again especially when stumps and hydrilla are thrown in.
I reccomend a 1/2 oz. carolina rig to feel the bottom, work quickly through soft bottom and slower through the hard stuff, the hotter and calmer it is the slower you fish and the more necessary hydrilla becomes.
Our Power Pro now gets spooled on the new Pinnacle Limited Edition Reels thanks to Sid Jackson, the 7 bearing Erica SR is my favorite, I've never fished a reel with smoother drag(Trulon) nor have I ever experienced such incredible freespool, it feels like we're cheating a little, oh well.
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
guaranteedfishon@msn.com
(321) 544-4534
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:7/3/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
68 hard fightin' fat bellied Stick Marsh/Farm 13 bass to the boat for Rodney Benny and father-in-law Buddy of Maryland tuesday. Rodney and Buddy fished carolina-rigged plastics in multiple styles and colors but watermelon lizards and tequila/ green flake 8" worms seemed most reliable on the Stick Marsh points and cuts, 12 fish came from the first ditch intersection we tried in the Farm on c-rigged soft jerkbaits in watermelon pattern however I believe it's much more important where you're throwing rather than what you're throwing. Buddy had rarely bass fished and had never fished a c-rig but had no problem at all pulling in a load of perfect specimens the marsh is known for that would have made for a tournament culling nightmare and double hook-ups were not uncommon. Rodney and Buddy had a blast in our "Bass Fishing Disney World" and proceded to book two more days in the next week. Wednesday, Christy & Norman from Ohio also fished c-rigs, we played it patiently at first for a couple hours trying for a big fish in the thicker cover of the Stick Marsh but could only muster a couple 4's. At about noon we decided to try the numbers game and hit the mother load in Farm 13 on a ditch intersection, 42 was the total for the day with multiple missed fish, jump offs, etc. and we were on our way to the ramp by 3 pm. They also got a little attached to this place and decided to book Saturday as well. Christy is shown above with her new friend depending on the site you are viewing.
Crankbaits are occasionally working for us but c-rigs have dominated as long as retrieve speeds are adjusted with weather conditions, the hotter and calmer the weather the slower the retrieve but always stay open minded as Stick Marsh and Farm 13 fish are known to break the rules frequently, they must not read the same articles as us.
guaranteedfishon@msn.com"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:6/30/02
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
40 fish Thursday on a half day trip with father & son Alan & Matt Freece of Melbourne, Fl. Alan won our mini-tournament mostly with a texas-rig but fish were also landed on crankbaits and carolina-rigs. We fished the basic summer haunts with current, points, cuts , some hidden shell humps and rock piles.
Friday I only had four hours to fish so I hit seven spots for about a half hour each. 33 fish hit the boat on crankbaits and carolina -rigs. The most productive location was a ditch intersection in the NE corner of Farm 13. The crankbait was a Fat "A" bomber in chartreuse, it doesn't make a difference what you c-rig, location is the key. 37 fish ate carolina-rigs Sunday as David Prentice and good friend Ryan of Nashville, Tenn were on board for about 6 hours before the rain chased us out. We caught fish on everything in the Stick Marsh on c-rigged tubes, lizards, soft-jerkbaits, ribbontails, (EVERYTHING) it simply didn't matter what you rigged as long as it was c-rigged. We fished Power Pro braid and David, a guide on Kentucky Lake was a believer so I sent him on his way with a couple free spools and some info. booklets. I have some for you to try too, just ask me !!!
Tricia, (my wife) couldn't stand it, I was booked but she had to fish so she took her boat, a maxed out camoflauge Gheenoe with poling platform and all the toys of the big boats in a sweet little package. After 4 hours of no Tricia sightings she showed up grinning ear to ear having caught 14 fish mostly on crankbaits including 2 fish over 5 lbs. She took off again and when torrential rains chased us to the ramp I had to drop off my clients and go pull her off her honey hole.
With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip you simply can't go wrong !!!
guaranteedfishon @msn.com(321) 544-4534
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:6/25/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
71 bass Monday in 5.5 hours, 36 fish Tuesday in 3.5 hours, largest 7.25 lbs. and lots of 4's and 5's. All fish have been caught on artificials. Due to recent rains the pumps are on and the water is flowing throughout the Stick Marsh and Farm 13 making conditions extremely condusive to bass-catching.
Timing of this wet weather could not have been better in my opinion though many would have liked to see it earlier , the fish had just reached the migration to their summer haunts a couple weeks ago when the rain began, the pumps turned on and began a much needed flush to the entire reservoir.We now have new water throughout looking more like coffee than chocolate milk. The current in the Stick Marsh and Farm is most pronounced at points, cuts, humps, and ditch intersections, exactly the preferred hangouts of summer bass and there are fish on every point, cut, etc. right now. I would advise anyone that will be fishing the marsh or farm soon to avoid the flats and fish the above mentioned areas though due to next-to no pressure on the marsh right now you can fish anywhere you want.
At each of the above mentioned spots there will be a sweetspot, sometimes several where fish are stacked, I feel a c-rig with at least a 1/2 oz. of weight and 30" of leader with a dark colored plastic or a firetiger crankbait that runs 10-12 feet is appropriate, remember this place is approx. 4 feet deeper than it was 3 weeks ago.I fish 12/50 Power Pro braided line and the sensitivity will change your life, talk to me if you see me and I'll set you up with a sample spool and literature.
