My 2025 Trophy Pond Monster Lunker Bass Hook Up’s and Other Decent Size Ones!…pics

[KonoctisWigwam]

I will show my ignorance here...but have only fished in Clear Lake once with my son, shortly after I bought the property, I hired a guide, but unfortunately it was spawning...my son was about 10, now it's going to be 34 in March...it was hard as heck to get them to bite during spawning, but the guide had a good trick. I lived at Lake Sherwood as a kid, that's where I got hooked on bass fishing. I'm a plastic worm type of guy...my property is in Horseshoe bay, one of the worst for algea, but the bass love that stuff...mostly along the short on Horseshoe Bay are Catfish in the rocks...when the guide took us over to my property, there was 15-20 lb. cats swimming out of the rocks...and there's a lot of lava rock also...as you may know, the volcano is active and exits into the lake in Soda Bay, the next bay over.

This is my new shop, everything is moving there, that I own, and I may need to rent in the area to finish the log home...

 

[KonoctisWigwam]

> BTW There's No Pigs in TEJON..lol

No not at all...they hate those Barley fields...

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

I hit the send button by accident in my last post....lol But theres Trophy Bass everywhere in Florida even in puddles....lol
Being a bank fisherman besides the excitment of hooking a Trophy Bass I definitely have to keep my eyes peeled out for Gators, Water Moccasins and Red Ant Mounds and Swamp Mosquitoes from He77....lol
I have to renew my Gator trapper assist license.
Last year I hooked a Trophy Monster Bass on the Booyah frog in a Walmart dirty azz parking lot retention pond, that thread is a few post down if u want to check it out, here's a pic of it....tra




Heres a pile of destroyed booyah frogs I have gone through and my little stock pile, getting low I need to get somemore... lol

 

[KonoctisWigwam]

Yeah, that's a good size. I've seen a lot of 10-12 lb bass pulled out in competitions, and by experienced anglers. The guide we used sprayed some type of garlic on the plastic worms, but he was using a different color than I use...purple ones are the ones I like, squigly tail or not, just a purple plastic worm. He was using black or dark grey...also my favorite bass pole is a $10 K-Mart special...I have better and more expensive poles, but K-Mart was like Wal-Mart back when I was a kid, and TGIF 5 & 10.
That looks like a 10 lber.

 

[ChrisAMX]

Oldtool Top water hits are the best, when a aggressive lunker Bass slams the frog its explosive and the fight is on. I am going to bump up my 2 part 2020 Frog Smashing Pond Monster Bucketmouths threads for u to check out all mostly trophy bass and plenty of them strictly on the frog.
KonoctisWigwam lived in Nor-Cal 35 yrs until 2014 when I moved to Florida, have been to Clear Lake.
Our Monster Bass lake ijetes the famous Okeechobee

Did you have success with the frog when you fished in CA?

 

[Oldtool]

Oh yeah I gotta try it!!! I moved to the mountains in Cali 8 years ago and access to nice trout close to home is hard to pass on. But we still go down and fish the bass here . and there



a good day a couple weeks ago !

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

No Chris, in Cali I was a Trout slayer i wasn't into Bass that much back then till I came to Florida, didn't know chit about the frog action back then . I have hooked countless Rainbows, use to limit out all the time...tra

 

[Oldtool]

Those are some monsters!

 

[KonoctisWigwam]

Trouts are for eatin', and some of the best, IMO. 1-2 lbers are perfect on the grill. I'd figure out a way to fit one of those monsters in my grill...I have a sayin'...don't stop smokin' til you see the whites of their eyes!

 

[KonoctisWigwam]

No Chris, in Cali I was a Trout slayer i wasn't into Bass that much back then till I came to Florida,

Trout are the best eatin' on my grill, both me and my wife feel that way. One of our faves. I would never eat a bass, they taste like $#!T, or what I would imagine, $#!T to taste like. Not sure if I've eatin' it...you get the point...
You ever fish up in the high lakes in Cali, like Almanor, or Eagle ? I know a couple of people that have property up at Almanor, those are sure beautiful, and they have trout in them. I don't know if they are stocked at some point our not, but there are a lot of trouts hiding in both of those lakes. I would never eat a fish out of Clear Lake, of any species, including catfish.

 

[Oldtool]

I pretty much only eat trout that are wild. Ie:
Either born in the lake or planted and survived. Once they start eating wild food the meat will turn pink red or orange. Hard to beat that. Like salmon!!! Freshly stocked aren’t as good typically. Sometimes we will catch and eat the spotted bass early in the year before the water gets hot . Fried with lemon , tarter yummm. The lake has to be clean and cool! The less mercury the better lol.

 

[Oldtool]

Eagle lake trout are the best !!!!

