Mothers Day Massacre at Lake Barrett

[etucker1959]

One thing I learned in a life long of fishing experiences, "be prepared for everything possible." In our Mothers Day trip to Lake Barrett based on the earlier fish reports. I totally expected to put a hurt on the LMB that swim in that lake. I was reading in the pre opener that 2 individuals caught 278 Bass!!! Opening week the numbers were in the 25-50 Bass per rod range. With numbers like that how could we miss??? We were going on the 2nd weekend of the Season and things don't change that fast do they??? But me being me, I still brought a wide variety of fishing stuff that covered most bases. Last years trip was epic on the cranks. The only problem was my 2 companions left their talent at home that day. (their big problem was crappy equipment) I wasn't going to go another year, where I'm telling all our mutual friends what a great trip I had at Barrett and Dan said the trip sucked!!! This year I was going to fix that problem and bring my equipment for my friend Dan to use. It wasn't a big deal, 1 bait casting rod, 1 good spinning rod for Senkos and a light spinning rod with #2 for the pan fish on the dock. That's if we had any time left in the day after slaying 100 Bass between the 3 of us. Dan did bring a Barrett newbie with us, Jeff from the Aqueduct trips. (So I assumed Dan would inform him on what he needed to bring) He did sound like he knew how to catch a Bass, so I wasn't too worried about him.

On to the fishing!!!

This trip I was more of a passenger (I didn't drive) so I let them call the shots including driving the boat. We headed up the Hauser arm of the lake and ended up in the flooded brush area at the very end of the lake. It looked good with quite a few other boats were fishing the same area. I did see some good spots we passed along the way if these area didn't pan out for us. It started off pretty slow, I couldn't get bit on the top water or anything else I threw at them. Dan caught a few on a spinner bait but it was more work then it was worth to me. (I was saving my energy for the big score later at those other spots we passed) To kill some time and energy I broke out my Barbie pole to fish for some pan fish. It's a 4 foot pole with #2 test line and a light drag. I started fishing with a tiny grub and the Gills just loved it. These aren't your park size gills but Bluegills much bigger then your hand. (I was having a Blast!!!) Then I hooked something a little bigger, at first I thought it was a small Bass, nope it was a very nice Crappie. It was massive, close to 2 pounds!!! We then moved around a little more and I started Bass fishing again. I started catching a few but I also started catching just as many Crappies as Bass. Nice Crappies everyone one of them!! (all between 1.5-2 pound fish) By this time my ego wouldn't let me be a passenger any more. I wanted to run the boat and be the big hero in leading us to our 100 Bass day.

I started off on the bank just West of the flooded brush area. We caught a Bass here and there and more of these Damn Crappies!!! I thought well what would happen if I put a proper size Mini Jig on the Barbie pole. Can we all guess where this is going???? Yep the Crappies jumped all other it!!! (still nothing less then a 1.5 pounds apiece) Eventually Dan ask's, "you did bring a Crappie pole for me didn't you???" Of course I did!!! Probably a better pole then my Barbie pole. I was using a solid white mini jig and Dan used a white and yellow mini jig. By now I knew right where these suckers were. I could make a 50 yard drift on the same bank and hit 3 different schools of these things. If I missed 1 of the schools I would still probably hit the other 2 schools. We never not got bit on any drift we made. Dan grew up fishing Lake Isabella (they had property up there) so he caught 1000's of Crappies in his life time. Yet he couldn't get over how big every one of these things were. Long story short, between the 2 of us we caught over 30 Crappies. Jeff didn't have the right gear and only caught a few. (next year I'll bring a pan fish pole for him too) lol

In talking to everyone else, something happened to the Bass bite compared to a week ago!!! It went from wide open to crappy in 1 week!!! Thank god for the pan fish!!! Dan caught 12 Bass, 15 monster Crappies and 5 good Bluegills. A great day for any other lake except for Barrett. For Barrett standards, this early in the season that was a pretty Crappie day!!!! lol

PS. All kidding aside that was the best and most fun big Crappie day I ever had!!!! Yes I know, "I WISH I BROUGHT MY CAMERA!!!" I didn't think anybody would want to see a 100 pictures of what a 1.5-2.5 LMB looked like. For that's what I thought we were going to catch. Boy I was sooo wrong on that one!!!