With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip you simply can't go wrong !!!
guaranteedfishon@msn.com"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:6/10/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
I hit the marsh for a half day with one of my best friends, Jim McCann and his dad Joe, I was really hoping to put these guys onto a big marsh monster, some quality bass were brought to the boat though we never got the opportunity for a real big fish. We dragged shiners down levy's , over points, anchored them in deep water with carolina-rigs, freelined them through the lips, behind the dorsal,but the texas-rigged 8" tequila green Berkley power worm in the masterful hands of Joe McCann outproduced all.
The road to the Stick Marsh, water levels, and color all look fair to good right now, most fish are very close if not completely to there summer haunts and very catchable. There are fish in the middle of the stick marsh near the orange bouy that will swing at buzzbaits but they rarely seem to connect with them, when my clients are buzzbaiting I keep a white or watermelon soft-jerkbait rigged within reach for my client to toss directly to the fish that misses once, if presented within 2 feet I would guess 75-80% of the fish eat the jerkbait before you can twitch it. I personally do not even throw a buzzbait at a fish after he missed it the first time, it's directly to the soft plastic bait.
The fish in the farm for the most part seem to be scattered on the ditch levees catchable with carolina-rigs, texas-rigs( any red or purple 8-10" worms) and crankbaits, I like Bomber fat A crankbaits in the wind and the 6 or 7a when it's calm. I personally don't feel you need anything besides firetiger or tennessee shad.
If you would like to book a trip or if you need a few "X 's" on your map so you can hit it in your own boat, feel free to contact me.
guaranteedfishon@msn.com"stick martian"
RANDY SANDERS
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date Fished:6/2/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Persistence and patience were mandatory this week as conditions were very challenging. On wednesday I had Vicki and Alan Freece of Melbourne Beach, Fl on board, they fished very persistently in tough conditions(soaring high pressure, cloudless) at Farm 13 for 7 fish on 3/16oz. texas-rigged Berkley power worms(red).
Thursday was father and son Tom and Rick Collier of Paris, Tennessee. They fished buzzbaits, soft-jerkbaits, and crankbaits in the farm and the stick marsh for 6 hours and hit 9 fish. Tom Collier shown above with a Farm 13 buzzbait fish depending on site you are viewing. Friday the tables turned a bit for Bill Sobanik of Connecticut as 17 fish were brought to the boat with a little help from a ferocious topwater bite in the Stick Marsh from 9:15-10:00am that ended as quickly as it began, Bill lost a big one that ripped the hook and split ring from his excalibur super-popr. This is the first serious topwater bashing I have seen or heard about yet this year and they were good fish. When everything settled down Bill booked Saturday as well, we then hit several fish in the farm ditches with red Berkley power worms t-rigged 3/16oz. Saturday Bill Sobanik again and off to the topwater hole from yesterday we went, big fish were busting regularly around us but Bill could only coax 1 to smash his lure that managed to escape all hooks, after searching for big fish all morning with only four dinks to show by 1:00pm we decided to hit a ditch intersection in the farm and by 3:00pm we had 19 fish to the boat. After the first couple fish we had to downsize and change colors to keep them hitting texas-rigs, then Bill hit a couple on a carolina-rigged green pumpkin soft-jerkbait and I got a couple on a 1/8oz. tomato seed finnesse jig.
All fish caught this week were either near the middle of the Stick Marsh(Friday) or on Farm 13 ditch intersections(thur,fr,sat), except for 2 buzzbait fish in the SW corner of the farm, the Stick Marsh fish were bigger but less predictable.
With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip you simply can't go wrong !!!
"stick martian"Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Date fished:05/18/02
Don't leave fish to find fish, this has undoubtedly been the key for this weeks success. Fish artificials if possible, if you must fish live bait place them no less than 3 feet below the float with a small split-shot 6 inches above the shiner, shiners placed only a couple feet or less with no split shot die much quicker due to low oxygen content in the surface water and most of the bass will not take them off the top right now anyways. You will most likely catch more fish with artificials right now. When fishing artificials, crankbaits have been most productive for us grinding through mussel and shellbeds forcing inactive fish to eat by literaly running into them. Drop-shot rigs and wicky screw heads(top secret) do the damage when crankbaits do not.
The most important factor here is to fish where the fish are, sounds easy but finding is the hard part, start at a point or cut in the Stick Marsh, or ditch intersection in Farm 13, you're already close to fish, now tie on a fire tiger crankbait that goes to 6', then tie one on that runs 3', alternate them. I recommend a bomber or a bandit if you would like to skip the tuning process, I also recommend 12/50 Power Pro line if you want to feel everything, I can usually tell the difference between getting bit and running into a shad with the Power Pro line, it will change your whole perspective about sensitivity. Now bust out your optimistic attitude, combined with the persistence of the energizer bunny. In my opinion this is all you need to find fish. The 2 biggest mistake that I see people make is to catch a fish and keep on truckin', or fish the shorelines. This is not a shore-pounding lake with scattered fish here and there, this is a reservoir with massive schools of bass, and yes there are big fish in schools here. The Stick Marsh breaks all the rules of bass fishing so chuck that b-master magazine on the way down, it sounds good but you will always learn more on the water than reading articles.
Saturday we put the theory to the test again anchoring within casting range of a massive shellbed with numerous logs and other scattered junk, not to mention fish. Our first and only anchoring was on a shellbed that reaches to within 3.5 feet of the surface with nearly 22' of water within 12' of the shell hump. When feeding, they sit right on the top and are catchable on crankbaits, soft-jerkbaits, and just about anything persistently thrown. When they are not feeding they simply slide down the hump and seem to hold in 8-10' of water, a little more challenging but still catchable with a bomber 7a, c-rigs, drop-shots and my new favorite, the wicky screw head which I created myself. In 7 hours of persistent casting with very few breaks besides sunscreen and water, we boated 17 fish without moving, although we fished several of the above mentioned techniques, every fish ate a crankbait, I fished a white/ blue back 6a bomber, Tricia threw a fire tiger 7a.
