Saturday morning on Rayburn "Santa" Clint Wade of Outlaw Outdoors brought 24 degree temps to Rayburn (that's Steve "Moonpie" Evans my partner for the day with Santa, I held the dog and played photog). The water temp as we idled out was hovering around 50 but as soon as the sun hit the water it warmed quickly. We took a chance and made a pass on a group of trap fish and were able to catch three on a 1/2 oz trap and then popped one a little over 5 on an a-rig. The area of the lake we were in there is still matted grass out to 7-8 foot deep and then scattered out to about 11 (if these really cold nights persist I think you will start seeing the grass fall over pretty soon, usually happens if we get prolonged water temps in the low 50's or colder). The first three were on top of the grass, then the bigger fish was on the outside edge, which is really more scattered grass than an edge. We had 4 probably in a half hour and it really slowed thereafter. Luckily we culled a fish and then caught an 8.08 out of a 27 foot brushpile. Interestingly we spent the majority of the rest of the day, with the bulk of our catch in the box by 9:30-10:00, out deep trying to cull up. Not sure if it was the hi pressure, east wind, poor fishing skills or what but we didn't help the stringer at all doing that. With about 30 minutes left we went thru a grass scrape I had been catching some fish out of but due to poor execution on 5 bites we were only able to cull with one 3 lber. This is one of those that got away, we really had a chance to bust a big stringer today, but from the results with only 23 and change winning several teams are probably thinking the same thing. But great fun, super tournament for a great cause put on by Clint and Stacy from Outlaw and Hunter from TriLakes, well done all. Blog on really fun Sunday with a new PB to come!

If you don't know about it there is a Toys for Tots tournament this weekend on Rayburn put on by TriLakes Tackle and Outlaw Outdoors. Great group of guys, little or no cost tournament, and the weather looks stellar. I got down there two weeks ago and the small fish fishing was pretty great, lots of 2-3 lb fish, catching them on top...all the way down to 32 feet. With the cool nights this week I would guess the trap bite might heat back up, if not pick up your flippin gear or your whopper plopper and see what happens! Hope to see everyone down for a good cause.

In case you missed it last week was the FLW Costa Championship on Kentucky Lake, if you missed it, that's ok, I was there and I missed it as well. Kentucky Lake is known for it's spectacular summer ledge fishing...not its fall fishing. It is the most humiliating week I have ever spent on a lake. First the ugly, I had never zeroed in an FLW event before, and not only did I blank on day 1, I followed it with a blank on day 2 as well. What's worse is this was, after my practice, absolutely no surprise.  There was little reason to pre-practice as the fish would have been out deep not long ago, so when I arrived mid-day last Saturday, about 6 hours behind when official practice started, it was the first time I had ever set eyes upon the lake. And it is gorgeous, good water color, leaves on the trees were brilliant, so I dumped my Ranger in and went north, which oddly there is downriver as the lake actually flows south to north. I checked an area a friend had told me about and got no bites, nothing really interesting, so I came about half way back up the lake to about 7 miles from Paris Landing where we were fishing out of and caught a solid 2 and one about 3 1/2 in the back of a creek on a Biffle Bug. That was my action for the day, so next morning I headed south, way up the river to the New Johnsonville area where the BFL regional was won a few weeks prior. Fishing dark til dark, I never had a bite...well actually I caught a skipjack on a squarebill. So Monday I came back south and over the course of a day, again dark to dark, I had one keeper bite, a 5 lber from about 12" of water I saw chasing bait. So Tuesday, my last day of practice I decided that I had to find the bait, as I was seeing very little shallow so I went out and starting in the river idled up a creek until I saw bait, which were piled in a corner, first cast with a C-Rig produced what I surmised was a barfish, second cast the same, third cast similar bite but it held on, a 6 lb largemouth. I didn't make another cast on the spot and fished 20 more similar spots until dark ran me off the water...that was the last keeper bite I saw while I was there (not only did I not catch any, I never saw a keeper caught). I wasn't alone, over 40 of the 193 pros that qualified and fished blanked both days. The FLW Tour angler of the year Bryan Thrift made us all feel small with 27 lbs day one, but Ky Lake bit him the following two days when he could only muster two fish on day 2, and blanked on the final day. One guy caught a limit all three days, of 193 pros only 7 caught limits both the first two days, get this, the 2nd-10th place guys that fished the last day, had the lake all to themselves, they weighed 8 fish, total, 9 guys that had "figured it out" weighed 8 fish with all that money on the line.  I have never seen fishing that tough in my life, and I'm glad to be back in Texas...only problem is I'm going back up there this weekend for the Wildcard, after having seen 4 keepers in 7 days of fishing.