Buggs Island: Social media roundup

The 2023 St. Croix Bassmaster Open at Buggs Island is set to begin in a matter of hours. We scanned social media and texted a few of the anglers to see if they had any practice pics to share for the first stop of Division #3 of the Opens, and the third stop for the Opens EQ anglers. Flooded trees and bushes are the talk of the town for this one.

The Opens anglers have been catching lots of bass, Brad Luethener here with a good one.

We checked in with Opens EQ angler Joey Nania for a Skype call on how his practice was going. You can check that out here as well.

Nania is concentrating shallow, using spinnerbaits…

… and swimbaits to target bass around the bushes.

Then he’s backing off and picking the deeper water apart with a Ned rig.

The pattern seems to be working well for Nania through practice, but he is a little concerned as to what the rising water will do to his bite.

Nania snapped a photo of the flooded bushes he is fishing. These abound on Buggs Island at the moment, as the water has risen to nearly 4 feet over full pool.

Hugh Cosculluela isn’t impressed with this catch.

But he’s feeling better about this one.

Casey Scanlon with another of the wrong variety.

The rain set in on Sunday, and Bobby Lane was less than enthused by it.

Trevor McKinney was on a pretty good bite.

But he said the rain has wrecked his area and now he’s looking to regroup.

All the water from the launch ramp up looks like chocolate milk according to McKinney.

Kyle Patrick with what looks like a good one…

…until you turn it sideways. A lot of the bass are post-spawn on Buggs Island, something the anglers were surprised to see this early in the year.

Jason Menninger with another post-spawn fish.

But make no mistake, there are still a few fat pre-spawn females…

… as Menninger displays with this plump 5-pounder from practice.

Blake Smith with a solid fish, and showing the vast difference between water clarity on some parts of the lake.

Ish Monroe is making a run at re-qualifying for the Bassmaster Elite Series this season.

And he’s catching the right kind during practice.

Joey Hanna with a nice Buggs Island largemouth. There are very few spotted bass in this fishery.

Garrett Paquette with a chunk on a topwater. The bass are pre-spawn, spawn, post-spawn and guarding fry. The latter two make for good topwater fishing.