The fish hit hard usually knocking a foot or so of slack in the line before seriously doubling over 6.6' medium action Berkley Series 1 rods. The picture above ( depending on the site you're on) shows the feeding mood, several times we had to slide the back hook out the gills and remove the hook from the split-ring to retrieve the lures, in other words, these fish were eating and absolutely inhaling our baits resulting in, believe it or not only 2 lost fish.
This is not the only place with this type of cover/structure combination as I recently counted nearly 30 similar places in the marsh that I know of, some tend to hold more fish than others but all hold fish at one time or another and none are visible from the surface. Bulldozers created these piles of rocks, shells, and clay, while making our bass fishing disney world, then once filled and stocked, current created by numerous pumps added mussels, shells, logs, and miscellaneous junk to these piles.
Make the most of your time on the water and don't just start fishing in the middle of nowhere, bass love to be near current but not necessarily right in it. Points, cuts, canals, farm ditches, and pumps of course always have more prominent current than flats and usually have ambush zones near intersections and/or bends in the current where "junk" is stacked, any object that breaks current can be used as an ambush point by that fish of a lifetime and are frequently stacked with fish.
Get out there and see what you can find or if you would like to skip the hunt and go right to the fish, give me a call @ (321) 544-4534. With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip you simply can't go wrong !!!
www.BASSTRIPS.comguaranteedfishon@msn.com
"stick martian"
Randy Sanders
05/13/02
Tricia and I decided to run down to the Stick Marsh late saturday and see if we could sneak in a fish or two before dark, it doesn't take long to catch the fish of a lifetime. We arrived about 5:15 pm and the wind was blowing about 20 mph. In many situations this would not be conducive to fish catching, however the Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 has countless areas to anchor and be within casting range of hundreds of bass and windy days can be awesome. Cuts in levies, through palms on the Stick Marsh side, or ditch intersections on Farm 13 are just a few examples. Drifting is not recommended in most areas on windy days.
Hole #1 NE Stick Marsh, "The Hump", a pile of shells, mussels,chunk rock, logs, and a broken culvert reaching to within 3' of the surface surrounded by 10' of water requested by name by many of my regular clients. The hump has produced hundreds of quality bass to me and my clients since late march of this year. The mixture of terrain is incredible down there and even though there are points, stumps, hydrilla, and other attractive bass hangouts very nearby, this is the bass 7-11 in the neighborhood and the Stick Marsh/Farm 13 have many such areas, different in cover combinations, some more obvious than others.
7-11 ? In other words most fish in this area stop by or use this hump at one time or another, even on slow days there are always a few hanging around, not necessarily inside the store (on the hump)but nearby usually looking for opportunities in both scenarios. Then without warning the store (hump) is swamped with what appears to be a line to feed, very impatient, down right aggressive, and some crowds are more feisty than others. The key here is to be here when the crowd is, then figure out if they want beer or ice cream, or in our case commonly crankbaits, carolina-rigs,etc.
Tricia and I waited patiently rotating from c-rigs to crankbaits for 45 minutes with nothing, at about 6:30, a solid bite on a c-rig that stripped my 6" junebug Berkley finnesse worm from the hook, this sends off an alert to us as we know how this place gets suddenly swamped with fish of all species as Tricia then proved by hooking into what seemed a good bass at first but ended up about a 4# catfish. I unhooked her cat and was retying her slimy line while she grabbed my c-rig rod and hooked-up again, this time the fish jumped and was green, not a monster but a feisty 2#er. I was not going to help her anymore so I turned a cheek, threw her crankbait rod and on the 3rd or 4th cast hit a decent 2.5 - 3# fish. Tricia's c-rig fish was hooked pretty deep and now knuckle deep in fish slime she wasn't smiling anymore. As I unhooked her fish she promptly picked up my crankbait rod, which was actually hers before this feeding frenzy at the hump and hit her second fish in as many casts. In the last 5 minutes I had caught 1 bass, yet I unhooked 3 bass, 1 slimy catfish, retied, and I know my wife is not paying me so I suggest we try somewhere else justifying it off to her as "saving those fish for clients." (you)
Hole #2 , 6:45pm, SE Stick Marsh, scattered mussels,shells,chunk rock,logs,etc. on top of a hidden levy 2.5 - 3'' down . No quick action this timebut by 8:00pm we had mustered up 3 more, 2 for me on fire tiger bomber, Tricia 1 more on a black grape soft-jerkbait "deadstuck" on the levy. We each lost a fish here as well, nothing big on our evening outing but 6 fish with more oppurtunities in 2.75 hours was well worth the trip.
Back to the marsh sunday 7:15am Straight to Farm 13 , approx. 10 mph. east wind. We started at the very south end of the second ditch from the west shore throwing topwaters of all sorts as we worked towards the west shore . After about 30 minutes we switched to shallow-running crankbaits and spinnerbaits, I caught a decent chunk (shown above depending on which site you are viewing) tossed a bouy out did circles and pulled 1 more fish out each. At about 8:15am I busted out a white/silver colorado spinnerbait, at about 8:30 I was crying the blues as a big fish had crushed my spinnerbait, jumped twice and then broke my spinner in half, returning only a blade on a stick. The fish looked 8 - 9 #'s so I figure he was at least 6 - 7#'s, I couldn't seem to put together another matching spinnerbait but offered my closest resemblance for the next 2 hours looking for another shot to no avail. not another strike for either of us.
