By Staff
June 1, 2001
The father-son team of Gordon and Jeff Collum caught a limit of bass that weighed 11.71 pounds on their way to victory in the final tournament of the regular season on the Bass Anglers Tournament Trail. The event was held on Columbus Lake. Columbus is loaded with small bass and they are usually eager to bite. Catching quality bass is another matter, however. That's something this pair seems to do with regularity, when it comes to fishing on Columbus and other river lakes.
First place was worth $1,000.00 to the talented duo.
Although the limit was only 5 bass on this day, the Collums had no trouble catching plenty of fish. According to Gordon, they caught fish all day long and ended up catching approximately 20 or more keepers. They were culling by 8 o'clock that morning.
Early Action
Like most fishermen on Columbus, they started out working the grass beds. After a few short strikes on topwater baits, they decided to check out other options. Once they located a few isolated logs along the banks of an old slough, they started catching bass on jigs. "We developed a pattern on isolated structure in lakes that were devoid of much wood cover," commented Jeff Collum. "In fact, if we found a lake with lots of wood structure, we didn't catch much. However, in lakes with just a little wood cover, we would almost always catch a bass off the isolated wood structure."
Their favorite weapon or lure of choice on this day was a 3/8 Didhebyte black/chartreuse jig tipped with a Zoom blue glitter trailer.
Besides the pattern that they established, there were 2 critical elements in their fishing strategy. The first was the strong Triple fish line that they employed on high-speed reels. They had to have tough line as well as a high-speed reel to catch up with the fish. The fish would bite the jig and run like a freight train. Most of the time they didn't feel the fish hit the bait. They would see their line take off fast to the side as the bass headed for parts unknown. By utilizing a high-speed reel, they were able to catch up with the fish fast enough to get a good hook set.
Critical Catch
On one occasion however, one of the bass did get behind a log before Jeff could stick him. Once he set the hook, the bass was tangled up in brush. With the 20-pound Triple fish line straining, Collum pulled the 3 1/2 pound bass out of the brush and over a stump. That one quality bass turned out to be the difference in winning the tournament and just placing in the money. And on a day such as that, every fish counted!
The title of Angling Team of the Year went to the team of Charles Wilson and John Mason. Wilson and Mason have won several points championships dating back several years over several different trails. In order to win the points championship and be crowned the Angling Team of the Year, a team has to be consistent and catch fish day in and day out under a variety of conditions. There is one thing that you can count on from this team and that's their ability to catch fish almost every time they go out on the water.
The remaining money finishers for the Columbus tourney are as follows:
2. Spears, Rigdon
3. Williams, Schoenrock
4. Raines, Reed
5. Heard, Dyess
6. Penny, Stewart
7. Knight, Taylor
8. Chisolm, Eubanks
9. Smith, McGinty
10. Covington, Fortenberry