Yesterday, flags stood like rippled plywood. Today, they’ll casually flutter.
No overstating it: That’s a big deal.
Anglers fishing the St. Croix Bassmaster Open at Buggs Island Lake found this Roanoke River reservoir roiled by 15- to 20-mph winds that gusted significantly higher. Reports of 5-foot waves on the main lake greatly curtailed running, as big water not only challenges safe navigation, it chews up the clock and decreases time efficiency.
Day 2 will remove these limitations and allow anglers to fish where and how they want. Realistically, it’s not possible to cover all of this lake’s 50,000 acres in a day, but the freedom to buzz across the lake, hop to another creek, or run down to the dam as needed will liberate game plans and allow anglers to fish freely.
Day-1 leader Powell Kemp said he was greatly limited in accessing only a tiny portion of the areas he has amassed over two decades of local experience. Today will likely see more of his preferred run-and-gun style.
Elsewhere, a few Bassmaster Opens Elite Qualifiers (Opens EQ) anglers shared their insights and weather perspectives:
Diversity Returned: Casey Scanlon’s no stranger to rough water, as the Ozark lakes of his Missouri home can get pretty sporty when the wind howls. Still, he fished a tenth of what he’d found at Buggs Island.
“I didn’t get to fish 90% of what I found in practice,” said Scanlon, who placed eighth on Day 1. “I got a few good bites early, fished some new water and just kept my head down and tried to not beat myself up. I made short moves all day and caught a dozen keepers.”
Pattern Plan: Louisiana’s Clark Reehm, who fished the Elites from 2008-2013, described Buggs Island as a pattern lake that is more easily exploited when calmer water increases running ability.
“It seems that you’re catching one fish here, one fish there; it’s not like you’ve got an area,” Reehm said. “I have shallow fish and deep fish. There are some very specific things I’m looking for shallow and once you get dialed in on what that is, you can start running that (in multiple locations).
“I have a lot of offshore rock and brush piles that I found graphing around in practice. I know the (Day-1) wind affected a lot of guys who were trying to use forward-facing sonar to find offshore fish because you couldn’t pinpoint a lot of the offshore stuff. In practice, you could pinpoint fish and pick them off.”
Reehm said that, while fish weights have been unpredictable, he believes the calmer conditions will send more robust limits to the Day-2 weigh-in.
Open Water Option: Tyler Williams of Belgrade, Maine said he found an offshore spot that produced daily practice bags of 19 and 21 pounds. Unfortunately, his spot was on the windward side of the lake and unfishable during Day-1.
“I couldn’t get to my fish (on Day 1),” Williams said. “I practiced on the wrong side of the lake for that wind. I should be able to get to them today.”
No Repeats: Arkansas pro Greg Bohanan started Day 1 with plans of making a long run downlake and then working through several other areas. An early stop on a spot much closer to takeoff yielded several good bites, so Bohanan decided to spend is day in that area.
A limit of 13-5 landed Bohanan in 23rd place. Today, he’ll take advantage of his expanded options in hopes of improving his position.
“One thing I’ve learned over my years of tournament fishing is that you don’t want to do the same thing two days in a row in the exact same area,” Bohanan said. “I plan on running a bunch of new water today and mixing it up.”
Brightness Decreased
Another significant difference from Day 1 will be cloud cover. Following the opening round’s bright conditions, anglers will have partly sunny skies today.
On one hand, anglers looking for a morning shad spawn probably saw that bite end pretty soon after daybreak. On the upside, sunshine bodes well for bed fishing. For one thing, warming sunlight minus the cold winds of Day 1 could trigger a strong midday movement. Also, brighter skies benefits sight fishing, so it will be interesting to hear how many anglers were “looking at ‘em” today.
