Anglers are hooked on being the best

This sudden change in temperature seemed to have an influence on the fishing and made weighing a limit not as easy as expected. Only a quarter of the teams weighed five fish, while a third of the boats managed only one bass or less.

Not only was the fishing tough, but at around 13:00, strong wind forced some of the boats off the dam before the scheduled weigh in. Despite the cold weather, there were 36 teams in the event, only seven boats less than the same tournament last year.

Also read: Competition steps up as bass take the bait

Interestingly, the winning bag this year was almost identical to that of last year’s June event at Vygeboom. Team Hooked Again’s bag of 5,36 kilograms was 160 grams heavier than team Thermocline’s five-fish-limit last year.

The largest bass weighed this year was 1,69 kilograms, nearly identical to last year’s bass of 1,655 kilograms. Compared to the previous tournament at Vygeboom, there was more movement both up and down on the Angler Team of the Year (AOY) leaderboard.

Also read: Lowveld Bass Trails end season with show stopping finale

Both Team Osprey and Team Angling & Outdoor World climbed nine places. The former leaped from 30th to 21st, while the latter vaulted from 25th to 16th. Performing poorly was team Passion for Bass which fell 11 spots from 17th to 28th after not being able to attend the tournament.

In total, 14 teams moved up, 34 teams moved down and nine teams had no change to their log position. There’s still a lot of fishing to go with three regular tournaments remaining in the season, so things are guaranteed to change again.

After a great start to the season, finishing 8th, 12th, 2nd, 3rd and 1st in the first five tournaments, team Hooked Again has moved into first place in the AOY standings, closely followed by Imbongolo which moved up three places into second.

Also read: Anglers’ patience yields results

Patterns revealed

According to many of the anglers, the bass were not biting the way they were during practice, and most anglers resorted to finer techniques to get some fish in their livewells.

Zoom’s Z3 Swamp Crawler and similar finesse-type worms rigged on a drop shot were responsible for many of the bass weighed. However, the winners of the tournament had an altogether different strategy. Tjaart Kruger and Vincent Cadle of Team Hooked Again employed Strike King’s KVD squarebill crankbaits in the 1,5 and 2,5 sizes to entice their fish.

These lures had a good erratic action with the wandering and searching motions they needed to lure those winning bass that were found shallower than most anglers anticipated. The bass might not have been at their biting best at Vygeboom, but an interesting by-catch was made when a grass carp that couldn’t resist a craw-coloured rattle trap was hooked.

This monster fish weighed over 20 kilograms and was caught by Rudolf Vermaak of Team Dream Catcher which finished second in their very first LBT tournament.

Also read: Its all about that bass at Driekoppies Dam

Next tournament

On Saturday July 9 the LBT venue will be Driekoppies Dam for the first of two (being held in July and August) tournaments at the venue. It will start at 07:00. This means registration will be open from 06:00 and the rules briefing will be at 06:45.

This is definitely the prime time to hit Driekoppies. To give you an idea, during the August 2015 competition, the average top-10 bag was 6,35 kilograms. Fourteen bass of over two kilograms were weighed during the two events and 376 bass were brought to the scale. The current LBT record was caught during this tournament by Frank Gottschalk.

A lunker of 4,42 kilograms. In other words, if there are two events you do not want to miss, it is these two.

Top 10 from Vygeboom Dam (five fish caught)

1. Hooked Again, 12,360kg – R3 500 cash. LBT, R2 500 cash from Subaru Nelspruit and Vehicle, and fuel prize for next event

2. Dream Catcher, 11,885kg – R2 000 cash from Venom Lures and R1 000 cash from LBT

3. Bass Bangers, 11,110kg – R2 000 cash from NTT Barberton

4. Imbongolo, 10,605kg – Angling & Outdoor World voucher and Itty’s secret baits hamper worth R1 700 

5. Wittus Angling Bass, 10,020kg – Warehouse Hamper and Sakata worth R1 600

6. Osprey, 9,835kg – Midas and Liqui Moly hamper worth R1 400

7. Angling & Outdoor World, 9,960kg – Solly’s voucher and Midas hamper worth R1 300

8. T&H, 9,035kg – Midas hamper worth R1 200

9. Fast Track, 8,970kg – Midas hamper worth R1 100

10. Doba Doba (four fish caught), 8,660kg – Solly’s voucher and Midas hamper worth R1 000.