Top 5 Patterns from Clear Lake – Day 2
Shad spawn and bass spawn in play for final day
Wayne Breazeale extended his Clear Lake lead by catching a limit of 22 pounds, 7 ounces on day two of the Costa FLW Series Western Division event presented by Evinrude.
Fishing a mix of docks, riprap and tules, the leader caught his fish on drop-shots and wacky-rigged Senkos. Here are the details of the rest of the top five.
2. Joe Uribe Jr. – Surprise, Ariz. – 40-15 (10)
Not one to fix what isn’t broken, Joe Uribe Jr. mirrored his first day’s game plan by sacking up a good limit of fish during the fast-and-furious action of the morning shad spawn in front of Rodman Slough. Picking his way through a nearly every cast kind of catch fest, the Arizona pro had five in the livewell within the first hour and then spent the rest of the day on an upgrade mission.
“At 8 o’clock this morning, I said, ‘I’m going fishing tomorrow,’” Uribe says. “The morning was just epic with the spot that I have. I had a few other anglers in there, but they stayed back and let me do my thing. I really appreciate that.”
Uribe caught his early morning fish on a 3/8-ounce under-spin with a 5-inch Keitech swimbait.
“When the fish would come up and bust shad, I could make a long cast on them and slow-roll it over the weed holes and pop it out of the grass to get them to bite. Also, the single hook allowed me to get better hook-up percentages than a treble hook bait.”
Once that bite tapered off, he switched to a drop-shot with a 6-inch Roboworm (margarita mutilator) and a Neko-rigged Daiwa Yamamoto Neko Fat worm.
“I used the drop-shot to fish weed holes, and I used the Neko rig to fish docks,” he says. “The Neko rig was a gliding presentation, and they were picking it up mostly on the fall.”
3. Nick Nourot – Benicia, Calif. – 38-14 (10)
Catching the day’s heaviest bag – 23-5 – pushed Nick Nourot up from 18th to third with a total weight of 38-14. The Benicia, Calif., pro ran the same pattern that yielded 15-9 on day one, but today brought a pleasant surprise.
“In the afternoon, the fish moved up, and they were not only suspended, they were locking down on beds,” Nourot says. “I only caught one bed fish, but they were all really fat; they were prespawners coming in to spawn.
“I think I can catch them tomorrow because they came up at the end of the day. They just appeared out of nowhere. There was a guy in there, and he said, ‘This stinks. I’m outta here.’ But I hung around there another 30 minutes and caught a 6-pounder, a 5 and a 4.”
Nourot caught his staging fish on a slow-rolled swimbait, while his bed fish bit a drop-shot with a Roboworm. That new arrival apparently brought a suitcase of aggression to the maternity ward.
“It was trying to eat bluegills and things that were swimming by its bed; it was that hot,” Nourot says. “It wasn’t there five minutes before. That was an easy catch.”
Prior to his afternoon rally, Nourot caught his first keeper in the early morning on a wacky-rigged Yamamoto Senko fished over a 10-foot grass flat.
4. Vince Hurtado – Turlock, Calif. – 35-12 (10)
Starting the day in third place, Vince Hurtado returned to the transitional area where he targeted fish coming and going on day one. Today brought a more challenging scenario, and Hurtado added 16-11 to his 19-1 from yesterday and dropped a spot to fourth with 35-12
“The fish are still doing the same thing, but I had a little company today, which is always a little difficult because I’m shutting off all my electronics and trying to be really quiet, but you have trolling motors and big motors all around you,” he says. “These fish are coming in to spawn, and they’re leaving for postspawn.”
Hurtado caught most of his fish on reaction baits, but mixed in some slower presentations.
“When I slow down, it’s just to let the area rest,” he says. “I don’t want to keep throwing the same thing; I’m mixing it up.”
5. Richard Dobyns – Marysville, Calif. – 35-7 (10)
Catching the biggest fish of the event – an 8-7 – helped Richard Dobyns race up the standings with a 15-spot gain that secured his final-round berth. Starting the day in 20th place, the Marysville, Calif., pro added 20 pounds to the 15-7 he weighed yesterday and tallied a fifth-place total of 35-7.
“I had a 10-pound limit in the boat, and I was just trying to upgrade,” Dobyns says. “I found a couple of 3-pounders and just stuck with my pattern. That big one was a Hail Mary fish. I just got lucky, but you take them as they come.”
Having struggled with the bed-fishing game on day one, Dobyns says he decided to just go fishing today.
“It was just slowing down. I caught all my fish on wacky-rigged Senkos [green pumpkin watermelon] and drop-shots with Roboworms [margarita mutilator],” he says. “I can catch topwater fish, but I’m not catching the right topwater fish.”