Off to the east side of Farm 13 to fish some rats on thick matts of vegetation, one blast for Tricia with no hook-up. At about noon it was off to a another shell/mussel pile with at least a laydown log or two sprawled about in 6' of water, we bombed the area for 4 hours, catching 16 fish barely ever moving the boat. Fire tiger and tennessee shad crankbaits grinding the shells were most productive but the carolina-rig scored a few as well, Tricia jumped one off by the boat probably about 5#'s and you heard my lost fish sob.
19 fish for the day for us , Steve"express" had a dozen, Scott Welcome and (1) guest had over 20 , and good friend, local fisherman, and proffessional billiard player , Roy Novak caught 11 , if I'm adding correctly that's over 62 fish from the marsh today by 6 fisherman, not a record breaker but would you mind catching 10 fish on a slow day ?
Very few places in the world, if any can honestly deliver the bass action that the Stick Marsh/Farm 13 impoundment can, My wife and I have fished from the big-O to the Susquehanna and have found our favorite lake, no comparison (opinion) to be right here where I was born and in fact by our choice, our lives completely revolve around the bass-action, beauty and constantly changing Stick Marsh/ Farm 13 reservoir. You've probably stood in line hours for a 30 second ride. Get in now, no waiting, and ride until your little heart is content !!! This is bass fishing disney world and the parking lot is empty !!! With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip, you simply can't go wrong !!!
www.BASSTRIPS.comGUARANTEEDFISHON@MSN.com
"STICK MARTIAN"
RANDY SANDERS
RANDY SANDERS
05/10/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Went to the Stick Marsh Wednesday with my wife Tricia and started fishing about 7:30am right near the boat ramp. The wind was calm and we had no action, we started up about 8:15 and went down the canal North of the ramp about 1/2 mile or so and veered left into an area I call "Airboat Flats". I threw a devils horse topwater and Tricia fished a buzzbait for about 15 minutes , I had a single ferocious strike with no hook-up. Our next stop was "Cherokee Cove", the big cut through the palms into the main lake, I rarely pass this area up as there is frequently current here. The water remains dirty here but the fish are catchable, the lure choice here for me is a fire tiger bomber crankbait that runs about 6' deep, Tricia opts for tennessee shad. I caught 5 fish and Tricia 2 with no big fish, the last 2 times I have stopped here we have caught 7 fish pretty quickly. In this area, the fish are not always in the cut but very nearby, the further you move into the lake, the higher the chances you will have to switch to a spinnerbait or topwater but don't go too far unless you are onto a pattern. Fire tiger and other heavily contrasting patterns seem to produce more strikes while searching through dirty water, yet once a "sweetspot" is located, I believe retrieve speed, and "contact with the cover the fish are relating to" is more important than color. At about 9:15 or so we went to the SE corner of the marsh, anchored within casting range of a submerged levy littered with shells, logs, etc. and began casting. We fished for about 20 minutes before Tricia got a nice hit right at the boat but didn't hook the fish, then I caught a 2 lb. fish right at the boat. Taking the hint I pulled up 12-15' of anchor rope and within 5 minutes we boated 5 more fish, one a 5 1/4 lb. fish shown above (depending on what site you are on) weighed on the "bogagrip scale". For maybe 10 minutes we were really busy, you must take advantage of these momentary feeding frenzies which was exactly what it was, I briefly scolded myself for having to re-adjust anchor line in the middle of our "window of oppurtunity". No more strikes besides some nibbles on carolina-rigged worms that I think were bluegill so at 11:00 we went to "Slingshot Slough" in the SW corner of Farm 13. Although we saw several large surface explosions we only boated 1fish on topwater, a 3 pound fish that clobbered a fire tiger Berkley frenzy pop. The wife had lunch plans and I had some frogs to modify for the june , july hydrilla matt bite so at about 12:45 we bailed out with 14 fish. Bass fishing at the Stick Marsh is generally incredible but rarely "automatic" especially when fishing artificial lures, persistence, patience, and optimism are always reccommended. If you don't fish here often I reccomend starting with crankbaits or carolina rigs near a point or a cut through a levy and don't fish further than 150 yards from it unless you're onto something, the shiner bite has been very tough but if you must fish live bait I reccommend slow-trolling or drifting them as deep as possible without snagging. There is low oxygen levels in much of the surface water therefore killing baits that are not trolled or fished below the bad water. There are fish in many places here but there are always some near the points and cuts, some are better than others.
Remember, 10% of fisherman catch 90% of the fish so if you decide to hire a guide, to make the most of your money & time, you may want to make sure that guide fishes Stick Marsh regularly, and doesn't just show up for booked trips, the fish here move, water levels, clarity, vegetation, and other factors are constantly changing. No one knows the Stick Marsh so well that they no longer need to fish it regularly to know where and how to catch the fish. Get out there and see what you can find , or if you would like to avoid the search,call or email me and I'll treat you like kings and/or queens while catching fish at the world famous Stick Marsh !!! Check out www.BASSTRIPS.com , with 100% GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip, you simply can't go wrong !!!