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

Yes I can only eat fresh trout, I would fill the cavity with butter, wild rice and spring vegetables then wrap good in heavy duty aluminium and cook them on the grill 20-25 minutes till the eyes are milky white.
Then unwrap pull the whole skeleton bone out in one shot and chow down.
My freezer was full of trout and all vacuumed sealed. With the huge trout I would make steaks out of them, yum yum....
I use to fish for trout at lake Amador and lake pardee too, The place I mostly fished for trout was Quarry Lake.
I guess I have hijacked my own thread....lol

Time to get back to Bassin....tra

 

[Oldtool]

Got some ! Careful with them pond lizards , do you have any bull sharks in your ponds ? I see videos of ponds that have been floooded and have some good size sharks !

 

[KonoctisWigwam]

Eagle lake trout are the best !!!!

One of my buddies that died used to go up there all the time, he had property in Greenville. I loved to fish in those lily pads or whatever floats on that lake...Almanor is pretty clear in comparison, both much clearer than Clear Lake. I just walked by my fishing poles, damnit, @THE ROMAN ARCHER, you may rekindle some fishing in me...but first I need to get everything moved to the shop for storage.

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

We been having some heavy down pours recently here in SWFLORIDA and Friday it was pouring like Niagara Falls. So I needed to get out so yesterday (Saturday) I went out to hit a few ponds. The pond water levels rose dramatically and that could really effect the Bite. When water levels in the ponds either rise up fast or decrease fast it effects the Basses equilibrium which effects the bite so I knew what I was up against. Plus water clarity was bad with staining and cloudiness from the bank run off. The first 2 ponds no hits at all that was a sign already I might get skunked for the day.
The 3rd pond I start off with the Frog and 3 cast later I get a big topwater explosion on the Booyah Frog and set the hooks hard and keep the pressure on till I got through the bank vegetation and on the bank in hand, it wasn't a Monster but a real nice one worth posting. Took some quick pics and released it back in unharmed and ready to battle another day. Then hit a couple more ponds but no further bites.
Then I assisted a real nice big boxer turtle ready to cross the road grabbed it and put it on the opposite side it was heading too. Thnx for following my post!....tra

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

Yesterday morning was one if the best outings hitting up the ponds for Trophy Bass in a long time. I Fished for 2 hrs in morning between 9-11 hit up 6 ponds and hooked 5 Bass a 2lb, 3lb, 3 1/2lb, 4lb and a solid 5 lbr. All on a Swimbait.
My thumb got torn up handling them for pics.....lol Released them all back in unharmed to fight another day. Heres pics of the 2 largest out of the 5. Thnx for following my post and as always "Get Out and Hook One Today!"......tra

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

Heres some decent Largemouths I hooked this past month...tra

 

[canamrider07]

Living the dream with those pond monsters! Way to go TRA!!!

 

[THE ROMAN ARCHER]

The course is closed this week for maintenance so I headed out early yesterday morning to hit one of my favorite ponds that has a cool wood bridge it makes nice for sightseeing from above especially when the water is clear u can spot the fish and watch the whole action hitting the bait. Alot of huge Spotted Gar averaging 26"-28" in this pond. Thier hard to hook because they mostly grab the soft bait part away from the hook and ends up tore off, they ruin a lot of my soft baits and tear up my frogs too. I'll post a pic of a 28" that slammed my frog and didn't get away it was locked on.
So after trying to get some action off the bridge didnt see any Bucketmouths so I hit the bank around the pond with heavy vegetation I was casting my booyah frog out.
After a few cast I got a very aggressive blow up slam went to set the hooks hard and my pole tip snaps off now I knew it had to b a real big one I was aggressively reeling keeping the pressure on the line got through the vegetation and on the bank and it was barley hooked in its mouth with only one hook out of the two because the pole snapped the hook set was week, it's a good thing I kept the reeling pressure on or I would of lost it. It was definitely a trophy Pond Monster Bucketmouth a solid 22" long and 6" body width.
Snapped some quick pics and released back in unstressed as it glided away nicely, That made my day! Then a few minutes later I got back on the bridge and I see one way bigger then the one I just hooked cruising the bank swimming under the bridge I cast out in front with the frog didn't want that grabbed my Swimbait pole cast that out in front of it didn't want that either and Swam off out of my reach.
So I knew I would b going back to that pond this morning seeing if I could get lucky an hook that Mega Monster, I was out there early 7:30 this morning but no luck seeing or hooking the Mega Monster but I did get a 3 1/2 pounder on the frog off the bridge and as I got it on the bank it was 4 foot below me it shook the hooks out and of course flipped flopped it's way back in the water oh well chit happens....lol
So Heres some pics of my Trophy Pond Monster I hooked yesterday, thnx for following my post and always "Get Out And Hook One Today!"....tra