"STICK MARTIAN" Full-time pro guide Randy Sandersguaranteedfishon@msn.com
Fish on Bass & Saltwater Fishing Excursions With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Pro guide Randy Sanders
05/07/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Jason Purvis and I hit the Stick Marsh at 7am Saturday morning with high hopes after hitting some nice quality fish the day before(see the 5-3 report with pic) Jason booked 2 days and stayed to fish 4. We began right by the ramp basically because we couldn't wait to fish and there are fish almost everywhere in the marsh. However besides a couple of missed crankbait strikes, maybe bass, possibly bream, or even collisions with shad are often mistaked as strikes, it's hard to tell for sure without bustin' out the mask & snorkel which I don't reccommend with the dino-gators cruising around here looking for mates right now. At any rate we were still fishless at 8:30am. We then went to hit a few shell piles that had been good to us in previous outings in the east rim canal on the Stick Marsh side, we again fished fire tiger and hot mustard crankbaits that run about 5-7' grinding shellbeds for about 15 minutes, then we carolina rigged,texas rigged,softjerkbaits,nothing. At about 9:15 we were still without fish. Persistence, focus, and optimism are critical at this point, Jason doesn't need to be reminded of this, his motivation to fish is overwhelming. One more stop before we hit Farm 13. Another shellbed, a big one, with numerous totally submerged logs, and about an 8' cut right through the middle, we anchored. If you feel you know where the "sweetspot" of an area is, anchor, no trolling motor frequencies and being able to concentrate more on your lure of choice without fighting wind, current, etc., will put more fish in the boat. We really had alot of confidence in our crankbaits and it finally paid off, at about 9:30 we got into fish, both our cranks were getting slammed almost every casts for about 30 minutes, I'm honestly not exactly sure how long they bit but a few were missed, a couple jumped off, and we had a double-hookup right to the boat but Jason's got away. After 11 to the boat they shut down as quickly as they turned on, we threw everything in the book at the same area, then fished the closest deep water, then back to the "sweetspot", they had vanished. When fish show up in numbers like they had earlier, even when they do move off the "sweetspot" or just "shut down", you can usually still find a stray nearby with a crank or spinnerbait but we had somehow lost touch completely. Around 12:00 we went to the SW corner of Farm 13 and began filtering through the thick stuff. I went with a no-brainer and fished with a 1/2 oz. fire tiger rattletrap ripping it over stumps, then letting it fall into the hydrlla and tearing it out, that's when my strikes came, though it wasn't easy, many hang-ups, and tired hands were certainly part of the process. Jason chose a different approach completely, a pop-r that he shaved down to float high in the water making it possible to pop, and fish "walk-the-dog" retrieves. He coaxed about 9 to hit topwater and between us we boated another 15 pushing our total to 26 before calling it quits at about 4:30pm. I got the biggest fish shown above though not very big by Stick Marsh/Farm 13 standards, we didn't weigh her but she was 4 to 4 1/2 lbs. Jasons persistence & optimism never lacked, combined with great conversation, and lots of laughs we had a few awesome days on the marsh and Jason's says he'll be back next month. With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip, you simply can't go wrong !!!
GUARANTEEDFISHON@MSN.com"STICK MARTIAN" RANDY SANDERS
Fish on Bass & Saltwater Fishing Excursions With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
JASON PURVIS
05/03/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Jason Purvis from Panama City, Fl and I hit the Stick Marsh Friday about 2:15- 6pm. We were delayed by some large Indian River Trout that morning. We had recently been experiencing a decent afternoon bite at the marsh and we were also optimistic because the pressure had been relatively stable for almost 3 days now and more fish (or bigger) were sure to start feeding. Though we caught good numbers of bass wednesday and thursday we were really looking for the big bite. We fished several points & cuts in the Stick Marsh where we scored previously mostly on carolina rigs but Friday they didn't care for the c-rigs, it seemed to be mainly a crankbait bite, anything fire tiger or chartreuse grinding shellbeds & chunk rock, when they hit they would usually clobber the baits, great quality fish 3-9lbs. , 7 made it to the boat in a little over 3 1/2 hours, several were missed but sometimes it was hard to tell strikes from collisions as we ran our crankbaits through massive schools of gizzard shad suspending at about 3 feet, the bass were under the shad sitting on the "piles" Jason hit a 5.25 lb fish on his first cast, I got a 9 a few casts later, both fish weighed on the Boga Grip, and to think there are fish out here twice that size !!!
stick martianRandy Sanders
JASON PURIVS
5/02/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The last 2 days on the Stick Marsh has been beautiful weather however the barometric pressure has sky-rocketed immediately after sunrise so adjustments had to be made to catch fish. Jason Purvis of Panama City, Fl and I changed our approach from rattletrapping flats to carolina-rigging points and cuts. In high pressure situations on the marsh my prime strategy is to get off the flats and hit the points and cuts but what is more important than just being in the right place is reading the water. On every cut & point in the marsh there is current of some type at some time, these currents move shells, mussels, logs, etc. In the cuts and points where currents bend, the above mentioned debree is USUALLY pushed to the outside of the current just out of the main current but still in current, this is where piles are formed, any debree stacks in these areas but in the Stick Marsh these objects are mostly mussels, logs and chunk rock. Bass also prefer to be near the moving water, they are not ambush predators by choice, they do not have the stamina to stay in the moving water for long periods of time therefore these "piles" offer perfect holding zones, as mentioned they are usually on current bends allowing the bass (and other fish) to look straight into the current without fighting it, allowing them to save all their energies for that unsuspecting baitfish, etc. How is all this related to high pressure ? In high pressure situations fish USUALLY either tighten up to cover or suspend somewhere mid-water column. The fish will not move much and the suspended fish must be nearly hit head-on to draw the strike and is not USUALLY a dependable pattern. Down-sizing can be critical during high pressure situations but in our deeply tanin stained waters, "downsized lures" and "trying to cover water" are direct contradictions of each other USUALLY. There are ALWAYS fish on cuts & points, the most critical part of your task (my task) is to find the "piles" , due to the high pressure the fish there are not moving. The best way to find these areas and catch these fish in my opinion is with a 1/2 oz. or larger carolina-rigged 4-6" straightail worm black, red, or purple in the dark water and watermelonseed, pumpkinseed, or green pumpkin if you can see 3 feet or more. Drag the c-rig as fast as possible maintaning bottom contact, when you hit "piles" you will feel the hardness of mussels, shells,etc. STOP, just let it sit there for 10- 20 seconds, then move the rig about an inch or two, stop, rinse, and repeat, when your back on the soft bottom continue fast dragging. There can be several hotspots in each point & cut and the silty feeling areas around the piles are usually a waste of time and by dragging them fast you can make the most of your time on the water. Jason Pervis is shown above (depending on which site you are viewing) with 1 of many bass he caught while he and I worked this pattern wednesday and thursday to put 34 fish in the boat, I fished 20# test today and was broke-off by fish 5 times, we never did land a big fish but there out there, some with my c-rigs in there face !!! There are many free-floating logs everywhere in the Stick Marsh and Farm 13 right now. They pulled the sunken bass boat out of the SW corner of Farm 13 today probably a victim of one of those stumps. Be careful out there. I have several openings soon so if you would like to eliminate the search and be treated like kings and/or queens while catching fish in the areas described above, please check out www.BASSTRIPS.com Email me at guaranteedfishon@msn.com or call (321)544-4534 With GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip you simply can't go wrong.
STICK MARTIANRANDY SANDERS
TRICIA SANDERS
04/29/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Ran back out with the wife monday after a half day trip and hit 4 fish quick at the first cut into the marsh, Tricia caught 3 on a bomber 7a and I got 1 on a carolina rigged junebug worm, all 1-3lbs except the 1 about 4-4.5lbs that jumped off Tricias crankbait by the boat. Shot over to the SW corner of the farm and threw SOB rattlin' shads for about 1.5 hours, Tricia tore me up again 4 to 3, I mastered catch and release this day as I released several before I even saw them. A steady quick retrieve seemed best for us with fire tiger being the color of choice we headed back with 11 fish, Tricia-7, Randy -4, why did I do that to myself ? Persistence is the key when fishing artificials, have fun, be safe.
stick martian,
Randy Sanders
JOHN & JERRY RICCARDIO
04/29/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Fished with father & son John & Jerry Riccardio on the marsh Monday, neither had ever fished with live shiners before but you never would have known it. Jerry and John both fish great and could have fished artificials but today was more about relaxation, family time and of course hopefully a monster bass would interrupt our day. Our first spot seemed to be the best only minutes from the ramp the fish were there and bit, slower than preferred but after a few fish with a half day scheduled we headed out to see the lake, they seemed pretty impressed with the wildlife, egrets, herons, osprey, gators, and we even found a sunken bass boat in farm 13, didn't see any signs of life around it so we called the officials and gave them the reg. #'s. After hitting some spots in the SW corner of Farm 13 with a few strikes but no hook-ups and limited time we went back to spot #1, again it was not fish after fish but we noticed that when we did not pay attention to our lines we got more bites, I know I know , that doesn't sound like a very solid pattern but I'm not one to argue with fish so we put on sunscreen, drank water, made phone calls, etc. Anything that would make the fish think we weren't paying attention, the fish's spotter was good and he wasn't falling for many of our tricks so I basically emptied all my tackle-stuffed compartments and did a little "Hot Stick Marsh Lures" presentation and right in the middle of my buzzbait discussion we were pleasantly interrupted by the bait alarm, Jerry promptly threw down a hook-set that would have made Bill Dance jealous and after 2 beatiful jumps a "boga-grip 5lber." made it to the boat for photos. No huge fish caught on the trip but both anglers caught quality fish and assured me they would be back to fish with me again, that last fish gave us great ending but I think the real catch here was the father/son time together. When we arrived at the ramp there was my wife with HER baitcasters in hand and that look in her eye so off we went, we'll let you know !!! www.basstrips.com stick martian Randy Sanders
With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
RUSTY KEMPER
4/25/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Hit the marsh today with Rusty Kemper of Melbourne, Fl with shiners and artificials on the schedule. Water looked pretty good but things started slow in the SW corner of the farm with only 1 fish in the first 2 hours for Rusty on a 8" texas rigged junebug worm and 2 missed fish, Rusty assured me he had never missed a bass, must have been bluegill hopped up on steroids, who knows ? I really wanted him to throw a lipless crankbait but he really loves to fish a worm. With only a half day scheduled the pressure was on so I shot to a good shiner hole near the ramp and sat on em' for 2 hours, most of the fish right now won't come to the surface to eat so putting a split shot about 6" above your shiner and fishing your bait as deep as possible without hanging up is reccomended if you must fish live bait. This also hides your bait from hungry birds above. 8 bites and 6 fish to the boat, again I was assured no bass had been missed. No big fish today but they all pulled like they were something and kept us guessing. After dropping Rusty back at the ramp, I headed back out and scored several fish on a Bomber 7A crankbait (firetiger) in the SE corner of the marsh, then a couple at the south point at the west end of the E/W canal, same crankbait, nothing big at either spot. Headed to the SW corner of the farm and hit a couple dinks pretty far back in there with a firetiger lipless crank. Within about an hour I saw 10-12 solid topwater strikes so of course I tried but no takers on topwater, then I busted out a 5" chartreuse pepper berkley jerk shad and got blasted about 2 inches below the surface on what looked to be a good fish, 5#s or so but who really knows ? when I set the hook I just got the knot back, no breaks, it just slipped through the hook eyelet, I rigged another and never got bit again, oh well. 16 fish for the day with no monsters but lots of fun, with lots of casts required, if you get frustrated after casting for twenty minutes with no results you will probably get frustrated, but if you casts persistently, optimisticly, you will catch fish and they will most likely hit hard and fight the same. Remember,a slow day at the marsh is still a great day at many fine lakes!!!
stick martian, Randy SandersFish on Bass & Saltwater Fishing Excursions With hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
TRICIA SANDERS
4/23/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Fished the marsh today with my wife Tricia from 9- 3:30 , we caught 7 fish pretty quickly in the NE cut into the marsh on texas-rigged 6" black/blue carolina crawlers by Berkley and some junebug ribbontails I'm not sure who made, Tricia hooked 1 about 4.5-5lbs. that managed to wiggle away before a picture could be taken but we were sure a larger fish would be hooked so we weren't too concerned. The water was a little dirty but obviously not too dirty, no rattle used. We then talked with a reliable source who caught some fish on soft-jerkbaits in the area NW of the ramp I described in detail in my report submitted 4-22, not sure what color he was fishing but I know watermelon seed works back there in the clear water. We then went to the SE corner of the marsh where we through crankbaits of several sorts to no avail, feeling there were fish there because of the massive bait abundance we switched to 1/4oz. carolina-rigged 6" black Berkley power slug and fished them slow, we caught 6 more fish but none over 3 lbs in decent water and headed to the cut in the levy almost all the way down the E/W canal on the right (north) where the wife hit 2 more small fish right in the cut on her junebug worm. Off to the farm we went with 15 fish directly to the SW corner of the marsh to try and get that shot at a big fish. Once past the shelter on the right we immediately noticed cleaner water than the rest of the marsh or the farm that I have seen besides that area I mentioned earlier, I hear the water at the spillway is clean but I don't usually fish there so I'm not sure. Some sections were cleaner than others but it's all pretty clean in the corner, the ditch intersections are dirty however which means about nothing, there are fish at all of the intersections , naturally some are better than others. We only fished the SW corner in the farm and after an hour of soft-jerkbaits and spinnerbaits with no fish we resorted to the trusty 1/2 oz. firetiger Rattlin' Shad by SOB, reeling the bait slowly until it stuck in the grass, then ripping it out drew strikes from many fish but only 9 more made it to the boat, nothing big but 24 hard-fighting 1-3# fish and hangin' with the wife made it a great day. Somehow we managed to catch a few everywhere we put down the trolling motor and I don't think it was just our skills, did I mention we started at 9;oo am ? The fish are generally more active now than anytime in the last 4 months,however persistence, patience, and focus almost always required Tricia noted egrets,herons,gators,osprey,an owl of some sort, a reddish egret (I think) and a funny looking fellow in a kayak with shorts much too small that looked as though he may have been smuggling out an undersized fish. Have Fun !!!
stick martian, Randy SandersDate:4/21/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The Stick Marsh is definately the place to be right now, the fishing in general right now is the best I've seen in quite a while. In the flats NW of the boat ramp the water is beautiful and visibility is up to 4 feet in some areas. This area is not out the cut through the palms into the main lake, go north from the boat ramp to the extreme north canal ( c-54 continuation) and head west about a mile to the flats on the left with all the shiner bait poles, you're there , now throw a baby minus crankbait, watermelonseed Berkley jerk shad jerkbait, or white/silver willow bladed spinnerbaits in a breeze, the water is clean and the bait abundance is huge. There is at least 3 schools of fish in this area but less big fish than in the big lake.Many of the points near the ramp are holding fish that are catchable on Bomber 7a crankbaits, c-rigs, and drop shots during high pressure, low wind days, the above picture is a drop shot fish by the ramp. The NW corner of the marsh is holding loads of fish in dirty water. They are very catchable with firetiger SOB Rattlin' shad baits, dark colored Berkley soft jerkbaits, Berkley seems to have the best injected feeding enzymes to help the fish locate in dirty water, a rattle will speed your descent and obviously helps in the dirty water which is cleaning up. The SW corner of the farm is holding fish as usual and a shallow running Bomber crank or a SOB rattlin'shad has worked great for us, firetiger but with all the clean water coming from the spillway the farm is cleaning up and I suspect shad patterns will soon come into play. The ditch intersections in the farm were still pretty dirty Sunday but I bet there are catchable fish there on lipless rattlebaits. No matter where you fish, it is usually not " automatic" and persistence, focus, and optimism always help. In my HONEST OPINION the next 2 months will be incredible here for topwater and buzzbait fishing but anyone who thinks they already know exactly when and where things will happen has already lost the battle, it is essential to stay open minded and the only way to know what will happen is to go so I'm goin' !!! Wanna go fishing ? check out www.basstrips.com , or call me on the boat at (321) 544-4534 .
stick martian, Randy Sanders
MARK
KYLE
Date Fished:3-12-02
Water Temperature: 64
Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
The 11th & 12th, Kyle Neely & Mark Palmer of Ann Arbor, Michigan fished the Stick Marsh with me 2 full days in BEAUTIFUL WATER, no kidding, 2-3 ft visibility in 5' of water mixed with hydrilla & coontail. There is a ton of clean water out there, you just have to look. Kyle & Mark religously fished with Baby "juan " minus crankbaits and scored heavily. A baby "juan" is a baby 1 minus crankbait with a mustache painted on, it worked so I made no comments. As the guys fished the artificials I maintained shiner rods out the back and I was occasionally able to interrupt them for a live bait hook-set. On Monday, 25 fish made it to the boat mostly on the crankbaits with big fish being 5 lbs. we never left the north end of the sticks. On tuesday we started out with the same plan, we fished our area til' 1pm and caught 13 bass, Kyle but-hooked a 22 lb. catfish on "Baby Juan" that nearly spooled him on braided line. The action slowed a bit so the guys mentioned seeing more of the lake so off we went. We went to the farm, SW corner where the water is nastiest, we deliberately fished the dirty-water to see what all the fuss was about, trust me, the fish are still there and they will bite, if you get it in your head that the water is too-dirty there you probably won't catch but if you throw that shallow- running crank and steadily retrieve it past each stump at least 4 times on each side and move on you will catch fish. We even scored on texas-rigs in the dirty stuff with biggest Farm fish being 4lbs caught on you guessed it , "Baby Juan " . Kyle and Mark got tons of pictures of fish, herons, egrets,etc. not to mention the gator that chased a topwater to the boat. I am 1 of only 4 full-time guides on the marsh and with GUARANTEED SATISFACTION on every trip you simply cannot go wrong. Thanks to a few other top-notch guides, parties of up to 16 anglers can be accomodated with fair notice.
Stick Martian, Randy Sanders 
JOSH
3/06/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
I have had the pleasure of spending today on the marsh with Josh Wilson (12), and Dad Joe Wilson of Kentucky. First of all I have to mention how lucky I am to meet the people I do, Josh for instance is only 12 but showed incredible patience and the manners any parent would die for, when talking to Joe it is quickly apparent why Josh is so polite, he's happy , and for good reason, Joe is about the coolest Dad a guy could have with immediately apparent strong family values (and a pond). Both are excellent fisherman and my money is on Josh in any casting contest. We spent about 75% of our time in the Stick Marsh, the rest in the farm. We had a good time both days but the bites were slow and the fish were difficult to hook sometimes spittin' out the baits before we could do much about it. Each angler caught 6 lb. bass, and Josh caught a 13# mudfish( chocolate bass ) I told him. I did hit a good fish in the SW corner of the Farm ripping a trap through the junk. Later back at the ramp, Hugh Crumpler said he had buzzbait fish, then offered to show me, HMMM, lets see, FISHING, WITH HUGH, and BUZZBAITS so we ran back out and to no surprise,yep, he does.
stick martian, Randy Sanders2/21/02
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Today I had the pleasure of fishing with Dee Davies, her son Greg, and his girlfriend Jennifer, we started out fishing for spawning fish with shiners in the sticks and landed 4 fish, 1 on an S.O.B. Spinnerbait by Bill Dee before the wind blew and the water became dirty, no hawgs but decent fish guarding beds. When the wind picked up the ladies mentioned getting out of the wind and maybe getting a little sun, I had just the spot to do a little nature tour and hopefully score some post-spawn schoolers. Amidst checking out some alligators, osprey, herons, egrets, limpkins, gallinules, and many other critters we were often pleasently interrupted by bass blasting our shiners, 3-4 bites every 30 minutes hooking about 50% we ended up with 14 bass and a mudfish( chocolate bass sounds better). Is was a relatively slow bite but patience paid off turning a tough day into a fun day.
stick martian, Randy Sanders
DENNIE
SCOTT
2/20/02
Water Temperature: 62
Water Clarity: 1 foot
Despite extreme winds, father & son team Dennis & Scott Davis pulled 23 hard fighting Stick Marsh bass to the boat, no monsters were caught however four fish were right at/or a little over 5 lbs. on the Boga Grip. These guys set the hook like pros and many bass left with crossed eyes. Most fish were caught on shiners but when the wind allows, Berkley Power Lizards, many styles of hard and soft-jerkbaits, and just about any artificial that is thrown with persistence continue to produce dinks and chunks on the Farm and Stick sides. In the topwater department, propbaits seem more productive than chugs, 1 prop when calm, 2 in the chop, orange bellies are my favorite. Have fun, be safe.
stick martian,Randy Sanders
TRICIA ROBERTSON
2/19/02
Water Temperature: 63
Water Clarity: 1 foot
The temperature dropped and the wind blew but Tricia & Gary Robertson of Chattanooga, Tennesse refused to be denied !!!
Most fish were caught on shiners on the stick side but several were scored in the farm on Berkley Power Lizards and hard jerkbaits Sunday and Monday. Come back soon Trish & Gary !!!
stick martian, Randy SandersWith hard-core experience to put you on the fish, show you the feeding habits,and migration routes of BIG BASS, you'd better not miss the boat!
Please forgive me as my reports are running a little behind, I ate so much turkey Thursday, Friday, and Saturday I was in a slight tripdephan coma only to awake to problem after problem Monday morning. First a rainstorm, then no trailer lights, got to the ramp and the live well pump wouldn’t work so I ran the boat to manually fill the live wells, engine broke, cancelled the trip and figured I would come home and do some laundry, washing machine broke, DAMN THE BAD LUCK !!!, should have ate more turkey and gone back to bed. I have heard it said many times that when things go wrong it happens in sets of three, I think whoever said that first was an optimist and I’d like to slap him five times.
Water Temperature: 58Water Clarity: 2-3 feet
Flip, flip, flip, thump, set hard and hold on !!!
LINE-HOOKS-
BAITS-
Skip the rattles unless the water is dirty (unlikely at Garcia)
COLORS-HOWEVER-
WHERE-
Randy Sanders
www.BASSTRIPS.com
(321) 544-4534
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